It's not you, it's me

I’m not good with goodbyes, so let’s just do this quick and painless: this is the last editorial you’ll read from me.

My time as editor of The Photographer’s Mail is coming to a close, and I’ll soon be off on new adventures. It’s simply not possible to put into words how gratifying the last handful of years have been, helping to steer this excellent publication. I’d like to go out with a few words of thanks.

Pulling a Lazarus on a publication like this is no easy feat, so I’d like to firstly thank the powers that be at Parkside Media, who made the call to give the old girl another shot. To be told such a beloved magazine was coming back into print and that I’d be responsible for sculpting it into a shape that best reflected the exciting and complex world of professional photography today was a (slightly terrifying) honour.

While I knew, more or less, the shape I wanted the new and improved TPM to take, and was confident I had the excellent crew to make it all happen, what I had never really counted on was the community response. Not a week goes by in which we don’t hear how nice it is to have the publication back in the world. It’s immensely gratifying to hear how people look forward to the new edition turning up in the mailbox, and how much they enjoy the sense of kinship in keeping track of peers and being inspired by others’ work.

So, to the photographic community who warmly embraced me and my team, there’s no way to overstate how essential your magnanimity has been — we couldn’t have done the job without it. To all the wonderful photographers who allowed us to feature their work in these pages, it’s been a true honour. To the advertisers and industry supporters without whom this publication simply wouldn’t exist, thank you for your generosity and friendship. To the team here at Parkside, and all our independent contributors, it has been a joy and a privilege to work with such passionate, consummate professionals. And to the readers, whether you emailed in, dropped us a line on a social network, came to say hi at an industry event, or simply continued to support us by reading the mag, cheers for that support. We do it all for you, and it’s your encouragement and gratification that keeps us going.

And while I’m stepping down, you can trust that the course we’ve set for The Photographer’s Mail over these past few years will continue into the future. I’m just the pretty face in front of a brilliant team that puts in a herculean effort to get this publication together, and you can trust they’ll continue to go well beyond the call of duty to keep TPM the fantastic read you’ve become accustomed to.

And before you get all weepy, I’m not going so terribly far – it’s likely I’ll still put together the occasional article for these pages. So it’s not really goodbye, but see you around.