THERE is something about a Giles Rocholl picture that puts the excitement into businesses.

Remember the image of a partner-founder of York-based expatshopping.com in pith helmet in the jungle ordering Bourneville cocoa on the Internet? The one with the now-famous Evening Press headline, It Ain't Half Dot Com?

That Rocholl image launched the organisation which now turns over £4 million a year - and is clear reason why the Harrogate photographer is so much in demand by PR agencies and major companies throughout North Yorkshire.

It is also a clear reason why Giles, aged 41, is entering both the Small Business of the Year and Best Use of New Technology categories in the 2004 Evening Press Business of the Year.

Like many good photographers, his career began in newspapers, passing with credits his National Council for the Training of Photojournalists exams. By the time he was 20 he was chief photographer for a group of weeklies covering North Yorkshire. Over the next 15 years he advanced up the promotion ladder working for most of the major publications of the region.

But in July, 1999, armed with IT and photojournalism skills he launched into the freelance market.

Now his main clients are well-known public relations companies in Yorkshire, serving organisations such as Business Link, Lloyds TSB, chartered accountants Garbutt & Elliott, Yorkshire Water and the Learning and Skills Council.

He has succeeded by fusing artistry with the latest technology, whether working for clients or capturing images all over the world and is constantly upgrading his systems. For the benefit of other photo-techno-buffs, he uses a Nikon digital kit, plus a fast, powerful two Gigahertz dual processor with 2.5 Gb of RAM Apple Mac G5 running Photoshop CS and broadband. The future? "I believe that my best pictures are yet to be taken."

Updated: 09:29 Tuesday, July 27, 2004