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Just as his grandfather made art out of homebuilding art, David Eichler is trying to make art out of home photography.
For the past five years David Eichler, who studied photography at the New England School of Photography, has been building a career as a commercial photographer, with a focus on architecture.
He’s doing pretty well, shooting high-end homes, mainly when they are for sale, as well as other building types, and portraits. But he hasn’t quite achieved what he hopes to achieve – a melding of commerce and art.
An art photographer for more than 30 years, David has worked in several fields, including as a photo and printing tech for a custom lab, and with his brother Steven in the kitchen and bathroom remodeling field. That was an experience, David says, that increased his sensitivity to materials, cabinetry, and countertops.
When he shifted to commercial photography, he says, he largely dropped his personal work because of the need to focus on one – or the other.
“If I’m doing art photography, then that’s what I should do,” he says, “not do commercial photography at the same time.”
To David Eichler, focus, concentration, is what photography is all about. It’s why he loves the field – and why he particularly enjoys architectural photography.
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“I like going out and looking at things. [Photography] gives me a reason to really look at things hard, because usually you go about your life and you’re not paying attention very much.”
“But with photography you really focus on things. It’s a slow process, setting up the shoot and waiting for the right lighting, studying the subject. What’s the best perspective, the best time of day? You concentrate and pay attention.”
“I like the more studied approach of architectural photography.”
Eichler, who lives in Daly City, was born in 1957 and recalls getting to know his grandparents in their home, a custom Eichler home in Atherton, then in their penthouse atop the Eichler residential tower the Summit on Russian Hill.
He didn’t know his grandfather well. “He wasn’t a person who was that easy to get close to, at least for a child. He didn’t so much engage with children that much. Grandma did a little more so,” David says.
“I was not around the business that much,” David says, noting that his father, Ned, worked for Eichler Homes. David remembers stopping by a few job sites and visiting the Eichler Homes office a few times.
But David did live in Eichler homes as a child, and says their architecture and everything that went with him have influenced him.
“The environment really sunk in, the whole feeling of modern design, the whole ambiance. It made a significant impact on me,” he says.
“And also, just being around a lot of modern furnishings – Herman Miller, Knoll, art by Matt Kahn, all that sort of stuff – really made an impression on me. Modern architecture and design was part of the whole environment. Even some of the toys I played with were modern.”
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“But my father’s taste also made an impression,” he says. Ned Eichler had eclectic tastes. During David’s high school years the family lived in a San Francisco Victorian.
“I’m not gung-ho strictly about modern design,” David says. “I really like some kinds of traditional styles as well.”
David may not be an art photographer these days, but he does make art, he says.
“I feel that what I do is creative, but I view it as commercial rather than fine art,” he says. “I like to feel that what I do serves a purpose for others. But there is still a personal style, and creativity, I can put into it.”
That’s why shooting houses for real estate marketing can prove frustrating, he says. Deadlines are usually tight and budgets low. He’d like to do more “formal architectural photography,” work for architects, interior designers, fine home builders – even people who live in Eichler homes.
David has shot Eichler homes that are for sale, “but not as many Eichlers as I would like, and not enough real homes, homes that people are living in and that look lived in. The staging that is done tends to be pretty generic.”
“I would love to shoot more Eichler homes, but more ones that are actually furnished and have people living in them. What I would ultimately like to do is a book related to these houses. There have been books about Eichler homes but they were historic books. I’d like to show what people have done to their homes in terms of remodeling and rebuilding them in recent years, to show a sense of the contemporary updates that have been done.”
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David met Ernie Braun, the photographer who gave Eichler homes their photographic exposure, only when Braun was elderly and retired. “Really nice guy,” David recalls.
“His work made an impression on me and in some way it has influenced me. I didn’t set out to incorporate his style into what I do, because there are some elements of it that seem so much of its time. The way people look, the poses, and gestures.”
“But the idea of a lifestyle photograph, that is something that has been in the back of my mind. How can I do something like that but for today?”
David says “the primary goal of every photographer” is to develop a personal style, “to stand out.”
“I hope I have a personal style. That’s what I’m striving for.”