When he picked up a camera at 6 years of age, photography quickly piqued the interest of a young Chris Martin, photographer at chrisMARTIN.tv.
“There was something magnetic about it,” he said. “I fell in love with taking pictures and documenting those milliseconds of existence that will never happen again, whether it be an insane landscape during a thunderstorm or somebody’s expression.”
Although he has been fascinated by photography for most of his life, in high school, Martin launched his own information technology/ network engineering firm – a career that followed him through his college years. He studied computer science at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma and later Oklahoma City Community College. Eventually, he left the IT field to pursue his true passion.
“I would rather not wake up in the morning than not be a photographer,” he stated. As a self-proclaimed perfectionist who holds himself personally accountable for his work, Martin spends about 15% of his time behind the camera; the remainder of his time is devoted to the production and promotion aspects of his business.
Martin is also part of Professional Photographers of America, an organization that provides resources to more than 30,000 photographers across the country and is also part of Help-Portrait, the one-day global movement that provides free physical portraiture to families and individuals who are unable to afford professional photography prices. “Help-Portrait’s a big deal to me because of the impact it makes. We’ve had people come in who’ve never had a family portrait, and we’ve had people
come in where we took the last portrait that will ever be taken of them.”
Over the years, Martin has also donated his works to the United Way of Southwest Oklahoma, the Starlight Foundation, Lawton Food Bank, Lawton Public School Foundation, Lawton Business Women, Women That Vote, Young Professionals of Lawton as well as others.
For 2020, he has selected Hungry Hearts Feeding Ministry as his dedicated charity. Hungry Hearts is a local nonprofit organization that provides meals and personal hygiene products to those in need. “I’m a giving person who loves to see people grow and circumstances improve,” he said. “There is an indeterminable amount of potential in southwest Oklahoma – and Lawton, in particular, to achieve things we could never imagine, we just have to reach for them,” he said.