Skaters: Tintype Portraits of West Coast Skateboarders

The portraits in Skaters compel the subject, the photographer, and the viewer to slow down. These images, created with wet plate collodion, offer an honest glimpse into the skateboarders’ core being: pensive, tough, playful, anxious, distracted, and innocent. Even the plates of seemingly empty skate parks are in fact teeming with immense energy and motion, yet the skaters are moving too quickly to be captured with long exposures.

Jenny Sampson earned a BA in Psychobiology at Pitzer College and has since dedicated her time to her photographic endeavors: wet plate collodion, traditional black and white photography, and commissioned portraits.