My name is Derek Schultz and I started Canned Photography about 3.5 years ago in the summer of 2006. I am a designer by trade and have been involved with the graphics industry for over 25 years.

I started out as a time served lithographic printer, with long stints in the studio and darkroom and I can remember dish developing halftone negatives in an icy room and trying to control the temperature of the chemicals with a kettle of hot water! A nightmare as you can imagine.

A major event occurred in the mid 80s with the advent of desk-top publishing. I was lucky enough at that time to be working for an extremely clever artist and photographer who was farsighted enough to purchase the technology. This consisted of a PC, an A4 black & white laser printer and a copy of Aldus Pagemaker. I was given the task of learning said equipment and I took to it like a duck in water! I was entranced by the endless possibilities.

Eventually, in 1997 I started up my own company Design By Storm Limited and was fortunate to be able to work for such clients as Procter & Gamble, Reckitt Benckiser and Allied Domecq to name but a few.

I sold the business in 2003 to a large reprographics company who wanted me to forge a design operation in their business. The one good thing to come out of the experience, was to be able to work with a great photographer. Without going into detail and to put it simply, things didn’t work out as I had envisaged them! So I left 2 years later and formed my new company Five Fingers Design Limited.

Let me just back track a little bit, because I want to explain where the photography comes in. Back in 1978 when I left school, there were not many jobs around for school leavers. Maggie Thatcher and all that! I took a job at the Norfolk County Council as a filing clerk, basically out of desperation. I maintained contact with my careers advisor though, who sat in her office in central Norwich thinking up ways for me to progress my first choice career path . . . which was . . . photography!

After about 18 months at the Council, the said careers lady called me up and said there was a “camera job” going at a local print company. Would I like to go for it? I went to the interview (a pint in the pub) and accepted the job even though the camera involved, was one of those large flatbed enlarging cameras - nothing really to do with creative photography! However, it provided the ideal get out from the maddening boredom at the Council.

It also continued a life long love of all things graphic. Everything I have done has only added to the graphic knowledge pool I have acquired over the years. I have always taken photographs. I have directed on photoshoots and designed enormous numbers of all sorts of items requiring photographic images. In short, over the years, I have worked with images until they they have come out of my ears!

So a few of years ago I decided that I would control my own images! I would visualise them, shoot them, direct them, develop them and print them! Of course at one time this would have been impossible due to the time constraints involved - but, with the advent of digital cameras capable of competing with the quality of traditional film - everything is now possible! And consequently I’m like a kiddy in a sweet shop!

So welcome to my sweet shop - Canned Photography is my play area! I love images and making them. I would love to make some images for you. You can benefit from all that experience in the image making process. Several companies already have; Cray Valley, Premier Foods, Coldwater Seafood, Sealord, Ontex UK, TDG Logistics, Novera Energy to name a few.

I’m not out to change the world and I’m definitely not out to buy it! All I ask is a little bit of recompense for my time and creativity and the permission and opportunity to get on with what I love doing. Thank you in advance and may I give you my personal assurance of providing you with a great service and some fantastic images..