Michael Friberg

For Michael Friberg a big part of the challenge of starting in photography was the isolation. “Sometimes when you work in this industry you can sort of exist in a vacuum,” says Friberg, who lives in Salt Lake City. Though he has traveled to New York City and assisted there for a short time, being based in the middle of the country left him without the kind of first-person contact with colleagues that East Coast or West Coast shooters may take for granted.

Yet Friberg credits his photography peers with playing a critical part in developing his career. How did he meet them? Online. He and his online colleagues help each other by advising on edits of shoots, or discussing how to handle an invoice, or asking, “What did you do in this sort of situation?” Friberg says.