Photography has always been in James Patrick Cooper's life. As a kid, he borrowed his father's Nikon to photograph friends and family. After high school, he shot football games and sold them to a chain of weekly newspapers, The Record, which soon hired him as the Director of Photography.

He began shooting NFL games and got a gig at a newspaper called Pro Football Weekly while also shooting for the NFL and Sports Illustrated. He is a two-time recipient of the NFL Hall of Fame Photo Contest.

James started turning his lens towards portraits in the mid-1990s, on location and in a Greenwich Village studio. His hallmark was off-center subjects, vivid colors and high-contrast black and whites. His photos caught the eye of an editor at Associated Press, who hired him to do a majority of the portraits for the wire. Others soon followed.

James has shot portraits and fashion for an array magazines including Vanity Fair, German Vogue, The New York Times and Shape Magazine. 

He has shot music portfolios for record companies such as Atlantic and Sony Music. He toured with the rock band Shinedown and country music singer Shooter Jennings and The Trans Siberian Orchestra as a music photographer.

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James is based in New York City and travels frequently for shoots in Nashville, Chicago and Southern California. 

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Photo:  Micheal Corrado