ROBERT CHAPPELL
"I bought my first SLR camera (Minolta SRT101) when I was in the service in 1965. I first started photographing nature almost ten years later when my family purchased a condominium on Sanibel Island. The Ding Darling Wildlife Refuge, and the many nature photo opportunities that Southwest Florida provided, inspired me to capture them on film. I was somewhat frustrated with the results at that time, as I could not afford the large telephoto lenses required for quality wildlife photography.

After raising two kids and putting them through college I had more time and money to devote to my hobby. I traded in my outdated equipment and purchased a couple of Nikon cameras and an assortment of lenses and that big monster lens I had dreamed about. I attended a number of short courses in photography but the "Complete Nature Photography Course" conducted by Joe and Maryann McDonald gave me the tools I needed to really get started in wildlife photography. I have also participated in a number of the McDonald Photo Tours to Florida and a Wild Game Farm on SW Utah photographing North American predators. I have photographed with Art Morris, an internationally renowned professional bird photographer, in Florida April 2004.

I have been photographing seriously now for about five years. I am a member of the Photographic Society of America, Willingboro Art Alliance, Home Fine Art Gallery, and am currently President of the South Jersey Camera Club. I have had work accepted in a number of local juried art exhibits this year including the Perkins Center for the Arts Photography 23, the Robert Ransley Juried Art Show, Willingboro Art Alliance exhibits, and Center for the Arts in South Jersey. I have also received awards at several of these juried photo exhibitions as well as camera club awards both local and state wide. "