by Max Marbut
Staff Writer
Workspace: Wes Lester, the City’s chief photographer
“I was about 14 years old when my father brought home a 35 mm camera. He found it on sale and thought I’d like to have it. It was very simple. It even had a crank winder. From then on I took it with me wherever I went.”
That’s how Wes Lester, the City’s chief photographer, remembers how his career as an image smith began.
Years later, in college at the University of Florida, Lester took a basic photography class and didn’t really plan to make his living taking pictures. After he graduated, he got a job at the Florida Times-Union and was assigned to the Neighborhood section where he took the photographs for the stories he wrote. Soon he had transitioned into the newspaper’s photo department where he worked for 12 years before joining the staff at the City.
The art of photography has gone through the switch from film to digital since then. These days Lester doesn’t spend any time in the darkroom, it’s all on the desktop.
He maintains a catalog of more than 4,000 images on the computer in his office and has thousands more stored on DVDs. Each image is categorized by subject matter ranging from press conferences and proclamation ceremonies to images commissioned for City publications.
Lester has also uploaded a collection of his images to http://www.flickr.com/photos/34206377@N08/. There his photographs are available to be downloaded by anyone who would like a copy.
“What I do is a public resource available to the taxpayers,” said Lester. “Just go to the site, find a picture you like, download it, print it and hang it on the wall.”
He said he takes as many as 600 photographs a day because he never knows what type of image might be needed and added, “If I don’t get it while I’m there I can’t get it again.”
Lately he has been spending some time in Hemming Plaza taking pictures of people.
“I think they have gotten used to me because they see me all the time. Sometimes the people in the plaza even pose. They’re just like the rest of us. They just want to make a human connection,” said Lester.
Another project he’s proud of is a series of photographs he took of Jacksonville’s Preservation Project. An initiative administered by the City’s Recreation & Community Services Division, more than 50,000 acres have been set aside and will remain undeveloped and untouched forever. Lester worked for months capturing images of the areas including the plant and animal life. His photographs were published in a book and also were exhibited at the Main Library.
“I would have to say that of all the things I’ve done since I went to work for the City, the Preservation Project has been the most rewarding,” said Lester.
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