A working list · Updated August 2026

A Boston Photographer’s Favorite Boston Photographers

When I’m already booked, or when I’m the wrong person for the job, I send clients to this page. Everyone here is a notable Boston photographer whose work I actually look at.

Shooting in Boston or New England and think you belong here? Send me a link.

Lobster fishing at Tenant's Harbor, Maine

Tenant’s Harbor, Maine — three hours north of Boston, before sunrise. Half the work on this page happens well outside the city.

Editorial & documentary

19 photographers

I started with about fifty names and cut it down to the colleagues whose pictures I go out of my way to see. Different specialties — news, sports, portraits, long stories — but all photojournalists at heart.

David Degner

Editorial

Widely published Boston photographer with 20+ years of experience, works with local, national and international publications and companies. Often photographing science and industry.

site ↗ · @degner

Sees Somerville the way most of us only see somewhere we’ve travelled to. Also a curator, which shows in how he edits.

site ↗ · @yorgosphoto

Years at the Herald and now Reuters. Fast, unflappable, and still finds the frame nobody else got.

site ↗ · @faithninivaggi

Brad Romano

Commercial

Commercial work that keeps a documentary spine. Nothing looks over-produced.

site ↗ · @bradromano

Sophie Park

Documentary

Patient work about who belongs where. She stays long after the news trucks leave.

site ↗ · @sophieupark

Reuters senior staff. Decades of politics and still curious — the long-form work is the part to look at.

site ↗ · @brian_photog

Amanda Sabga

Documentary

Independent and relentless. Her pictures feel like she was the only one in the room.

site ↗ · @amandasabga

Getty sports. Great at the moment after the moment, when everyone else has put the camera down.

site ↗ · @maddiemeyer2

Philip Keith

Portraits

Quiet, close portraits. He gets people to stop performing, which is most of the job.

site ↗ · @philipckeith

Rania Matar

Fine art

Guggenheim fellow working between Boston and Beirut on girlhood and womanhood. The most gallery-minded work on this list.

site ↗ · @raniamatar

Globe sports staff, and a licensed drone pilot — so she gets angles the rest of us are still imagining.

site ↗ · @danielleparhiz

Jessica Rinaldi

Documentary

Pulitzer for feature photography and it’s obvious why. She earns access most people never get near.

site ↗ · @jrinaldi5

At the Globe since 1981. The Berlin Wall, the Marathon bombing — he has photographed the record.

site ↗ · @johntlumacki

OJ Slaughter

Community

Photographs their own community rather than dropping into it. Protest and culture work with real warmth.

site ↗ · @oj.slaughter

Erin Clark

Documentary

Globe staff and a Pulitzer finalist. Takes local stories seriously enough to make them national.

site ↗ · @erinclarkphoto

Freelance for the Globe, Herald, and AP. If it happened in New England, he was probably standing there.

site ↗ · @newz27foto

Jodi Hilton

Human rights

Based in Cambridge, works on migration and human rights abroad. Serious, careful reporting.

site ↗ · @jodihilton

Thirty years in and the regional essays are still the strongest thing in his portfolio.

site ↗ · @cjgunther

Jesse Costa

Multimedia

At WBUR since 2007. Shoots and produces — good pick when a story needs sound as much as pictures.

site ↗ · @jessecostapix

MIT and Kendall Square — a center of scientific research in Greater Boston, and a place I photograph often.

The MIT campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts

Weddings

10 photographers

Ask your friends first — then remember that most people have just one wedding to compare against. I went through more than a hundred Boston wedding sites and kept the ones with a point of view. I’m judging pictures, not service.

Clean moments, not over-toned. A bit heavy on the glassware and flowers for my taste.

site ↗

Well composed, respectful, comfortable. Nobody looks like they’re being managed.

site ↗

Zhaun Frias

Natural light

Good use of natural light, and reaches for flash only when the room actually needs it.

site ↗

Still shooting film, which I love. It shows in the restraint.

site ↗

The weddings feel like college hijinks — in the best way.

site ↗

Gina Brocker

Documentary

The weddings feel real. Very little posing and none of it precious.

site ↗

Anderson Marques

Composition

I like their compositions — someone is clearly thinking about the frame.

site ↗

Not the usual compositions. Also a well made website, which tells you something.

site ↗

A classic who has the system nailed down. Low risk, consistently good.

site ↗

Posed, but well posed — and there’s a real difference.

site ↗

Food & product

10 photographers

This work takes more gear, more space, and more patience than people expect. These are the ones in Boston I’d trust with a table full of food and a deadline.

Michelle Boule

Food & product

Boston-based, works across the country. Reliable hands on a complicated set.

site ↗

Light, bright and smiley, with a hint of that medium-format film look.

site ↗

Classic, well plated, food-first photography in dramatic light.

site ↗

Sophia Li

Food & wellness

Works with food, lifestyle and wellness brands. The journal section of just pretty photos is my favorite part.

site ↗

Careful color, controlled light, clean composition. The toning is what makes it sing.

site ↗

Nicole Loeb

Lifestyle

Meticulously set, and still full of people actually enjoying the food.

site ↗

Probably my favorite. Always appears to be trying something new.

site ↗

Clean product and food work. Nothing fussy.

site ↗

Joseph Keller

Food & people

Community and human moments in idyllic New England settings.

site ↗

Great work, and based on the Cape — which saves some clients a lot of travel.

site ↗

Real estate & interiors

2 photographers

A short list, and I’d like it to be longer — send me names.

Ovi Mustea

Architecture

Mixes architecture with lifestyle for real estate, restaurants and hospitality. More interesting than the category usually allows.

site ↗

Brian Doherty

Interiors

Traditional interior and architectural work, based on the South Shore.

site ↗

Should you be on this list?

If you shoot in Boston or New England and your work belongs here, send me a link — your site, your Instagram, whatever you’re proudest of. I look at everything that comes in and update this page a few times a year.

David@DavidDegner.com

Hiring instead? I shoot editorial and commercial photography out of Boston and New York. See my work ↗

The Emerson Paramount Center lit up in downtown Boston

The Emerson Paramount Center, downtown Boston. ( David Degner / WSJ )