FIRST AND LAST :: BEN HORAN

As a photographer, I've had the opportunity to shoot a lot of athletes as they meander their way through a career. Slowly enough images build up to justify delegating a virtual folder with their name on it somewhere on the hard drive. Then...when things really get serious, with printed materials, film negatives and mementos, they get a real folder to hang in the 'ol filing cabinet. Its like i'm building my own little Library of Congress, preserving history for no other reason than my love for it. It got me thinking about how lucky I am to document these dudes grow up and change over the years.

I am gonna keep this up...I have lots of people, with much larger time spans that I can show. Should be cool.

This old b/w photo of Ben got me going on the idea though, so we'll start with him. Its only 2 yrs old. It seems like I"ve know Ben my whole life. He's just one of those magnetic souls. Those who know him, know what I"m talking about. This shot was from the first NIke 6.0 shoot we ever did in the Keys. He rolled up on the shoot fresh after being discovered and put on NIke. Until I met him he was referred to as "this sick skateboard guy from some small town in Georgia." Now I'm proud to say he's Ben Horan and one of my good friends.