Ian Coristine became comfortable using a camera while flying during a 22-year career in the aviation business. His air-to-air photography has graced many magazine covers and articles, while serving his former business, the distribution of Challenger recreational aircraft across Canada.
In 1992, a random flight in a float-equipped Challenger led to his discovery of the the 1000 Islands. It was love at first sight. A quest began and three years later he became the owner of a small island, quite literally one in a thousand because it offered perfect protection for his plane from marauding storms. A natural harbor exactly a wingspan wide with a sloping lawn at the end allows him to taxi onto dry land to a perfectly sheltered tie-down.
His islands photography began as an attempt to show friends what he had “discovered,” but he soon realized a number of unlikely ingredients had converged to present an opportunity. He owned the perfect plane for the task and unlike most photographers who are expected to capture the spirit of a place in a brief visit, he was living in the assignment. If the magic didn’t cooperate today, he could try again tomorrow or the next day, week, month or year. He began to realize this was more than an opportunity, it was an obligation. If he didn’t do it, it was very unlikely these ingredients would come together again.
Coristine's first book of photography, The 1000 Islands, was an astonishing success, selling out three large printings and becoming by far the most successful book about the place ever to appear. It is now a sought-after collectible. Water, Wind and Sky was crafted with a stronger focus on the art of the place for the people who shared his passion for the islands and was released in 2005. His third book, The Thousand Islands, completed a trilogy of books about the River in 2006. All three were bestsellers, with over 55,000 copies sold despite not being distributed beyond the immediate region. A smaller, fourth booklet 1000 Islands was published in 2007 and sold out a print run of 30,000 copies, winning a Premier Print "Benny" Award in the graphic arts industry's largest and most prestigious worldwide printing competition.
His fifth and final book of photography of the Thousand Islands will be released in the spring of 2010. Titled The very best of Ian Coristine’s 1000 Islands, it is a compilation of his finest photographs, selected from a library which exceeds 30,000 images.
His Thousand Islands photographs have been featured internationally, in Canadian Geographic, Central New York Magazine, Coastal Living, Cottage Life, Country Discoveries, Le Figaro (France), Gourmet, Kingston Life, Lakeland Boating, Les Echos Serie Limitée (France), SAIL Magazine, Volvo's LIV Magazine (International Edition), Volvo Car España (Spain), as well as in a number of books and publications by other authors about the region.
The first one-man gallery exhibition of his work was held at the Brockville Arts Center in 2004. The Antique Boat Museum in Clayton, New York featured “Aerial Perspectives – The Photography of Ian Coristine” during the summer of 2005. The popularity of that exhibit prompted a sequel “Another Aerial Perspective” in the summer of 2006. Onondaga Community College, in conjunction with the Everson Museum of Art, brought Coristine's images to Syracuse, NY with historian and professor emeritus Paul Malo through an exhibition titled "A Floating World." St. Lawrence University in Canton, N.Y. hosted "A Floating World - Ian Coristine's Thousand Islands", again with Professsor Malo at the Richard F. Brush Art Gallery.
DxO Labs of Paris, France, award winning publishers of revolutionary high-end camera and lens correction software, selected Coristine as one of their 12 founding "Image Masters" from professional photographers around the world. The City of Brockville, Ontario nominated him for its “Tourism Award” in recognition of the attention his work has brought the region.