About Me

I bought my first camera about seven years ago. After a few years of shooting flowers, landscapes, and buildings, I transitioned to portraits because, well, photographing people provided more of a challenge with a greater reward. Portraiture continues to bathe my brain in endorphins - and an alluring image still gets me right here.

I currently do freelance work and have been published in Bleep Magazine (the first and third images are mine). I've worked with models in Paris, Detroit, Cleveland, and New York, to name a few. I’ve also been a member of Professional Photographers of America since 2017.

What does ‘Aktis’ mean?

AK'-tis [Origin of actino: Greek, combining form representing aktī́s (genitive aktînos) ray, beam]

I’m not really a fan of generic business names (i.e., First Name Last Name Photography), so I wanted to create something more interesting. Aktis Creative started out life as Studio 5 Columbus, but that didn’t really tell the full story of my business. I love shooting in the studio, but since I shoot on-location very often, using ‘Studio’ in the name seemed too limiting. And the ‘5’? Eh - I have no idea. ‘Columbus’ was, at first, an obvious choice since I live in Columbus, Ohio, but there are so many places I have shot and would still love to shoot. As time went on, ‘Columbus’ also became just too much of a limitation. So I decided to rebrand the entire business.

‘Aktis’ is a distortion of the word ‘actino,’ which means ray or beam of light. Since my first name is Ray and photography is all about light, I thought this would be a perfect moniker. I knew I wanted to use a word other than ‘photography,’ since making an image is so much more about simply putting the camera to one’s eye and pressing a button. ‘Creative’ was an all-around better word. So, in a nutshell, that’s how Aktis Creative was born.