Bio

Walter Wick's photographic tricks have captivated fans of his books, including the I Spy and Can You See What I See series.

Download Walter Wick's full-color biography (1.8 MB PDF) 

More than 38 million copies of Walter Wick's books have been sold worldwide. Best known for brilliant search-and-find photographs, he is the author, creator, and photographer of the Can  You See What I See? series, as well as the co-creator and photographer of the I Spy books. He is  also the author and photographer of two awardwinning science books, A Drop of Water:A Book of  Science and Wonder and Walter Wick's Optical Tricks.

Even as a child, Walter loved to tinker and build. Using discarded roller skates and plywood, he  made skateboards for himself and other children in his rural Connecticut neighborhood. He developed an interest in photography in high school, and then attended Paier College of Art, where he studied photojournalism and landscape photography.

As a young photographer, one of Walter's goals was to work for Games magazine. At his own expense, Walter built and photographed a mirror maze and submitted it to Games. The editors were impressed; they acquired that puzzle and immediately signed up more. As his reputation grew, Walter photographed covers for books and magazines, including Psychology Today, Discover, and Newsweek.

One day when cleaning out a drawer, he arranged the odds and ends - screws, safety pins,  springs, washers, a chain - on a glass tabletop. He liked the result, photographed it, and made it into an art sample, which he sent to editors and art directors. The photograph became the inspiration for a poster for Let's Find Out Magazine, which in turn was the spark that set off the first I Spy book, with riddles by Jean Marzollo. Eleven years later, Walter published Can You See What I See?, which appeared on the New York Times Bestseller List for 22 weeks and inspired such sequels as The Night Before Christmas, Scary Scary Night, and Treasure Ship. With each new book in the Can You See What I See? series, Walter takes photographic illustration to greater heights of aesthetic achievement.

Whether creating photographic compositions out of odds and ends or out of elaborate sets that he  constructs with a team of model makers, Walter Wick opens the eyes and tickles the fancy of young and old alike.

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