A man from Exmouth who travelled the world as a newspaper photographer has died aged 74.

Ian Louis David Robinson was born on October 18, 1948 and died on November 26, 2022.

Ian died just before Christmas of motor neurone disease after one year of illness.

Ian was born in Exmouth and lived in the town until 1966. He attended the Boys' Grammar School at Withycombe.

Ian left Exmouth to become a social worker but eventually became a freelance journalist and photographer who had a lot of his work published in many national newspapers, including a large photo on front page of The Independent of three Buddhist Priests on Dartmoor. He mostly wrote his own stories to accompany his photography.

Ian's brother, Brian who currently lives in Exmouth, describes his brother as 'Exmouth’s own Indiana Jones'.

Ian helped capture a double-murder whilst covering Mardi Gras in New Orleans and after being main trial witness, he was awarded an Honorary Sheriff of Louisiana.

As a social worker, he pushed a wheelchair from Derby to Sheffield to raise money for Stoke Mandeville Hospital.

Ian loved to travel to far off places like Big Bend, Texas, for Mountain Bike Magazine, and had stories and escapades published in Land Rover Monthly amongst many others.

Ian was also the official photographer for a number of international events including the Yukon Quest 2,000-mile dog sledge race in Alaska,  Land Rover Camel Trophy races, Operation Raleigh Expeditions under colonel John-Blashford Snell in Borneo (where he was once attacked by Orangutan) and Mongolia, where he was thrown from a collapsing bridge.

Tribute was paid to Ian's love of Land Rovers at his funeral, when his family  arranged a special procession of a converted hearse Land Rover as the lead car.