Darren Ankenman was originally a documentary filmmaker. But then while following around the Black Crowes, he realized there was a lot of interesting things happening around him — like Jimmy Page was hanging out, and lead-singer Chris Robinson was dating Kate Hudson. And eventually, after shooting behind the scenes video, he had an epiphany that he needed to document all this, but differently. It needed to be photographed, not filmed.

During this time he transitioned away from filmmaking and moved toward photography. Ankenman is now a world-renowned photographer and he shoots oddities from his travels, beautiful girls, celebrities, Los Angeles (his blog called Welcome to LA is definitely worth a bookmark) and everything he finds interesting.

He currently lives and works in Los Angeles and he invited us into his world.