Jake Poehls
Senior Associate Photographer

Photography kind of crept up on me. I was not exposed to it at an early age or even as a teenager. In fact, if someone had asked me five years ago what I thought I’d be doing today, I would have said a professional musician.

I was born and raised in Chicago, IL and became familiar and appreciative of the fast-paced, unpredictable world that is a big city. I received my undergraduate degree in journalism from the University of Colorado at Boulder, which is where my introduction to photography began.

What began as casually taking pictures of close friends quickly turned into an introspective journey of me wondering the streets looking for unique people and things to photograph.

Shortly after graduation, I made the decision to pursue photography professionally and enrolled at the Academy of Art University’s Masters program. For the past few years, I have studying part time while working as a freelance photographer in the city of San Francisco.

My goal as a professional is to not only please and excite the client, but to walk away from a job with photos that I can cherish and be inspired by.