Hello, and thank you for your interest in my photography! I’m David with David Andrew Foto, and I specialize in capturing candid street photography. I come from a large family— I’m one of seventeen adopted brothers and sisters! My wife, Torrie, and I live just south of Grantsburg, WI, with our dog, three cats, and nine cows. I work at M-Health Fairview in the Twin Cities as a Security Sergeant.

But enough about me…!

I’m guessing that the main thing you want to know about me is my photography, and what exactly inspired me to create art through photography. Not to sound too cliche, but it’s true— I was first introduced to photography when my mom bought me a semi-disposable Fuji film camera. You know the ones in clear plastic in the electronics department at Walmart? Yep, that’s the one. I began to take random photos of my family and everyday life. One of my favorite photos I took captures a scene when we had some family friends over. They had a family that was just as big as ours! At the end of the night, we took a group photo of both families; I’m sure that photo is buried somewhere in my mom’s hope chest. Every single time I come across that photo, it brings me back in time. Picture this: A bunch of kids from all different cultures, after being baked in the sun all day, together for a group photo (probably about 40 of us there!), and cheesing away to our heart’s content. And— snap!

Fast forward to about three years ago— 2021. I’m working at a sound booth at church, and my friend Steve who was running the livestream asked me if I had any use for an older camera (LUMIX G7) that the church no longer needed. Now, at the time, my friend Zach and I were going to start a YouTube channel about Christian apologetics. I told Steve that sure, I’d take it, thinking that I was going to use it to propel us into our YouTube career. Little did I know that this moment would re-spark a passion that was buried. Fast forward a few months— the YouTube channel didn’t take off, simply because we didn’t have the time to commit to fully operating a channel and all of its logistics. Every day I would see the camera on my dining room table as I’d walk past for work.

So, one Saturday afternoon I decided to take the camera out of the bag to see how it worked. Now, mind you, I had never used a digital camera up to this point— I didn’t know anything about the exposure triangle, let alone bringing the composition into focus. Nevertheless, my beautiful wife was sitting on the couch, and the next thing she knows she has a lens in her face. As I told my wife to hold there, I snapped my first picture.

Now, this picture probably isn’t framed correctly. You can come up with many different criticisms of this photo. However, it re-sparked a passion for freezing time. Since that day, I’ve been acquiring gear, researching and learning the exposure triangle, and learning how to compose my shots. I’ve spent countless hours on YouTube universities. Through my research, there has been one type of photography that has stood out every single time, and that is street photography.

Street photography to me is being a fly on the wall: unnoticed, invisible, capturing everyday life— essentially, freezing time. My first big taste of this was when I did street photography in Chicago, IL— the Windy City, full of dreams and aspirations and people going out to perform their daily lives. Insert me, there, in the middle of the magnificent mile— and rain begins to fall. Fog rolls in from Lake Michigan. And I realize in that moment that I am in my element.

Life continued. People adapted to the rain. It was shocking to see the number of umbrellas that came out of nowhere. People were laughing and enjoying life; meanwhile, I was there but invisible. I was the fly on the wall, capturing peoples’ experiences.

These photos, while not perfect and where I still had a lot to learn (actually, I still have a lot to learn!), the beauty— candid, raw emotions and situations I was able to capture— continue to motivate me today.

Fast forward to 2024: the hunt continues. I hope to inspire likeminded photographers, who are not just interested in street photography but any niche of photography, to get out there and pursue their art. If you made it this far in my post, thank you for reading this far. I hope that a little photographer from Grantsburg, WI, can inspire you to get out there and keep shooting. I hope that you stay along for this journey, as it’s a bumpy ride— so buckle up! As I learn new things, I hope to provide updates on this site as well as my insights.

Next month’s blog post will be about my company’s motto: Capturing God’s Glory through a Lens.

Always be shooting,

David

Humble Beginnings

David Andrew Foto