Everyone appreciates the pictures that surround them, but hardly ever stop to consider the photographer who took them. However, senior Shawn McNamara has established himself as a well-known photographer and videographer in the sports aspect of Downers Grove.

McNamara started his photography career two years ago by picking up his dad’s camera at his younger brother’s basketball game.

“I was at my brother’s travel team game and my dad told me that I could either record the game on an iPad or take pictures with his camera and I didn’t wanna do either. So he just gave me the iPad, and now I was standing there and I’m like, I’m not doing this. But then I just said ‘give me the camera,’ and it went from there.” McNamara said.

From there on out he had discovered a passion. McNamara started to photograph different sporting events around DGS, his most anticipated one being for the varsity football team. Head varsity football coach Mark Molinari had McNamara be this past year’s photographer for the varsity football photos.

“I noticed he had very creative ideas on what he wanted to do. He was asking [the football players] to do things that they have never done before, because nobody can get those guys organized. A lot of the time when you ask the football players to do cool things, they don’t wanna do it, they actually get embarrassed, but Sean was getting them to do [things],” Molinari said.

McNamara’s creative ideas didn’t just get seen by Molinari. Photography teacher Samantha Washer also noticed McNamara’s style of photography.

“I feel like he is constantly observing his surroundings, observing what’s going on and remembering it. Then I think that translates into his work, making it more photojournalistic. He’s capturing the important moments that have happened instead of what is happening, which falls into the seriousness of his work,” Washer said.

The seriousness of McNamara’s work comes with time and travel. He takes around 800 photos per game and spends 20 hours per week looking through and editing them. McNamara has also taken up many opportunities by taking photos for other school’s sporting events so he can strengthen his photography.

Another opportunity McNamara has taken to improve his photography skills is by asking Washer for her critique on his photos.

“He comes to me for critique, he’ll say ‘can you just look at this?’ He doesn’t have to do that, he can just do his own thing, but I think it’s the greatest thing in the world. Just the fact that he values my opinion because I have done this professionally and wants my critiques on his work,” Washer said.

Senior Jonny Klaeren, one of his best friends, has realized the work McNamara has put into his passion. Klaeren also thinks his observation of the world around him has made him stick out among other photographers.

“[McNamara] is very talented in what he does. He’s had some really good opportunities and creates some really awesome things. I think [McNamara] has his own set of eyes and he doesn’t try to be like other people,” Klaeren said.

One of his most recent pieces he has done was photographing the DGS Hall of Fame night. This was omething that pushed him out of his comfort zone from sporting events. Molinari asked him to be the photographer of the night, and to Molinari, he sure did step up.

“We just had the DGS Hall of Fame, and we were in a real pinch, we didn’t have a photographer, so I literally grabbed him the day before and asked him if he could come. [McNamara] did an outstanding job, he handled himself with great professionalism and his portfolio was outstanding,” Molinari said.

McNamara hopes his professionalism can work hand-in-hand with his photographic creativity to make himself stand out.

“I guess I just try to not be basic. You know, everybody gets the same picture of somebody dribbling up the corner or catching a pass. I just try to do other things to make myself stand out,” McNamara said.

This story was originally published on Blueprint on March 14, 2025.