Our Team


Ian Norman
  • Sony a7II 22%
  • Sony a7S 67%
  • Olympus 35RD 11%

Ian Norman

Creator/Editor

Ian Norman, co-founder of The Photon Collective, is a full time traveler, photographer and entrepreneur. In February 2013, he called it quits on his 9-to-5 to pursue a self-directed career in photography. He started his flagship photography project, lonelyspeck.com, to teach photographers of all skill levels how to photograph the Milky Way. After two years of overwhelmingly positive responses to his website, tutorials, and free learning tools on Lonely Speck, he was ready to expand into other realms of photography. Thus, The Photon Collective was born — a community where Ian and Diana (his girlfriend) aim to spread their photography knowledge and experiences freely with the world. Follow Ian on Twitter, Instagram, and North to South (the couple’s travel and entrepreneurship blog).

Diana Southern
  • Sony RX-100 III 50%
  • Lubitel 2 24%
  • Nexus 6 26%

Diana Southern

Marketing/Design

Diana Southern, entrepreneur and co-founder of The Photon Collective, leads a nomadic life of world exploration with her partner in crime (and love of her life), Ian. Diana uses mostly small, lightweight cameras and offers a beginner photographer’s perspective to The Photon Collective community. She enjoys photography because it offers her the opportunity to capture a moment — an experience — and allows her to show, rather than tell, others about the people and places she meets on her travels.  Follow her (and Ian’s) adventures on North to South, their blog about travel and living an unordinary (or rather EXTRAORDINARY) life. You can also follow Diana on FacebookInstagram and Twitter.

Cody Smith
  • Sony a7S 36%
  • Hasselblad 500CM 44%
  • Canonet GIII-QL17 12%
  • Yashica MAT-124G 8%

Cody Smith

Contributing Writer

Cody William Smith is a self-described adventurer, lover of nature, mountains, sunlight and putting himself into precarious situations. He currently resides in Los Angeles where he works professionally as a freelance photographer and cinematographer. His landscape-centric fine art series A Moment’s Reflection has been featured all across the web and in publications around the world. He received his BFA in Cinema from Columbia College in 2012 and has been working in the film industry ever since. You can follow Cody on his website, Tumblr, and Instagram.

Tyler Sichelski
  • Canon EOS 6D 90%
  • Galaxy Note 3 10%

Tyler Sichelski

Contributing Writer

Tyler Sichelski is a photographer based in Arizona. Tyler loves to specialize in landscape, astro and long exposure photography. He is very passionate about photography and teaching others. Check out his portfolio and workshops at his website: tyskiphoto.com and follow him from his Facebook, Instagram or Twitter.