Maryville High School senior Andrew Zappa sold his first photograph this year — to National Geographic.
His shot of the northern lights was taken during his second National Geographic Student Travel experience, in late July 2023, and now is online at https://natgeostudenttravel.org/, the website promoting the program.
“This is a dream of mine,” Andrew told The Daily Times last week during an interview at MHS. “I would like to be a photographer for National Geographic.”
In the fall he plans to begin studying business administration at High Point University in North Carolina. “I thought that would be the smarter decision,” Andrew said.
However, he’s also hoping for another National Geographic tip to Africa this summer and the opportunity to photograph a lion.
In the past couple of summers he’s used his camera to shoot bison in Yellowstone National Park and polar bears in Canada. Here in Tennessee he often heads to Foothills Parkway to take photos of sunsets, stars and cars.
The night sky
Even before receiving a Canon EOS R camera a couple of Christmases ago, Andrew said, “I was always taking pictures on my phone. I was always interested in nature.”
His interest inn astrophotography began by accident. “I was just playing playing around with my camera outside after dark, and I happened to capture a nebula in one of my pictures,” he explained.
The photo National Geographic chose for its website is of the northern lights in Churchill, Manitoba.
“In the winter time there’s more polar bears than there are people there,” Andrew said, and one if his favorite shots from the trip is one of a bear he took from a boat about 70 yards away.
The northern lights shot was taken when students went out after midnight. “About 2 a.m. is when the clouds starting clearing up, and we started to see the green from the northern lights in the sky,” he explained. “It just kept growing and growing, getting more intense.”
The 30-second exposure also happened to capture a shooting star — the only one Andrew saw that night — on the left side of the image. On the website that part has been cropped from the image.
First class
Some of Andrew’s earliest photos were pictures of sunsets when he was about 12 years old. “With your phone you can get good quality, but it’s not as great as an actual camera,” he said.
Andrew took his first digital photography class at Maryville High School last fall.
“He has a natural eye for it,” teacher Jeanie Parker said. “He understands the principles of design. He understands it, he sees it and he frames it. He doesn’t have to crop.”
“He’s very good about showing the view that he wants them to see,” she said. “Andrew is looking for a story to tell.”
Andrew said the class taught him “a lot more in detail about how everything works.”
Assignments include theme prompts such as photographing motion, form or texture
“We also did some grab bag things,” Parker said, including pulling what she calls “the smart kid words” from a bag, such as the word “clandestine.”
“They have to figure out what that means to them and try to shoot it, while figuring out how their camera works,” the teacher said.
Many of the students are beginners, and MHS has cameras that they can check out to use.
One of the beginning students last semester, junior Abi Ralls, won Best in Photography at the 18th Annual East Tennessee Regional Student Art Exhibition, presented by the Knoxville Museum of Art.
“Even kids with no experience at all, once they get it, they get it,” Parker said.
Andrew also has used a GoPro camera during a diving trip in Roatan, off the coast of Honduras, to capture photos of stingrays, sea turtles and coral landscapes.
Among the photos he’d like to take in the future is a whale underwater.
“National Geographic is a fantastic first sale,” Parker remarked.
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