The man behind the camera

Mark Philbrick stood in the sunshine of a late-July morning and concentrated on the faces of the students he was about to photograph. The shadows of the surrounding trees danced under his feet as streams of light glinted like a prism off the surface of the Duchesne River.

Then the clouds rolled in, and Philbrick smiled.

"That's nice," he said as the prisms suddenly vanished. "All of a sudden, you can shoot in any direction."

He took advantage of the cooperative light, snapping shots of the students and their professor wading in the stream, gathering trout for a research project.

Philbrick, Brigham Young University's chief photographer for the last 33 years, has a way of seeing — and capturing — things most people miss. Thousands of BYU's best moments, from academic accomplishments to famed athletic events, have been frozen in Philbrick's lens for fans and faculty to remember.

That is why, as another school year and football season begin again at BYU, 55-year-old Philbrick is doing what he loves most — crashing through a thicket of stinging nettles, standing knee-deep in frigid water, looking for the perfect shot.

His job is to make the university look good.

At first glance, Philbrick — a typically clean-cut BYU employee — seems reserved, even shy. But on assignment, wearing sandals, slightly stained hiking pants and a long-sleeved, collared shirt, he looks as though he could fit in anywhere.

He's a natural athlete, hiking and biking with the best of them while carrying a camera. Were it not for his abilities to dance and ski, he never would have landed a blind date with his future wife, Peggy Hancock, in 1976.

That was the same year Philbrick was hired as BYU's first full-time photographer. He already had taken pictures as a student — first for the yearbook, then the campus newspaper. In September 1976, he traveled as a student to Europe to take pictures of one of the school's performing-arts groups on tour.

While on a bus in the Netherlands, Philbrick's boss sat next to him and told him he'd been officially hired.

Since then, Philbrick figures he's taken more than a million photos for BYU and traveled on research trips and performance tours to more than 20 countries. It's his dream come true.

"You name it, I want to go there," Philbrick says. "Not just to go, but to go take pictures, go to capture. Every (picture) I take has a purpose. Good photographers aren't just snapping pictures all the time. They think, 'Oh, this is nice, but the light isn't right, so I'll come back when the light is right.' That's what makes good photographers. They wait until the light is right."