Biography

I grew up in eastern Scotland where my parents were berry growers. I ran and worked the farm until it was sold in the late 1980’s then studied geography and contemporary European studies at Dundee University for my honours degree. But my first love has always been the natural world - and image making.

Since 1993, photography, writing, guiding and design has provided the livelihood for myself and family. You can read a comprehensive account of the evolution of my work and career in Retrospective. Thirty Years of Photography, available in PDF form. In its foreword by the late, much respected editor Outdoor Photography magazine, Steve Watkins said,

“Anyone can take photographs and pretty much everyone does these days, and yet I can confidently say that the percentage of photographers operating at the very top of the game has barely changed in the decade I’ve been the editor of Outdoor Photography magazine. In a market saturated with lovely photographs of pretty much everything it is his ideas, his unique perspective on life, that stands Niall and his work apart.”

The companion volume to Retrospective, On Nature and Photography. Selected essays 2000 - 2020, is an illustrated collection of 22 published essays that explores every aspect of outdoor photography, both as a communication tool and as a form of personal expression. In these two volume, I give an account of myself and my ideas—what underpins the work you see in these collections.