I came to photographing birds like a duck comes to water. While photographing flowers and insects I began to observe the birds that surrounded me. One day as the fall set in and as I began to close my gardens for winter, I turned my camera on the birds that flew all around me. There was no turning back as I became infatuated by what I saw through the viewfinder of the camera, as though seeing the world a new for the first time.

I had always been a person who looked at birds and noted any that I hadn’t seen before in a well worn bird book that I kept on the shelf of my studio, but it was always by chance if a bird should come to me. I became so overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of creatures that had always been around me but that I had never seen because I wasn’t looking and so I began to look for birds adjusting my photographic equipment accordingly.

I have had the good fortune that my good friends and collectors of my art work Dr. Bill Lindley and Colleen Lindley are avid and highly respected regional / national birders. Bill had always told me of his adventures around the world in chasing elusive and rare birds on every continent but now he was acting as a resource person informing me where I might make good sightings regionally. They introduced me to The McIlwraith Field Naturalists – Nature London group here in London, Canada where I met Pete Read and Sue Read both also renowned international birders and birding guides. Additionally, through my photography I have met several highly respect bird photographers in Ontario such a Jim Pearce of Stoneycreek, Canada of whom I go out regularly to photograph migrating birds. If I’ve gained any height in my reputation as a photographer of birds it is because I am standing on the backs of their years of experience and I am grateful. That said, I am a very willing participant and as a teacher I can assure you if a student has a “fire in their belly” for the subject they will excel, I have that passion.

Since starting my adventures in photographing birds, not just here in South Western Ontario, I have had the encouragement of having my photographs published on the pages of many birding magazines, from the cover of Ontario Field Ornithologists, OFO News, to numerous images in the Cardinal Magazine – published by Nature London as well as other periodicals internationally. I owe a debt of gratitude to Betsy Baldwin and Hugh Casbourn, editors of the Cardinal for publishing my first bird photographs, as well as including my photography in many issues of the magazine The Cardinal which is printed by Nature London - McIlwraith Field Naturalists since I joined a few years ago – it is their labour of love and my pleasure to serve them and my home of London through it.

It seems I’ve become a “birder” but I am an artist with a camera when I photograph birds and I hope that when you view my images you can see this influence in them. I am planning to begin exhibiting large photographs of my images in the very near future but more on that later.

I hope you enjoy seeing through my viewfinder with me and find the same passion for birds as I have.

Gerard Pas

Should you want a simple print or to organize an exhibitions of Gerard's work please contact us a photos@gerardpas.com