Sailor enjoys the unique aspects of photography – InkFreeNews.com

Lakelan Saylor shows off his Nikon D5100 camera and the lens he uses for sports photography. A sophomore at Wawasee High School, he photographs many of his school’s sports teams. Nature is another of his favorite subjects. Photo by Lilly Dwyer.

Lilly Dwyer
InkFreeNews

SYRACUSE — Lakelan Saylor, 15, is a sophomore at Wawasee High School and a budding young photographer.

“I started by taking pictures of the sunset with my dad’s camera that he had and thought, ‘Hey, this is kind of fun’… They ended up giving me my own camera for Christmas one year,” he recalls.

Sailor’s first camera was a simple compact camera. These days he prefers a camera that allows him to be more hands-on.

“It does all the work for you,” he said of his first camera. “And then there are manual cameras that you can set up yourself. Their zoom is different, the lens really zooms. On the camera (point and shoot) there is simply a button that you press up and down to zoom in or out. I’m more tame.”

Sailor takes photographs with a Nikon D5100.

“There are faster cameras, but I work with what I have,” he said.

He also retouches photographs in Adobe Lightroom.

Sailor photographs for many Wawasee sports teams, including baseball, soccer, soccer and softball. He also photographs his sports of cross country running and swimming.

“I don’t shoot manually all the time, because in sports it’s much more difficult. And especially birds, because I love photographing birds. For them, I just shoot with my car,” he said.

Apart from sports photography, he has also done several photo shoots for senior citizens.

“They’ll catch me because I’m cheaper and they know my photos are pretty good for a newbie,” he said with a laugh.

Nature is another of his favorite subjects.

“Probably my favorite birds, and then any flowers and landscapes. … I also like to be in nature,” he added.

The photo caught his attention and didn’t let go because of how personal it was.

“You can make it your own, being able to photograph whatever you want and make it look however you want. Every photograph you take is originally your own; it is not the same as anyone else’s. It will always be a little different. I think that’s the freedom he has,” he explained.

Saylor describes herself as “mostly self-taught.” He also takes part in independent photography study at school. He sees this art form as something he could pursue as a career.

“I think I might go to college as a business major and then a photography major and see if I can start my own photography business,” he said.

Recently he has also started participating in competitions. Last year, one of Sailor’s nature photographs, a close-up of a lily pad, was one of the top 100 entries out of 60,000 entries in the Rocky Mountain School of Photography competition. Nine other photographs of him hang in Warsaw’s Parkview Hospital.

Between cross-country running, swimming and photography, Sailor stays busy; however, when he has free time, he enjoys spending time with friends hunting, fishing and surfing on Lake Winona.