We caught up with the brilliant and insightful James Denton a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

James, appreciate you joining us today. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

Initially I was able to learn a great deal from watching instructional videos on YouTube and adapt it from our earlier experience in film development. After learning the basics we went to upstate New York to learn under legendary wet-plate photographer, John Coffer. He operates out of a farm in the rural outskirts of Rochester, NY. The farm has no running water or electricity and allows you to learn in an environment that forces you to think like the photographers did during the 19th century. We took over a year to learn the process and perfect our routine before we felt comfortable enough to start doing it professionally. It was essential for us to develop routines to create a consistent quality of work.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My wife and I have been producing wet-plate photographs for over a decade. We specialize in portraits but also create photographic art using the unique look and quality of the process. While I’ve seen digital filters and AI attempt to create the look of wet plate photography, it never captures it. Most people think of scratchy, low-quality images when in fact the process is capable of capturing the highest fidelity of any photography. While some clients are weary of a process that will capture every contour and crease with no way of smoothing them out in post, the process has a way of lending dignity to the subject that photoshop can strip away.

Alright – so here’s a fun one. What do you think about NFTs?

I’m not sure I understand the value of them. I collected baseball cards as a kid, so I do understand collectables, but an NFT simply doesn’t exist. A card, stamp, or action-figure is a thing that you can hold. NFTs are digital photos that can be reproduced endlessly with no effort.

Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?

We slowly built up to where we are now. The initial costs were not very high, just a few hundred dollars, to get an older camera and the materials. As we went along and started making a few dollars here and there we could upgrade our equipment and eventually pay rent on a studio.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.baileydentonphoto.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bailey_denton_photography/