About Benjamin

I always wanted to be an artist, but sometimes that’s easier said than done. I grew up in Mansfield, Ohio, which was an old, Mid-Western town that was built on the back of the industrial revolution. While Mansfield once had a storied past, it was a hard place to get off the ground as an artist when I was growing up.

Fate, luckily for me, would soon see me leaving Mansfield and moving to Silicon Valley when I was 19. The year was 1995 and the World Wide Web was still a very new thing, even in the bay area of California. I quickly realized that the world of analog was coming to an end and that the era of computers was just beginning. I soon co-founded one of the first all-digital design studios and never stopped moving forward from there.

At some point, I became the defacto expert, animator, designer, and programmer for a program known as Flash. This propelled me to the top of the industry which landed me jobs with amazing companies like Microsoft, Apple, Time Warner, Wells Fargo, Phillips and hundreds more top high-tech companies.

For one project, I was asked to create something amazing for Hewlett-Packard’s Chai platform. I used my knowledge of programming and Flash to create the world’s first streaming video using the Flash player. This was done years before Adobe would offer streaming video through flash, and a total of 6 years before a little company known as YouTube would even exist.

As the years progressed, I started to move away from the programming side of my business and focused more on the design and creative direction that I loved so much. I also started to do more with photography and videography, taking product shots and commercial video for many of my clients.

Almost two decades after moving to California, I was headed back to the East coast to expand my horizons. It was then that I realized just how much creative leverage photography offered me and I began to spend more of time behind the camera.

Within just a few years I had received several awards for my photography and solidified a name for myself. I started a new graphic design company, Emotiv, and continue to maintain my photography business, Benjamin Lehman Photography, at the same time.

I also began to mentor many young and burgeoning photographers by teaching people around the globe by streaming free classes using the Twitch platform. In addition, I also started working with many local artists and charities, spending as much time as I can helping those in need however my skills might allow.

As I enter this newest phase of my career, I look forward to expanding my commercial, advertising, portrait, and editorial photography for anyone who is interested in working with me. My style is unique, but my approach is client-centric. A long time ago a wiser designer than me once gave me the following sage-advise, “You have to design for your client, not for yourself”, and that has stuck with me ever since. My only goal is to make you, your products, and your company look the best that they can.