About | Julian Ray Photography

Creating uniquely compelling and engaging imagery to help great companies build strong relationships with their customers.

"Julian is an adventurous, highly creative, and enthusiastic commercial photographer, passionately dedicated to crafting impactive images that really grab your eyes and don't let go."
— Peter Francis

A little bit about me.

Like many of us, I used to have a hard time articulating what I was striving to communicate with my photographic art, my “brand” as it were.

As with most things in this age, the push is for simplistic, loud, sticky phrases that bellow rather than inform and engage. As such most photographers label themselves as an… Awesome Award Winning Travel, Dreamy Wedding, or Epic Sports photographer, etc.

My clients are drawn to my images of people as well as architectural concepts, design ideas, real estate projects, food experiences, and all sorts of lifestyle stories because they recognize the uniquely honest way I tell their story.

On the surface none of these seemingly diverse types of photography lend themselves to being easily simplified into some hashtag like label. For years I tried to distill and articulate my “style” and I can tell you that for a while my elevator pitch went on for many floors AFTER the person left.

Some years ago, during a creatives planning session, the art director said something that struck me. All these seemingly un-related styles of photography do have one thing in common. The “Ah Ha” moment for me was when the art director said “… but Julian IS the portrait guy! He’ll find a way to show the true feeling of…”.

The portrait guy!

My love of discovering and showing the essence of the subject, the truth of the moment, the core, so to speak, IS the passion that is at the heart of all of my work.

Yes, yes I know that tradition dictates that portraits are supposed to be of and about people, I know, but to me the challenge and joy is the same. To find a way to show the essence of the subject. That subject can be a person, yes, but it can also be a cool bedroom, a fabulous croissant sandwich, a building’s unique design, a cup of tea, a hotel lobby, or an aircraft interior. All these have a fundamental truth at the core that deserves to be, must be uniquely expressed if they are to reach and impact the desired audience.

They are all portraits.

My passion for crafting impactive and moving portraits is at the center of my work.

In a world where yelling is the norm, shrieking is the baseline, my ability to give voice to a quiet and subtle truths, the real essence of the subject is at the heart of every image I create.

Julian Ray