Neil Ralley

Contributing writer

Visit Neil's photo gallery

I am a native Brit who for over 20 years pursued a career in Human Resources, initially domestic UK work and then progressively more international. In 1996 I had the good fortune to marry an American and one of us had to move in order to shorten a 3500 mile commute and it made sense for it to be me. Since moving to America I have been building up a small practice in executive search, doing a combination of US and overseas assignments.

My interest in stained glass and in photographing it also dates from the period around 1996. I had always noticed and greatly admired stained glass art from my early days in Carlisle, England, which has a fine gothic cathedral with some original glass dating back to the 14th century.

I had also been a keen photographer since getting my first camera, an old Brownie box camera, when I was about 9. However, it wasn't until the mid-90s that I put the two things together and discovered that stained glass can be extremely photogenic, albeit requiring more than a little luck and judgment in order to get good results.

Personally I still use 35mm and always shoot slide film. I used to shoot negative film but when I began shooting slides as well it quickly became clear to me that I was getting by far the best results from slide film and because it is so easy now to get good prints from slides there is really no reason for me to use negative film.

I get each film scanned as soon as it has been processed and at what I consider to be a reasonable resolution, 3072 x 2048. This means that within my portfolio I have digital images on CD and original slides. Even if the former should deteriorate over time the latter should be good for many decades if properly stored.

I honestly believe that, given the right equipment and film, I can produce pictures which include details which simply cannot be fully appreciated by the naked eye when one is viewing a window in situ.

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At his gallery, Neil sells elegant frameable art and notecards, each incorporating an actual photographic print of one of his images. He is a distributor of Glassmasters stained glass reproductions - miniatures of works by Tiffany, Frank Lloyd Wright and other well-known artists. Many pieces are based on original artwork by Impressionists, Chagall, Kinkade and bird and wildlife artists.

Thumbnails are of photos by Neil Ralley - used with permission
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