Overview

Terry has been photographing the world since he was five years old. In 2001 he founded Terry Smith Images through which his images have been sold to a diverse mix of commercial, publishing, editorial, and fine-art clients worldwide. In addition to photography, his work also spans traditional, digital, and photo illustrations, often incorporating his additional talents in oil painting, watercolor, and drawing.

Digital Archive

Creating a digital archival legacy of thousands of images is not easy. Nearly all of our slides and negatives from our pre-digital years have been digitally scanned by multiple generations of film scanners. We have witnessed the bit decay resulting in lost files on "archival" digital media like CDs and have lost count of the number of hard drive failures we've experienced over the years. (Always have a backup!) We are continuously learning and improving our capabilities in order to provide a digital library of images that are meticulously edited, captioned, and keyworded and immediately available to our clients.

A Letter From Terry Smith

From elementary school through high school I was always known as an artist. I have drawn and painted from as early as I can remember. When I was younger I never looked at pursuing art as a career because, quite frankly, I didn't want to be poor. Artists didn't make money. The only person my family ever knew who made money at art was a local painter on Greers Ferry Lake where I grew up in Arkansas. He quickly whipped out landscape oil paintings, spending in a few minutes per painting. They looked great from across the room, but I knew better.

While I always loved art, I never wanted to be formally trained in it. I couldn’t bear the thought of anyone telling me how to draw or paint or to be critiqued by art teachers. I escaped my hometown early at the age of sixteen and started college where I initially majored in physics. The following year I changed my major to Computer Science. It was far more fun, came easier to me, and I had decided I didn't want to be a poor physicist. Computers have always been a part of my life. I remember printing color images on an Okimate 10 printer attached to my Commodore 64 computer when I was ten. It's too bad they didn't have digital cameras back then! While completing my Bachelor's of Science and Master's of Science in computer science degrees at the University of Arkansas I specialized, more or less, in computer graphics. I took classes in creating photo-realistic computer graphics, generating scientific visualizations from large data sets, and completed projects where I created 3D interactive environments. The “world wide web” was born during these years, and I created my first personal homepage in 1995.

After graduating with my Master’s at the age of twenty-one, I entered the realm of financial services software. Over the following years I designed and developed user interfaces for numerous applications and internet and intranet websites in addition to software architecture and development. Not long after I started my software career I purchased my first "real" camera, a Nikon 35mm SLR. My very first camera had been a 126 film camera with Mickey Mouse on the front which was given to me when I was five-years-old. I had always enjoyed taking pictures and, in retrospect, had always taken a lot of photos when I was young (after upgrading to a 35mm point-and-shoot, with auto-advance no less); however, I never considered photography part of my "art". With my new Nikon I started furiously reading every photography book and magazine I could find.

As I kept learning more and more about the photography industry I found to my amazement that people were actually making money taking pictures. Some were traveling and shooting pictures all over the world and actually sustaining themselves. So in 2001 I embarked on the path of turning my hobby into a profitable business. Along the way I also discovered the professional illustration market. Until that point I just thought illustrators drew comic books!

Since then, Terry Smith Images has evolved into a dynamic, fast-growing company that produces photography and illustrations for a very diverse client base. My Mickey Mouse camera has been replaced with the latest professional digital SLRs and accessories. I produce art, and I even get paid for it. I do so through as many different styles, techniques, and media as possible in order to meet today’s global needs of the marketing and publishing industries. This diversity is essential to success in today’s marketplace.

Thank you for visiting my website, and please contact us to let us know what we can do for you.

   -- Terry