Hello, my name is Braden Pitman and I have a passion for wildlife photography.  Originally it was just for me, I simply enjoyed capturing photographs of wildlife, landscapes and moments to share with friends and family.  

My first exposure to wildlife photography came thru my father, who had a Olympus 35mm Film Camera, forgive me for not knowing the exact model, with a motor drive and a wide selection of lenses.  He took thousands of photos of Bison, Bighorn Sheep, Deer and Elk.  Like me he has a day job, and the photos were mostly for himself, friends and family.  He gave me my first exposure to the light triangle and an idea of how a camera works to capture a photo.

Below is one of his photographs of a bull in Yellowstone National Park:

For a long time I did not pursue photography as the equipment that I wanted was well beyond my means as a teenager and young adult. In the early 2000's I bought my first digital camera, an Olympus Stylus 500, 5mp, point and shoot.  In fact I bought two, one for me and one for my girlfriend at the time.  It worked well for the time and the cost, capturing photos of parties, social events and a few landscapes.

As cell phone cameras got better I started to rely on them more and more for my day to day "memory" captures, but for specific shots of a grizzly, deer or elk the cell camera still fell short.  I tried using the cell camera on spotting scopes or binoculars, but the vinetteing was severe and the quality was barely enough to post to social media to share what I saw with my friends and family.  

Recently, in 2020, I was out fly fishing at one of my favorite fishing holes near Helena Montana in the early spring and stumbled upon a picturesque scene.  A Cow Elk with two Calves bedded beneath a spring green aspen in the middle of a field.  My position was perfect as I could see over the grass to the bedded calves, and they were only 150 yards away.  A perfect opportunity and angle to capture a photo.  Unfortunately, I was still using a cell phone camera and my binoculars to capture scenes like this.  I struggled to get the camera aligned properly with the binoculars, and struggled to get the Elk in the binoculars once the camera was aligned and never did capture this beutiful spring scene in front of me.  

Driving back from fishing that night I resolved to spend $400 on a Camera with a decent zoom lens so I could capture decent photos at 100 yards or so the next time I was presented with an opportunity.  The sole idea being to share on social media to impress a girl I was infatuated with at the time that claimed to love everything outdoors.

Once I was in front of my computer it became quickly obvious that what I needed was a true DSLR digital camera, with interchangable lenses.  The Point and shoot zoom lenses might be able to do what I wanted, but a DSLR definitely could.  So being fiscally responsible, and sticking to my self appointed budget, I quickly spent around $1000 on a Canon T7 Camera Kit, and a 50-250mm Zoom Telephoto Lens.  

Very quickly, I started to realize while the T7 was a decent camera, eventually I would need to upgrade for faster autofocus, point metering, low light performance, and more reach.  First I began to use the T7 and brush up on my composition, management of the light triangle, and so I began taking pictures.  Lots of photos of spring elk, deer, a few birds, a few landscapes.  Some turned out well, others were blurred and unusable.  Most of the photos were either used for just social media or saved for a rainy day.  

This basically continued through until Winter of 2022.  After looking around at restaurants and businesses at the photos they had hanging on their walls I came to the conclusion that some of my photos are on par, or better than the items that some places displayed.  I decided to look into ways of making a little side money with my photos and selling prints and digital downloads to help pay for my hobby, gas, and to give me another excuse to go play in the woods, because everyone always need more excuses to go play in the woods!  

Ultimately, this last idea is what lead to creation of B Pitman Photo, and to the site that you are viewing.  I'm not looking to turn this into a career or my primary job.  I am mostly looking to share a few of my photos with the world, make some gas money, hopefully make enough money to pay for some better gear, and have yet another motive to spend my free time in the outdoors.

I hope you enjoy my photos and would appreciate any and all feedback for the site or for my photography. 

Thank You!