Deirdre Maher Ridgway is a photographer from Bray.
Photography is definitely my passion. I find myself taking at least a few photos every day.
As a child, I used to love going to my grandparents’ house, digging out the old box brownie cameras from the shoe press and playing photographer. But the lens never seemed to move to the way I wanted. When you moved the camera right the image seemed to move to the left and vice versa, much to my frustration. However, this knowledge came in handy in my adult years, using a square format camera. I was fortunate enough to have studied analogue photography in IADT a few moons ago. The darkroom was always the place I wanted to be. Processing the latest roll of film, then seeing my images appear before my eyes. Pure magic, and dare I say, nearly a lost art.
But, photography took a back seat, when I started my family. Once my children had grown up, and I decided to go back to work, it was easier to find jobs in other fields. Plus, digital photography had become the new master. It’s so easy now for people to take photos with little or no skill; you can take as many as you like with no cost and easily edit them to near perfection.
I am slowly, but surely picking up the camera again in a professional capacity and I am really looking forward to my photographic renaissance. Photography gives me a creative freedom that I struggle to get from any other source.