In 2006, after much debate, I decided to jump into digital photography. I had been using Photoshop since 1999, but I was still empathic toward film. After the Southwest trip in September of 2005, I felt a little ‘disappointed’ with my work and decided that things would become more immediate and fresh if I bought a digital camera. I started out with just a simple Canon point and shoot. I used the hell out of that for two years . In 2008, I felt that cost and technology advancements would justify purchasing a digital SLR.
I first owned a Canon EOS XSI. For about three years, I sort of reacquainted myself in photography . I shot many different subjects but it wasn’t until 2010 on a trip to Minneapolis that I realized my truest love was photographing in urban areas. It was the then that I started looking back at some of the photos I took over the last few years. It made sense again. Slowly, as time went on, I went back and started to photograph in Chicago again, only this time, I was seeing things in color. I found that many of those locations from the nineties were long gone and was on a search for newer hidden gems.
Just recently, I upgraded my gear to a Canon EOS 60D and I feel more strongly than ever that my heart is in photographing the lost gems and often overlooked portraits of the city of Chicago.
MICHAEL A. PRIORIE 