I am Jen Underwood, my Photography journey began years before it actually did. It was the mid 1990's and I expressed an interest to a friend about it, and it came out of my mouth naturally. I did not have the money for a camera at the time, and would wait another decade before I was able to get started.

In 2005, I started doing Food Photography for an ebook I was trying to make about food. I took several shots and sadly I lost most of them except for a photo of strawberries. Fast forward a few years and I used my New Digital Camera to really get into it but I wanted a challenge. In the late Summer of 2007, I was living in Idaho and had read in a Photography book that if you wanted to take good pics, you should try it during a storm, sunset, or when there are shadows instead of harsh light.

So I took this advice and headed to the Desert. Kuna, Idaho is about twenty minutes or so outside of Boise. It is a long, quiet desert land with no houses, no nothing. The sun was setting, and I started taking random photos. They were the best photos of my entire life. A storm was brewing off in the distance, Idaho has an elevation of 4,000 feet so the clouds looked lower. Everything was perfect. A rainbow appeared and I shot a really good one next to a rock. I left that day with an amazing start.

I would spend every day, taking my camera with me and taking photos of whatever struck me. I felt naked without it and it was a big part of me. I tried Landscape and Nature photos mostly and if the view was missing something or not all that great, I had a knack for hiding part of it and photographing it anyway just to see if it worked.

An eclectic retail shop agreed to hang my prints for four months on the wall in their shop and I jumped at the chance. The problem is, they moved them around constantly out of boredom, and the shop was stuffed full of twelve thousand items, so I don't think anybody saw them.

I had a website online at the time, and once a woman wrote me and said that my love of nature shows through my photos. This was the biggest and best compliment of my life and brought tears to my eyes.

What I see when I look at my photos is: life. Vibrancy. Hope. Color. I see this every single time without even trying, I have a very strong, almost sophisticated style at times, that is also Abstract.

I am an Abstract Artist also, and maybe the need to be Artistic comes out in my work.

The past five years or so, I have become very interested in Natural Light Photography, mainly because where I live does not have the best photographs to take and I can't do landscape shots here, so I make the best of it by taking photos of flowers, objects, doors, windows, whatever is available and the fascination with light has ruled things for so long, it is now a staple in my work.

I have always been someone who wanted a future of hope, and yet lives in darkness so to speak. A difficult life that is easy to get depressed in, so I take photos of light to hope it seeps into every aspect of my life.

In 2011, My trusty camera had to be sold to a friend of mine because I needed basic stuff and was dirt poor, selling it felt like losing a part of me and hurt so much. Interestingly though, the camera broke a few months later because it was wore out so my friend actually lost on that one. I did not get another camera due to being in poverty all the time, I just waited and got a tablet and went from one tablet to another and I was surprised how easy I could take photos on them and have it look good. It is not what you are using, it is how you use it.

The photography thing will continue with me until I die, because it is just who I am now and it has been a wonderful journey.

My other websites: https://linktr.ee/jenu