David Goodman has been taking pictures ever since he can remember and, photographically speaking, is largely self-taught.  As a young boy he was always grabbing the camera of his father—famous furrier Gus Goodman—to look through the viewfinder and push the buttons. When David was 8 his dad gave him one of his own cameras to play with and learn. Soon the elder Goodman - who was also a photo-bug since his youth - taught David film development and darkroom technique, and eventually the father/son photographers built a darkroom in the basement of their Long Island home. As a teenager, the younger Goodman spent his summer vacations working in his dad’s fur factory. When he was 15, he took the earnings of the summer to purchase his first 35mm camera, a Nikkormat FTN. After that, he was rarely seen without his camera, photographing anything and everything of interest. A favorite weekend activity was to hop on the Long Island Railroad with his best friend, run around Manhattan photographing whatever caught his eye, head back home to Westbury, and downstairs to the darkroom to see the day’s catch. In high school he was a mainstay of the Photography Club and the prime photo contributor to his senior yearbook. Also an aspiring actor, Goodman appeared in all of the high school musicals and photographed them as well. His love for both photography and theatre continued through college—Hofstra University—where he majored in theatre while photographing dozens of productions as well as photographing and editing the yearbook, all the while performing in many productions. After graduation, Goodman started photographing his fellow actors for their professional purposes and, at the age of 24, opened his first photography studio specializing in theatre, headshots, and fashion to pay the bills and to finance his more personal work.

Eventually, Goodman became more involved with his family business, and, seeing an opportunity for a different kind of creative expression, joined the company full-time as designer. During his years at Goodman Couture, David earned a reputation as an innovative trailblazer. He single-handedly created the then-unknown category of fur-lined leather bomber jackets and created an entire line of reversible fun furs geared toward a hip younger generation. He also expanded the company’s reach by creating a line of luxurious Italian cashmere knit sportswear. Goodman was also an innovator in revolutionary fur manufacturing techniques, and even won a U.S. patent for one of them. During his years at Goodman Couture, David handled all the fashion photography for the company, while continuing his personal photographic work. 

In his early years, David was primarily interested in black and white film photography. But in 2002 he made the switch to digital—and color—and never looked back. In 2013, Goodman returned to photography full-time, taking his camera to the streets of New York City where his visual interests shifted to cityscapes and street life, and which eventually led to his current residency on New York City’s iconic High Line Park.