A surfer carries a board at sunrise at Old Lighthouse Beach.
Jenni Koontz
Since she was a child, Jenni Koontz has taken an interest in photography.
“I always used film cameras until my freshman year of college,” said Koontz, 32, who lives on Hatteras Island in Avon, North Carolina with her daughter Emma Sage.
Koontz graduated with a psychology degree and went back to school for digital photography. After photographing her daughter and getting feedback on the images, she realized photography was her passion.
“Lighting is everything and if you can read any lighting situation, you can use the light to create any image you can think of,” she said.
Now, Koontz loves to photograph the local surf culture on the Island, as well as surfers defying gravity and the waves without surfers.
“The ocean is also forever changing," she said. "It is really neat to document the evolution of the sandbars and the different swell's that come to the island."
Note: This is the sixth installment in an occasional series profiling North Carolina photographers.
Ocean waves crash against the shore after a storm in Avon, NC.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
A photo of a first jetty firing near Avon, NC.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
Surfer Pat O'Neal at the first jetty during a Hurricane Hermine swell.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
Local Buxton, NC surfer Brett Barley emerges from a wave during the Hurricane Hermine swell.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
An angler stands at Old Lighthouse Beach in Buxton after Hurricane Matthew.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
Remnants of the Frisco Pier, which was damaged during Hurricane Earl in 2010.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
Surfer Wolfgang Blackwood rides a wave during a Hurricane Hermine swell.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
Local Buxton residents and surfers Rusell Blackwood with his son Wolfgang Blackwood hug each other near the first jetty. Russel Blackwood is local legend in Hatteras Island.
Credit Jenni Koontz / https://epicshutter.com
The sky turns purple during a sunset near the remnants of the Frisco Pier.
Elizabeth “Liz” Baier is WUNC’s Supervising Editor for Race, Class and Communities. She has two decades of experience than span print, audio, and digital reporting and editing.