I can be reached by e-mail at chris@christopherdilts.com
About Me
I started making photographs of bands in 1997, in the basements of southern Indiana punk houses. I also designed flyers for shows that I helped put on and, in 1999, after completing a BA in Anthropology and Sociology from Earlham College, I was offered a job as Photo Editor and Senior Photographer at a start-up publication called P8NT Magazine, which would document the emerging competition paintball scene, particularly the professional circuit. A six month portfolio building gig turned into a six year odyssey traveling the world, sleeping on floors, couches and in airport lounges, photographing a intensely fringe sport and making a struggling independent magazine. In the process I was forced to learn everything from magazine design to digital pre-press to video editing to copy editing to web design. The magazine embraced the DIY ethic that I had grown up in and was never more, or less, than the talents of the handful of people who made it.
Since then I've worked doing packaging design for two DVD labels and helped start a record label (Formed Records). I worked as a designer for a website that receives more than six million unique visitors a month (MrSkin.com) and have served as the creative director of a small clothing label (Killing Machine Apparel Co).
I've shot photographs for bands like Milemarker, Cursive, The Murder City Devils, Bright Eyes, and Submission Hold; worked as the still photographer on a variety of video productions (both Jawwbraker Video Series and Monkey With A Gun Productions Heroes For A Day); shot for Chrome Messenger Bag company and documented Bike Messenger and Alleycat Racing scenes, recently attending and shooting the Cycle Messenger World Championships in Toronto.
As a photographer and a designer there is nothing more satisfying than exploring things that are edged out of the vision of mainstream life. Sometimes that's a band in a basement. Sometimes that's a professional athlete who lives in a twilight zone where no one seems to know that what he does even exists. There is something that words cannot express about the strength and dignity that these people have, making sacrifices with little hope of wealth or public acclaim. They're driven to trek across the country, making do, sleeping where they can, playing the songs they love or the game they've sacrificed their body to.
I live in Chicago, Illinois, and seem to own a lot of cameras, bikes and records.
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