About Ryan…

Ryan Scheer is a photographic artist based in Steamboat Springs, Colorado using photography techniques from the late 1800s to produce western-themed dioramas. Using the Wet Plate Collodion process, Ryan brings images to life that are inspired by his youth and his love of the western lifestyle.

Having grown up on Ranches in Colorado, Ryan was lucky enough to be provided with a playground for childhood imagination that seemed endless as the property lines provided less of a boundary, and more of a question of what lies beyond the fence. On these ranches, his creativity was deeply influenced along with the way he saw the world. There was the dialogue and storytelling craftsmanship that the ranchers and cowboys displayed that created a hunger inside him to be a storyteller as well as grow an immense nostalgia for his youth in the west.

In addition to Ryan’s life experience, his cinema experience shaped a deep storytelling passion in his life. The filmmaking of John Ford and his cinematic world was a huge inspiration in him becoming a filmmaker for fifteen plus years. The film “The Searchers” remains one of his favorite films and was Ryan’s introduction to the age-defining acting of John Wayne.

After having his second child with his wife Jacque, Ryan returned to his hometown of Steamboat Springs, Colorado after having lived in large cities for the better part of 15 years. He and his family traded in the conveniences of big box stores and endless restaurants for the outdoors and a simpler way of life. During this time is when he found himself feeling creatively inspired and creatively confident in a way he hadn’t experienced since the days of his youth on the ranchlands. Feeling this way left him to ponder where this new sense of creative hunger came from and what it was all about. It didn’t take him long to realize that the answer was simple, he was back on the family ranch.

With this newfound creative inspiration, Ryan chose to leave behind his days of commercial and documentary filmmaking and focus on a personal creative journey. A collection of photographs documented using the Wet Plate Collodion process from the early 1800s. His current collection includes dioramas inspired by remnants of his youth and of his surroundings today. An ode to the days that shaped him and a wink to the west that isn’t rooted in fierce machismo, but in fun and wonder. A way for Ryan to honor his past and discover who he was, who he is, and the world that gave him his lens.