Spotlight: Adam Conway

So lets the the vitals out of the way, who are you, where are you from, yadda yaaa....

My name is Adam Conway, I'm a "staff" photographer for The SkateboardMag, and I'm from a small town in northwest Indiana.

I'm not going to lie, Northwest Indiana raises a red flag... how did the journey go from there to where you are now?

Well, basically........I grew up skating there and just partied and had a great time. Then it was time for college, Time to get a real career going for myself. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life but I had a good friend who was gonna go to school for photography so I figured I'd just follow him over there and after a few years I was a so-called "photographer". After a couple years there I realized that all the people who were there were gonna do basically nothing with their lives, so I decided to drop out before I got sucked into the black hole of art school. I told my parents, packed my shit up, and headed out to California with a couple friends about a week later........to make a long story short, I pretty much just met as may people asI could, lurked round, and someway or another got to where I am today.

So for a lack of better terms you could say that you "made it".... man that sounds dumb, but either way is it what you expected it to be?

At first it was very overwhelming. one minute I was working for some bullshit homeland security job (which if I might add, homeland security is total bullshit because I would show up an hour late every day still drunk from the night before and not even care about what the fuck I was doing) And the next minute I was working for Adio and Planet Earth. I got the job and seriously 3 days later I was in Germany shooting photos with them. After a few months they decided to hire someone else, someone who was "down" with the rest of the team, and I pretty much thought my "career" as a skateboard photogarpher was over. I basically sat in my friends house for a week before I got a call from Dave Swift who told me that he wanted to put me on staff for The Mag. Since then it's been nothing but good times, but there's been a number of people (indusry kooks) that have been bummed on me at times.

Without giving out names, whats some of the crap you encountered that bummed you out?

Its not so much shit that I've beem bummed on, but rather the fact that people have been bummed on me at times. Some people label me as an "asshole" or a "hater", but the truth of the matter is that if someone's being a kook I'm gonna be the first person to let them know. It's just the way I was raised. I'm not sure how they do it out here in California, but where I'm from you call it like you see it. And if that means telling a team manager to "fuck you" to his face, then so be it. I don't have any beef with anyone in the industry. I just wish that it wasn's so highschool-ish. Sometimes even gradeschoolish. fuckin tattle-tales and shit. It's fucking lame.

Well given what the industry is based of from you'd expect some of that to a certain extent... Are there any other areas you'd ever be interested applying your skills to?

I would actually love to extend my skills to the so-called "art" scene if you will. It just seems that there's so much bullshit involved with the whole "skart" business. I just wish people could see some real shit instead of teenage kids smoking cigarettes. Nothing against Templeton.....that's just an example.

Very true, that's one facet of the skate world I never really was too fascinated with yet... Either way, pressing on... You were a regular user of SBP which seemed to be the meeting grounds for many up-in-comers like Price, Ying, Dukes, Chase and so forth... Did you find that using the internet as a networking tool you were given an advantage coming up in an unconventional manner as opposed to the old guys?

I don't think that the internet is a good tool at all. I mean, yeah sure, you can "meet" people over the internet. But in all seriousness, the internet is just a disguise for who you really are. For example, in text there's really no way to interpret sarcasm. And I think that sarcasm is a major part of skateboarding or even life in general. So if you can't interpret that then you can't really figure out what a person is all about. I think that actually getting out there and meeting people in real life is what it's all about.

Most definitely, do you have words of advice for the aspiring guy that currently lives in the middle of nowhere and wants you be in your shoes?

. I would just have to say that if you're 100% down for making skateboard photogarphy a career, then you should put 100% into it. And by that I mean moving to California or the East Coast or what not and actually trying to make it instead of just shooting your buddies in your hometown and posting your photos on the internet. When I moved out I'd been shooting skate photos for probably about 6 months and in all reality, I had no idea what I was doing. But I made a decision to move out here and do this and there was nothing in my eyes that could stop me. I just kept my head up and stuck it out. Trying to make connections whenever I could, and I guess it paid out in the end. I mean, what else could someone ask for? Getting paid to travel the world and getting interviewd about "how they made it". Its a dream come true.

Shit, well I feel about 2 feet tall right now... since this is a nerd site I gotta ask the gear question..... What's your most treasured piece of gear throughout all the crap you've had?

Seriously, a disposable camera. every other camera I've used I know exacly what's gonna come out of it. Even something like a leica with no light meter. I know the exposure and what not just by looking at the light after shooting so many times. So its pretty rad to just use a piece of shit everyonce and awhile and see what comes up on the negatives. chances are, you'll be stoked.

Any last words before we wrap this thing up?

I guess I'd just like to say that skateboarding is fun, and people shouldn't forget that. when skateboarding becomes a "buisness" for people, it really shows in their skateboarding or photography. It kinda takes away from the whole aspect of the thing. We all started out skating in some driveway somewhere and I know that eveyone could identify with the feeling of learning their first ollie. I think people forget that sensation, and it's very sad to me. With my life, and photography, I've aways wanted to do what I felt was fun and true. I'm not gonna go out and shoot with whomever is doing the gnariest shit down whatever rail. I'm gonna go out with the dudes that im stoked on. If im not on the top 10 photographers according to the Skatepark of Tampa website, who the fuck cares? Rankings are for Ryan Schekler and MTV. I'm in it for the fun.