MAN'S FOCUS ON IMAGES NEAR OR FAR; PHOTOGRAPHER HUNTS FASCINATION.

Byline: Victoria Giraud / People and Places

When photographer Don Wiechec walks into the Santa Monica Mountains, he thinks of himself as a hunter, stalking the light.

``I first learned to look and later to see. There's a great distinction. Sometimes it takes 30 years to learn to see,'' Wiechec said.

His photos of mountain scenes are used in brochures and exhibits by the National Park Service, and a collection of 10 of his photos is in the French National Collection at the Bibliotech Nationale.

Wiechec has had shows of his photographs in Europe and around the U.S.

He is planning to publish a book of his mountain photos, but before that, he and his wife, Betty, also a photographer, will publish a book of photos about the people and culture of Burma, the nation now known as Myanmar.

Fascinated with places like Rangoon and Mandalay, Don said he and Betty ``wanted to go to Burma all our lives.'' From December '95 until January this year, the couple made four trips to take photographs.

Even though they could only wangle monthlong visas because of Myanmar's military regime, they were not disappointed in this interesting country. Burmese, Wiechec said, have the highest literacy rate in Southeast Asia, are a gracious people and have ``a rich social life and little crime.''

Wiechec found that new housing tracts in Myanmar reminded him of his hometown, Agoura Hills. The couple ventured all over the country looking for interesting subjects, taking care to observe Wiechec's credo: ``Don't steal pictures; always ask.''

Inside the famed Pindaya Cave, using only ambient light and long exposure time, Wiechec photographed some of the 15,000 images of Buddha. One of these was a statue done apparently while Buddha was still alive.

They found other unusual opportunities like photographing a shaman healing, and a trance ceremony. One of his particular favorites is a photographic series of an 8-year-old boy herding his father's water buffalo from atop the same animal.

The book, which hasn't been named yet but is scheduled for a January publication date, will have 350 color photographs and 20 pages of explanatory text. And when this is finished, Wiechec is planning other books on Myanmar, especially a much-needed book in English on Burmese art.

Wiechec's first taste of Southeast Asia came when he served in the Vietnam War as a young Marine Corps captain. As the titular mayor and ``public works guy,'' Wiechec was in charge of rebuilding in a town of 20,000 people and feeding 5,000 refugees.

``The experience changed my life completely,'' Wiechec remembers. ``I see America as foreigners do us. The American Dream was fractured for me and I became attracted to foreign travel.''

When he returned from Vietnam in 1968, he and Betty decided to go to New York University Film School.

After film school, the pair spent the next 13 years making documentary films. ``Get Off,'' a film about heroin use for the New Jersey school system, and ``Inner Edge,'' a film for CBS that explored a sports star's moments of peak performance were two of them.

A ``fierce dedication'' to ensuring that their home in Liberty Canyon was not going to be threatened by a proposed tri-state motocross course in the nearby mountains inspired Wiechec to photographically discover the Santa Monica Mountains.

``I got a chance to do things that stay with people,'' Wiechec said. ``Photography is about involving the viewer, making people a part of the image, triggering someone's imagination.''