Ken Crowder Photography

Ken, a native of Ponca City, Oklahoma, has been observing and photographing the world around him since he was a young boy.

He grew up taking photographs and processing black and white film and prints with encouragement and instruction from his father.

Attending Oklahoma State University he studied Horticulture his first year, then changed directions to Fire Protection and Safety, for which he received an Associates Degree. During that time Ken spent 3 years as a student firefighter. Learning to play the cello in grade school, Ken was a cellist in the OSU Symphony Orchestra throughout his time at OSU. Changing directions one more time, he spent his last 2 semesters as a Cello major in the Music Department. Unsure of his career direction, and working part time in the OSU photo lab, he decided to "join the Navy and see the world".

In 1981, after enlistment and boot camp, he graduated from the US Naval School of Photography, in Pensacola, FL, becoming a US Navy photographer. His first 3 years of service were spent aboard the USS Inchon, LPH-12, a helicopter carrier. As one of 4 photographers onboard Ken spent his time documenting activities on and off the ship, as well as spending many hours in helicopters and a variety of ships photographing military activities in locations including the Atlantic, North Atlantic, Caribbean and Mediterranean areas.  While aboard the Inchon, the ship was stationed off the coast of Beirut, Lebanon for several months, giving him the opportunity to go ashore several times to cover military operations and activities.

Towards the end of his shipboard duties, Ken qualified to attend the intensive year long Military Photojournalism School at Syracuse University. After this further education he received the title of Navy Photojournalist, and began serving his last 3 year tour of duty as a staff photographer at SACLANT, the US NATO headquarters. While their he continued to document military activities in the US as well as various NATO countries overseas.

After leaving the Navy, he returned to his home state of Oklahoma where he spent several years as an industrial photographer working first for a local metal fabricator as their in-house photographer and then as a photographer/photo lab technician for Conoco Oil Co.

Ken is now a self-employed photographer, with over 40 years of professional experience, specializing in commercial advertising, fine art and creative portraiture, based in Tonkawa, OK.  He had a show of his Photo-A-Day project in the Oklahoma State Capitol building in 2009.  He continued this project into 2010 making at least one image of artistic merit every day for 730 consecutive days.

He and his wife and artistic partner Audrey, also own a custom picture frame shop/gift shop/art gallery, all housed within the same building as his studio. She is a full time art instructor at Northern Oklahoma College (NOC) here in their hometown. Audrey is also a working artist in ceramics and photography.

Ken taught as an adjunct instructor of photography at NOC for almost 20 years.

In his free time he spends many hours in garden plots that he and his wife tend to. Ken has recently taken on the challenge of growing almost all of the vegetables, herbs and flowers that go into their gardens from seeds.