Larey McDaniel
 “You don’t take a good photograph, you make it.” – Ansel Adams
Larey McDaniel got his first clarinet and his first camera at about the same time. His music studies began in the fourth grade at his Bremerton elementary school. The following year, he inaugurated his new Kodak Brownie camera on a family trip to Glacier National Park. He’s been enthralled with music and photography ever since, and created a professional life that neatly intertwines the two.
He has been taking photos professionally since his college years: photographing weddings, portraits and fine art landscapes. He has been a member of the Seattle Symphony since 1961 playing clarinet and bass clarinet.
Larey cites the rapid evolution of digital cameras and image-enhancing software as the factor that has most fueled his passion for photography. “In the (literally) dark old days of film, I spent hours in my darkroom printing and reprinting my black and white negatives to get prints that were often less than exemplary. Now I spend hours at my desk coaxing out the color, detail and composition that I want.” he says. “I never liked being in a darkroom. It’s so, well, dark.”
When asked about digital “manipulation”, Larey responds: “Of course I manipulate my images! The camera can capture only a small portion of the visible spectrum. A great deal of work needs to be done in order to be faithful to the shading and vibrancy of the scene as I saw it. The process has changed, but the method is still very much like it was when working with film.”
Larey shoots with a Nikon camera and edits in Adobe Lightroom with additional adjustments in Photoshop.
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