Jim Reed is an internationally known American award-winning photographer, filmmaker and writer best known for his images of extreme weather.
In 1991, he began a 30-year project to document climate change and its impact on the United States, documenting extreme weather, including tornadoes, blizzards, floods, drought and 18 hurricanes, including Katrina. 2021 marked Jim's 30th and final year of the project. Although semi-retired, Jim continues to photograph certain climate events.
Jim is a contributing photographer at National Geographic and Nikon, and is represented by Getty Images, Science Source and Science Photo Library in London. His work has been published in National Geographic, The New York Times, Scientific American, Popular Science, and The Guardian, among many others. He is the author of the critically acclaimed photo book STORM CHASER: A PHOTOGRAPHER'S JOURNEY (Abrams, New York).
In 2002, he was hired to take a Hollywood crew into two hurricanes to capture footage for the motion picture THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW (20th Century Fox). In 2009, he was invited to The White House to show his photographs to Pete Souza, chief official White House photographer for Presidents of the United States Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama. In 2012, he was hired by Dag Kitlaus, co-creator of Apple's Siri, to go storm chasing and intercept a hurricane.
Jim has been featured in numerous TV weather shows and specials, including Good Morning America, The Today Show, CBS This Morning, CNN, ABC 20/20, The Weather Channel, The Discovery Channel, and Oprah. He has received many awards for his work from, among others, Communication Arts, Photo District News, American Photography, Photo Review, Lucie Awards, and Prix De La Photographie Paris. His photography has been acquired by private collections and corporations in the U.S. and abroad.
Jim was born in Albany, Georgia, raised in Springfield, Illinois, by his single mom, Audrey, and received a BFA from the University of Southern California in Los Angeles in 1983.
American PHOTO magazine writes, "Jim Reed is clearly more than a great storm chaser who risks his life to create iconic images of extreme weather. He's a heartfelt environmentalist whose real mission is to encourage us all to adapt a more healthful and prudent lifestyle in dealing with this era of increasing weather challenges."
Jim is currently working on projects in Caledonia, Minnesota, including freelancing for the Caledonia Argus, one of the oldest, and still in-print, newspapers in the Midwest. Jim also joyfully enjoys his time with his 3 ½ year-old Golden Retriever, Sawyer (seen here at age 6 months).