Raised in Berkeley, California, Michael Stokes is now a Los Angeles-based photographer. He graduated first in his class and Phi Beta Kappa with a Fine Art degree through the film department at California State University, Long Beach. Before changing his career path to filmmaking, he was a photography major, learning pre-digital photographic techniques and using darkrooms and silver gelatin film. In film school, he wrote and directed a short film, Alien, that screened in film festivals around the world.
Michael’s first coffee table book, Masculinity (2012), was a glamour-styled, photographic male figure study book that is currently out of print. In the same style as his first, his second book, Bare Strength (2014), is already in its third printing and is available on Amazon. It features a chapter on wounded veterans of war, specifically amputees. From the sales of this book, he has donated $10,000 to the Semper Fi Fund, a charity that benefits veterans of war and their families. Also in 2014, Michael collaborated with the publisher Taschen to produce My Buddy, supplying the publisher with his collection of vintage photos of nude WWII soldiers.
Michael's third and fourth books, Exhibition and Always Loyal release November 1, 2015. Exhibition continues the exploration and celebration of the male figure, while Always Loyal is dedicated exclusively to wounded United States veterans. Before the end of 2015, from pre-sales of both books, Michael will donate $20,000 to the Semper Fi Fund.
Michael’s photos of wounded veterans have been shared around the world and have been featured on television: Good Morning America, The Today Show, The Tonight Show, The View, and The Talk. They have been featured in several major newspapers and online periodicals around the world, including: The Independent UK, The Mirror UK, The Drudge Report, The Huffington Post, The Huffington Post (French Edition), Cosmopolitan, People magazine, BuzzFeed, and Vanity Fair Italy, just to mention a few.
Michael’s fashion and fitness photographs have been featured on America’s Next Top Model, have twice been the cover for Men’s Health Italy, and are used for more than twenty-five novel covers. Michael has also made personal appearances on television’s The Insider and Inside Edition.
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