Alistair Cowan

Bio

Born and raised in Paisley, I spent my first 40 years in the West of Scotland. As a Civil Engineer, specialising in power stations, I spent a lot of time commuting to the East, managing projects at Kincardine, Longannet and Cockenzie power stations and eventually saw the light and moved to Longniddry in East Lothian. However, the tedious commuting back and forth along the M8 was broken up with spells overseas and I spent some time in Pakistan, Lesotho, Hong Kong and South Africa.

In the 1990’s, I took up a role as Commercial Director for Europe and Africa, based in Glasgow and spent my next 20 years either commuting along the M8 in the opposite direction or sitting for more hours than I care to remember at Edinburgh Airport waiting for a flight.

I retired in 2014 and that’s when I discovered photography

About my photography

During my working life, I guess I always had a small compact camera with me on my travels and eagerly waited on the rolls of film being developed when I came home. So, photography has always been there in the background. But it wasn’t until I retired that I started to take it more seriously.

I took a 10 week Open University course to learn some basics and got myself a “proper” camera. I now have a Nikon D500 and a Sony 7R3. I am a member of the Royal Photographic Society and Edinburgh Photographic Society and regularly join the Edinburgh Photography Meetup Group.

I like detail, so tend towards a more abstract style, including multiple exposure and ICM. I like experimenting.

Travel photography is also a growing passion.