Founder, Photographer, Educator

Colby Brown

Colby is a professional photographer, photo educator, author and entrepreneur from Denver, Colorado. Specializing in landscape, travel and humanitarian photography, he has been fortunate to have worked all over the world, in pursuit of capturing the beauty of life on this planet and helping to make a difference in the world for others. In 2010 he co-founded Lespwa Haiti, an organization that provided support services on the ground to small local NGOs doing phenomenal work in that island nation of Haiti. Colby’s passion for photography and teaching helps propel him to hold photography workshops, digital editing classes and webinars throughout the year, in various countries around the globe. In 2011, he founded The Giving Lens.

Chief Operations Manager & Photographer

Kate Siobhan Mulligan

Kate is a photographer, writer, and photo educator from Vancouver, Canada. She is sponsored by Sony Canada and has traveled to 45+ countries focusing on cultural portraiture, street moments, and compelling travel imagery.  She is an advocate for human rights, social justice, and poverty elimination both at home and internationally. She is a seasoned educator, teaching and mentoring for travel photography online and in person, and of course, when leading with TGL. When not travelling, writing, or photographing she enjoys surfing, reading, making fun of Michael Bonocore, craft beer, coffee, more coffee, her husband, Peter, her obese cat, Fat Dexter, and a baby girl, Fin, that’s now along for the ride.

She is addicted to Instagram, f/2.8, and hope.

Social Media + Trip Coordinator

Meredith Dolan

Merdith is a former TGLer who now assists with operations and trip planning. She’s behind much or all of our social posts, and the person most likely to interview you for a trip. She’s a powerhouse of logistical skill, NGO experience, and a great photographer and videographer to boot. She’s now a location-independant freelancer living all around the world.

Travel Editor, Photo & Videographer

Michael Bonocore

Michael has been working in the photography industry for over 8 years. While photographing paid assignments, from commercial ad campaigns to weddings, he realized his passion for travelling with camera in hand was too great to ignore. He started visiting locations all over the globe, documenting not only the beautiful landscapes of the countries he visited, but also the lives of the local communities. He began working with international non-profit organizations to help bring awareness to the causes that he was passionate about. Through the workshops with The Giving Lens, he has taught children the art of photography in countries such as Nicaragua, Peru, Jordan, Thailand and India.  His passion for travel and photography has led to his new career as Travel Editor for Resource Travel. He is our Senior Trip Leader.

Photographer and Blogger

Daniel Nahabedian

Daniel Nahabedian is a freelance professional photographer, specializing in Travel, Culture and Landscapes (maybe also Sunsets). He is also He is a photography instructor, teaching in group and private workshops about basic and intermediate photography, as well as post-processing in Lightroom. He is an Armenian-Lebanese-French guy, raised in the UAE and living in Spain. Avoid asking him where he is from. His goal is to contribute to making the world a more friendly place by sharing his travels, knowledge acquired, and glimpses into cultures and traditions from around the world. He has an award-winning travel blog, Canvas of Light.

Photographer and Educator

Susan Roderick

Landscape Photographer

Paul Pichugin

Travel Photographer

Andy Yee

Andy Yee is an international award winning photographer that specializes in travel and tourism projects, industrial design, architecture and special event photography. He is a content creator and photo educator based in Sydney Australia, when not living out of a suitcase. He believes as a photographer there are similar traits to being a photojournalist, teacher, and a travel agent. He want to inspire others to seek out their own adventures and push their own boundaries. As a contributor to the Travel2Next and Resource Travel networks, his commercial work has also been published in Signature Style & Travel, Indesign Live and Habitus magazine.

In June 2017, he won the Sony Alpha landscape photography award for an image he took in the Sahara in Morocco, while using Sony Alpha equipment, on a Giving Lens trip!

Melissa Findley

Melissa Findley is an Australian Travel Photographer. Melissa’s extensive scope of work includes Travel, Adventure, Portraits, Landscape,Lifestyle and NGO. Working with brands such as The Intrepid Foundation, CanonAustralia and a number of different tourism boards across the globe, Melissa has spent the past few years relentlessly chasing her dreams, wherever they take her. Melissa’s ventures in charity and raising awareness include donating funds from photographic prints and zines to both Cambodian and Nepalese charities, volunteering in Uganda with OrphFund and supporting organizations protecting Orangutans and elephants in Borneo and Laos respectively. This is only a glimpse of Melissa’s NGO and giving back work. Inspired by the powerful beauty and wonder of the natural world, Melissa tells very intimate stories of the places she travels to and the people who make each place uniquely their own. Through her lens, her dedicated followers become her travel companions and are immersed in a sensory experience of culture, beauty and emotion. With an abundance of real-world experience, Melissa’s work has taken her across the globe from Australia to Nepal, Africa, Samoa and everywhere in between.

Photographer and Educator

Varina Patel

Photographer and Educator

Jay Patel

I could start off like this – “Seeds of Jay Patel’s appreciation for beautiful places were planted early in his childhood….” but it would get boring really fast. I will just sum it up and say that I am a Landscape and Wilderness Photographer who loves to capture dramatic light. These days I spend my time traveling and photographing the world with my beautiful wife Varina Patel and enjoying outdoor activities like running, hiking, cycling, snorkelling, scuba diving and more. Varina and I have spent more than a decade building our photography business, Visual Wilderness, that offer video courses about all aspect of nature photography.

Travel Photographer and Educator

Kenna Klosterman

Paromita Chatterjee

Paro is a documentary photographer based out of Kolkata. Her work has been published in various national and international magazines and newspapers like Tehelka Magazine, The Wire, The Hindu, BBC, Aljazeera. She has a natural affinity towards women’s issues, gender identity, environmental concerns, and anything under the sociopolitical spectrum.  She is a member of DiversifyPhoto, a community of BIPOC and non-western photographers, editors, and visual producers looking to change the culture in photography. Her camera is her talisman which helps her tide over the undercurrent of ridicule for being “a woman working in a man’s field.”

Landscape Photographer

Jeff Bartlett

Jeff Bartlett is an adventure photographer and writer based in Jasper National Park, Canada. He is passionate about active travel and uses his craft to tell compelling stories about adventure culture. His photography uses a unique combination of vibrant landscapes and the surprising placement of people within them to engage a true sense of place. Coupled with his active writing style, Jeff’s simple aim is to inspire people to get outside and explore.

Photographer

Peyton Hale

Photographer and Educator

Brian Matiash

Brian is a professional photographer and published author based in Portland, OR. He specializes in landscape & travel photography and has spent the better part of a decade educating and inspiring photographers all around the world with his tutorials, videos, and stories.He is a member of the Sony Artisans of Imagery, Zeiss Lens Ambassadors, and the G-Technology G-Team programs.. He also contributes regularly to a variety of photography publications, both online and in print. Brian is married to fellow TGL Team Leader, Nicole S. Young, and together the two of them have incredible photographic adventures all around the world.