The story of a photographer
Riley Schutz is a 20-year-old, self-taught, photographer from Maple Ridge, B.C. Ever since he was a young boy he has been drawn to the outdoors. Riley’s love for the outdoors has influenced him both as an outdoors enthusiast but also in his photography as he attempts to capture the outdoors in its most raw form.
Riley’s father bought him his first camera when he was in grade 5. In 2017 Riley was given the opportunity to travel to Australia which sparked his love for photography.
Before departing Canada and traveling halfway across the world, Riley consulted his neighbour, Jeff Jackson, who has been featured by National Geographic Your Shot, Global News & CBC. Jackson gave Riley a short lesson about how to properly use his camera. After this lesson was over Riley continued to experiment and research landscape photography and his camera. When Riley arrived in Australia he was eager to begin shooting.
Since returning from Australia Riley has continued his endeavours in photography. This includes traveling to new places every year to capture what he sees and share his love of this earth with the world, his followers on Instagram, Facebook, and other online social medias.
In 2019 Riley was given the opportunity to travel to Costa Rica as a part of an international school trip to complete his Gold Duke of Edinburgh’s Award as well as relax and decompress from the stress of the rigorous IB Diploma Programme. Before Riley left he was given another chance to expand his photography horizons when he was offered by World Challenge to become the groups' videographer. Riley graciously accepted and through this experience Riley conducted on-camera interviews with his group members as well as captured landscape and lifestyle shots. This led to his first film ‘PURA VIDA!’ a documentary of his trip which included both landscape and action shots but also students’ anecdotes about the trip. Since Costa Rica, Riley has traveled taking photos of epic landscapes, people, and the adventures he has been on.
In August of 2020, Riley was given the opportunity to work for his first commercial client, LMS Reinforcing Steel Group. During this month Riley visited over 100 LMS construction sites to deliver photos to LMS while they were undergoing their website re-launch. Since then Riley has continued to work with LMS which has given him a foot in the door with other commercial construction clients such as EllisDon & ITC in Vancouver.
Riley hopes to continue his pursuit of photography and videography into university where he is studying adventure guiding and tourism management at Thompson Rivers University in Kamloops.
