The following is biographical information on the Jurors at the Meadowlark Photography Expo:
Ian Plant
Ian Plant has been photographing the natural world since 1995. His work has appeared in a number of books and calendars, as well as national and regional magazines, including Outdoor Photographer, National Parks, Blue Ridge Country, Adirondack Life, Wonderful West Virginia, and Chesapeake Life, among others. Ian is a Contributing Editor to Nature Photographers Online Magazine. His sixth and most recent book is the critically acclaimed “Chesapeake: Bay of Light. An Exploration of the Chesapeake Bay’s Wild and Forgotten Places.” Ian’s work has also appeared in five books of the Wonder and Light series: Shenandoah Wonder and Light, West Virginia Wonder and Light, Blue Ridge Parkway Wonder and Light, Virginia Wonder and Light, and Maryland Wonder and Light. Ian is co-owner of Mountain Trail Press and Mountain Trail Photo. Ian leads several Workshops every year through Mountain Trail Photo. – from http://www.meadowlarkphotoexpo.org/Speakers.htm
Miriam Stein
As a photo editor for the National Geographic Society, Miriam Stein has worked on magazines, books and websites for the School Publishing and Cartographic Divisions. She is currently conservation projects photo manager at National Geographic Maps, where her main focus is LandScope, a multimedia conservation initiative jointly run by NatureServe. Miriam has dedicated her educational background in conservation to photo editing natural history subjects for nonprofits such as Conservation International, Defenders of Wildlife, Nature’s Best, the Smithsonian Ocean Initiative and The Nature Conservancy. Miriam has contributed her time to a variety of conservation initiatives and her own photography is held in both museum and private collections. She is an active member of the North American Nature Photography Association and concurrently serves as a founding affiliate to the International League of Conservation Photographers and a board advisor to the Imaging Foundation.
“I’ve been a NANPA member for about 7 years and have reviewed portfolios at every summit. I also did reviews at the recent FotoWeek DC. Portfolio reviews aren’t exactly the same as judging but it demonstrates a critical eye.
A few years ago I was asked to judge the NANPA Member Showcase, which involved selecting top 100 and top 10 out of about 3000 photos. It was quite a task and a great experience, as the photography was phenomenal. I was also invited to judge a NANPA fine art exhibit this fall in Jackson, WY but it got cancelled at the last minute due to funding. I’ve also won many awards for photo editing I’ve done at magazines I’ve worked at.”
Charles A. Veatch
Author of the book entitled: The Nature of Reston, Charles Veatch has been an outdoorsman all his life and a Reston resident since the earliest days of his founding. This combination has resulted in a book that best illustrates The Nature of Reston.
Charles A. Veatch was born in 1942 in Washington D.C. He obtained his B.S. in Finance from the University of Virginia in 1964. During the summer of 1964, he began working for Robert E. Simon’s Palindrome Corporation, the developer of Reston, Virginia, and in 1968 moved to Reston with his wife and two children. Veatch obtained his real estate license in 1960, while still a student at UVA. He started his own real estate development and consulting firm, Environmental Concepts, Inc., in 1970. He soon developed many residential and commercial projects throughout Northern Virginia, including ones in Reston.
For decades, Veatch has been an avid participant in Reston community organizations. During the early days of Reston, he was a founding member of the Reston’s Lions Club and the Reston Board of Commerce. He is currently a member of numerous non-profit boards including Friends of Reston for Community Projects, Planned Community Archives, Reston Historic Trust, Greater Reston Arts Center, Nature’s Best Foundation, The Potomac Conservancy, and Fairfax County Parks Foundation. Furthermore, he has many other affiliations with non-profit organizations such as the Friends of Shenandoah River, Friends of North Fork, and The French and Indian War Foundation.
Veatch has been honored with many awards for his extensive community service. He received the 1994 Fairfax County Volunteer Service award for instituting “Ethics Day” Programs in local high schools. In 1998 he was named the Best-of-Reston Honoree. In 1999 he received the Martin Luther King Jr. award for “Contributions to the Community of Reston”. In 2000 was named Reston’s Citizen of the Year; and in 2004 was chosen as Fairfax County’s Citizen of the Year.
As a fly fisherman and lover of nature, Veatch began photographing the scenes around him. Now a passionate and accomplished photographer, Veatch published The Nature of Reston in 1999, a book of his photography of natural areas of Reston. Profits from this book, now in its second printing, have gone towards the construction of a Nature House in Reston. Currently, Charles Veatch is the president of The Charles A. Veatch Co. He also devotes his time to many non-profit organizations concerned with nature and the environment.
The Charles Veatch Collection contains materials related to the history of Reston, Virginia. These items include: working papers and other documents, newspaper clippings, brochures, maps, videorecordings, and books. Total volume of the collection is 3.3 cubic feet or 4.95 linear feet. — Copied from http://www.gmu.edu/library/specialcollections/veatch.html