Beverly Flood / Invert at Tim Brauch Contest

Demarcus James / Frontside Invert

Minna Stess / Rock & Roll slide at Freemont

We heard about photographer Todd Fuller before we actually ever met him.  Some of the female skaters would send us pictures he took of them, and we were amazed. There was a style to his photographs we didn't see too often, especially when it came to shooting with the girls. We followed his work on instagram where he posts pics of not only female skaters, but rad kids like Logan Frank, and the male pros as well. And we were hooked!  Since Todd is at most girls skate events snapping away and posting great shots, we thought you should get to know him...


Name?    Todd Fuller / aka @besuro on Instagram

Where do you live/work?      San Francisco Bay Area

How did you get started in photography?

I had a really nasty foot break that stopped me from being able to skate anymore, so I took up the camera. I had some video and motion picture shooting experience prior to that, so I wasn’t exactly starting from zero.

Evelyn Abad / Frontside Boneless

What type of photography do you do when you are not shooting skateboarding?

I have a hard time being interested in shooting anything else, to be honest. Skateboarding has so many spots, tricks, characters - I never run out of inspiration.

What made you decide to start shooting female skaters? 

No conscious decision on my part. To me it’s all just skateboarding. There are a lot of people out there who want to tell other people what is and what is not skateboarding or who is and who is not a skater and I hate that so I’m stoked to see so many young women getting involved and glad to help put those old-fashioned ideas to rest.

Beverly Flood

Are there any skaters you really enjoy working with & why? 

People that are positive and confident. I’ve shot a lot with Beverly Flood, she’s always good to work with. Poppy Starr Olsen is pretty amazing. I met her at a contest last year. Logan Frank, before he moved to SoCal. Too many to list, really.

Dezmin Lane / Ollie

What are some of your favorite places to shoot at? 

Any backyard pool is good. Derby park in Santa Cruz, Fremont Skatepark and Lake Cunningham all come to mind as well.

Poppy Starr Olsen /  Backside Air

Do you have an all time favorite female skate image that you’ve shot?

Probably the shot of Poppy from last year’s Tim Brauch Memorial Bowl Contest at Lake Cunningham. The sky was just amazing.

Josh Rodriguez / Frontside Hurricane

Any favorite tricks you like to shoot?

Crails, backside disaster, layback grinds, proper slashes, hurricane, nose blunts. Stuff where the skaters body is elongated or twisted are always more interesting than something where the person is basically just squatting down or standing up.

Favorite camera body & lens?

I’m shooting with a Canon 5D mkIII right now. I use the Canon EF 15mm f2.8 for fisheye stuff and a Canon 50mm L f1.2 for street skating or portraits.

Ki Crumpton / Benihana

 Do you like to light or do you prefer shooting with natural light?

I shoot at skateparks a lot and there tends to be a lot of visual noise in the background at skateparks, so you try to minimize it any way you can. For me, that generally means using flashes.

Any girls out there you haven’t shot yet but would like to?

Sure - Leticia Bufoni, Julz Lynn, B Zeuner, and a few more that I don’t want to jinx by mentioning names.

Dylan Meikle / invert

Any advice for someone who wanted to get into action sports photography? 

Just get out there and do it - You don’t need much to start. Just a camera or an app that lets you have manual control. Don’t get caught up in the technical aspects - you’ll recognize the problems and seek out the solutions as you go.

Check out Todd's work at:

www.skateographer.com or on Instagram at instagram.com/besuro