JO HAYWOOD puts the work of a pioneering Yorkshire photographer in the frame.

Frank Meadow Sutcliffe put Whitby on the map. Born 150 years ago this month, his sepia images of life in the Yorkshire seaside town travelled the globe, collecting praise and prizes along the way. He, on the other hand, stayed put. "His work made Whitby into a photographer's Mecca," says Charles Bowden, producer of The Camera Man, a documentary celebrating Sutcliffe and his work to be shown on Yorkshire Television tomorrow.

"He won numerous awards and was much in demand, but he was never tempted to follow his photographs on their travels."

Frank Meadow Sutcliffe was born in October 1853 in Headingley, Leeds. His father, Thomas, was a watercolour artist who encouraged his son, while he still in his infancy, to take an interest in the new art of photography.

In 1875, the family moved to Whitby where young Frank turned a disused jet workshop in Waterloo yard into a studio.

He began to make a living taking formal portraits, but his real passion was capturing Whitby and its people. He photographed fishermen and their families, farm workers labouring on the land, and scenes up and down the nearby coast.

"His photographs were beautifully composed without being artificially set up," says Charles. "He had a real artist's eye."

From a technical point of view, taking pictures could be a difficult, physically demanding process in Victorian times.

Weighed down by his heavy camera and awkward tripod, and carrying a bag full of glass plate negatives, Sutcliffe often struggled to record his images - especially in stormy weather.

North Yorkshire landscape photographer Joe Cornish has a particular fondness for his picture of waves crashing over Whitby pier during a winter storm. "Despite his camera's limitations," he says, "Sutcliffe has somehow captured all the drama of the moment in a beautifully composed photograph."

In a career spanning 50 years, he took more than 1,500 pictures, which were exhibited around the world and netted 62 gold, silver and bronze medals.

He retired from photography in 1922 and sold his entire collection of glass plate negatives. Within a week he had been appointed curator of Whitby Museum, where he worked until his death in 1941.

The Sutcliffe collection was bought in 1959 by professional photographer Bill Eglon Shaw.

It remains in his family's ownership to this day and can be seen at the Sutcliffe Gallery in Whitby.

"Compared to other photographers of his era, he managed to produce pictures from his photographs as opposed to just a straight record," says Michael Shaw, Bill's son and curator of the collection.

"The combination of technical quality and artist input make them very special indeed."

More than 60 years after his death, people are still drawn to the gallery and the town itself as a direct result of the master photographer's work.

One such devotee is musician Ray Randall, a member of the Sixties group The Tornadoes. Ray, from London, had been away from the pop scene for 30 years. One day he saw Sutcliffe's photo of fishergirl Polly Swallow and, fascinated by her beauty, travelled to Whitby to discover more.

"I found myself writing songs again," he says. "And they were all about Polly Swallow."

At the same time Jenny Matthews journeyed from Lancashire to Whitby to find out more about another Sutcliffe character, fishergirl Lizzie Hawksfield.

By chance she and Ray met, fell in love and set up home together. And now Ray, with Jenny as his manager, is back playing his music in pubs and clubs around North Yorkshire. "It was pure chance," says Jenny. "But Sutcliffe brought us together."

Updated: 11:16 Saturday, October 18, 2003