Yes, I look like a windswept new age traveller in this image, but this photo means a lot to me. It is a very rare selfie shot via my iPhone from October 2019 and it was taken at the most northerly point of mainland Iceland.
I had previously visited the most westerly, southerly and easterly points of mainland Iceland on previous road trips. 2 hours before this was taken I was trying to fix a very inconvenient puncture at the mother of all remote garages, at this point I thought that my goal of visiting this place was doomed.
Determination won the day!
James Machon A.R.P.S.
I am an enthusiastic Guernsey based photographer who loves to capture landscapes, travel, street and documentary images.
I have been doing photography seriously for over 13 years and I love the fact that it is a permanent learning curve. Guernsey has a dramatic coastline which I take advantage of whenever possible and I also relish any chance to travel and experience different parts of the world.
Personally, I now prefer to be a hobby photographer and I look for stories to tell via the medium of photography. I take on projects when it fits in with my other commitments, but all the weddings and portrait shoots I leave for the younger guys.
Thank you for taking the time to check out my work.
Cheers.........James :-)
My gear
Photographers are often asked what gear they use, well in my case there have been a few different set ups over the years.
2011 to 2016 - During these years I was a massive fan of canon and I armed myself with a 5D mk3 and a big selection of lenses. i was definitely suffering from 'I don't know what I need so i will buy everything........ and carry it all around....... just in case. well that became very tiring and i increasingly found myself humping around lenses that never made it on to my camera. eventually i got fed up with the weight and the fact that travelling around the world with so much heavy glass was a real pain, so it was a time for change.
2016 to 2023 - i now fully immersed myself fully into the fuji x system, and once again i bought enough lenses to sink a ship.......... just in case. the fuji gear was much lighter and the image quality was superb, however the build quality let me down on several occasions despite taking exceptionally good care of my kit. history repeated itself and yet again most of my lenses never connected with my camera body, so what was the point of having them.
march 2023 - i met an amazing and inspirational photographer in bangkok by the name of Kars Tuinder. he told me that he had one camera body and one 35mm lens which he used for absolutely everything, and that got me thinking. wouldn't it be fantastic to be free of all this gear and have one small camera that would have to be used for everything. so i decided to use my fuji with a 35mm equivalent lens for everything, and it was liberating. but, there was still build quality issues, so I decided to take the plunge, flog everything, and invest in a leica camera.
october 2023 to now - I now shoot exclusively using a leica q3. This thing is small, incredibly powerful and built like a tank. it has a fixed lens and it is all I have used in the last 30 months, to date it has been my sole camera for Gdansk, istanbul, ireland, albania, Vietnam, Morocco, and I am about to use it in 2025 for trips to spain, france, cambodia and thailand. i have absolutely no regrets and am loving the freedom this camera gives me. maybe one day I will buy another leica to keep the q3 company, but until i can find someone to buy some middle aged organs off me, then the q3 will have to do.