I am but one of the many people with the name Michael McDermott. One part of my existance on this planet, a fun part, is as a photographer who uses subtle, sometimes not so, embellishments to produce digital photographic imagery.  The word photographer is derived from a combination of the ancient Greek words for "light" and "I write".  I have been taking pictures, photographing, snap-shooting - writing with light - since I was in elementary school. In 2005, I left film cameras and darkrooms behind for the digital world of pixel manipulation.  I have found that the digital side of photography allows more expansive expression of light writing.  Although I do, at times, photograph in a photo-journalistic style, I do not feel constrained to realistic renderings of the world around me. Capturing the image with the camera is but the first step to the final creation.  I spend more time working with the image in the computer than behind the camera - a heretical approach to those of the traditional or documentary ilk. I enjoy photographing animals and people and landscapes and, well, pretty much anything.  Animal portraits are especially fun - dogs, horses, chickens, goats, spiders (I know, technically not an animal) and the occasional human.  The most important part is capturing the mood, spirit or feeling.                                                                                     I'm never sure how to classify my photographs.  Is that a still life or a landscape? If the wind wasn't blowing, I call it a still life.  The important part is that the photograph elicits a reaction; a sigh, a laugh, a frown, a smile.  It is then I consider the image a success.