Hunter MoonNevada City, California

I photograph people in the light that is already there.

Portrait and editorial photography — Nevada City, California — commissions open for 2026

Hunter's Moon — Portraits made on four October nights by the light of the full moon and nothing else. Exposures ran to eight minutes. The sitters had to breathe slow.

Hunter's Moon — 35mm — pushed to 3200

No strobes, no crew, no set. I work with the light a room or a hillside already has, which means a sitting is mostly conversation and waiting.

Fifteen years of portraits: authors and their jacket photographs, founders who hate being photographed, families who want one good frame on the wall, and long documentary series made for no client at all.

Film for personal work and anything made outdoors after dark. Digital in the studio, where a client needs to see the frame as it happens. Everything is printed before it is delivered — a photograph that only ever lives on a screen has not really been finished.

Selected series

04 sets

Winter Light, Deer Creek — Six weeks of sittings on the creek path, all of it shot in the ninety minutes before the canyon loses the sun. Cold hands, long exposures, no reflector.

Frame 01

Winter Light, Deer Creek

Six weeks of sittings on the creek path, all of it shot in the ninety minutes before the canyon loses the sun. Cold hands, long exposures, no reflector.

Year
2025
Made for
Personal work
Location
Nevada City, California
Format
35mm — Tri-X 400
View the series
The Makers of Broad Street — Eleven people who still make things by hand on one street: a luthier, a letterpress printer, a farrier, a baker who starts at three in the morning.

Frame 02

The Makers of Broad Street

Eleven people who still make things by hand on one street: a luthier, a letterpress printer, a farrier, a baker who starts at three in the morning.

Year
2024—2025
Made for
Editorial — publication to confirm
Location
Nevada City, California
Format
Medium format — Portra 400
View the series
Hunter's Moon — Portraits made on four October nights by the light of the full moon and nothing else. Exposures ran to eight minutes. The sitters had to breathe slow.

Frame 03

Hunter's Moon

Portraits made on four October nights by the light of the full moon and nothing else. Exposures ran to eight minutes. The sitters had to breathe slow.

Year
2024
Made for
Personal work
Location
Sierra foothills, California
Format
35mm — pushed to 3200
View the series
Studio Sittings — Commissioned work: authors, founders, musicians, families. One light, black backdrop, ninety minutes. Most people relax by the twentieth frame.

Frame 04

Studio Sittings

Commissioned work: authors, founders, musicians, families. One light, black backdrop, ninety minutes. Most people relax by the twentieth frame.

Year
Ongoing
Made for
Commissioned portraits
Location
Studio, Nevada City
Format
Digital — 100MP back
View the series

Contact sheet

Every frame, in sequence

Arrow keys to move — Esc to close

Sittings and assignments

Editorial assignment
Half or full day, on location or in the studio. Usual turnaround for a selects gallery is three working days.
Studio sitting
Ninety minutes, one light, black or paper backdrop. You leave with a set of edited frames and full print rights.
Documentary series
Longer-form work made over weeks or seasons, for brands, foundations and publications. Scoped case by case.

Tell me who is being photographed, roughly when, and where. That is enough to start.