Jonathan Oman (aka: Jon Oman)

I was born and raised in the state of Michigan. More specifically, I lived in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, near the small town of Ironwood, and only about twenty miles from Lake Superior. I spent the first twenty-one years of my life there, and then moved to the Detroit area, to find work. After I retired from Ford Motor Company, my wife, Ann and I moved to Summerville, South Carolina, in 2003.

My first camera was a Kodak Brownie box camera. It took 127 Kodak film and the film was developed at the local camera store. I first used this camera when I was about twelve years old. But, I really became interested in photography during my junior year in high school. In fact, my first SLR was an Exakta 35mm, with a 55mm prime lens. This was quickly followed by a Nikon FTN with the 50mm prime, and a 200mm telephoto lens. Soon after buying our first home, I built a complete B&W darkroom, and used it as time permitted over a twenty-five year period.

Over the years, I have owned the following cameras:

• Kodak Brownie
• Kodak Pony 135
• Exakta SLR
• Nikon FTN SLR
• Canon AE-1 SLR
• Mamiya C330 TLR
• Calumet 4x5 view
• Shen-Hao HZX-45IIA 4x5 view
• Cambo Legend 8x10 view
• Minolta 7000 SLR
• Minolta 8000i SLR
• Hasselblad 501C
• Nikon D70
• Nikon D200
• Nikon D300
• Nikon D2x
• Nikon D700
• Nikon D800

I still own some of them.

I do prefer landscape photography, but tend to do macro-photography of flowers. The reason for this tendency is the fact that there are so many flowers in Ann's garden. All I have to do is step out my front door! Having said that, I will take photographs of just about anything, given the opportunity. The one thing I do not do, is portraiture. People tend to look like deer in car headlights when I take their photograph!

Other than photography, I am interested in computers/software, woodworking, and music (mostly Jazz).