Everybody shoot landscape. But
only selected create some good ones. What did they missed to make
it good?
Art, in all forms, is immensely subjective.
I don’t know if anybody can give
universal reasons why something
should be categorized as “good” or
“bad”. I certainly do not have that understanding.
Some photographs touch
us emotionally, more deeply than others.
There are many reasons why this
could be, including; choice of subject
matter, technical excellence, aesthetic
pleasure, personal resonance, intellectual
curiosity, etc.
You do very intense personal project
and also commercial project. What
interesting for us is both project
output have the same style and the
same character. While some photographer
do a very different style &
character of output when shooting
for personal & commercial project.
What do you think about this? Why
can’t they do the same?
I am very fortunate and due to the success of my landscape work, I have
been able to accept commercial work
which allows me to use my personal
style of photographing. There would
really be no reason for anybody to
commission me if they didn’t want the
resulting images to be in my style. I am
also not sure I could photograph very
well in any other way. Practically speaking,
most photographers are not in a
position to turn down work and it is
necessary for them to adapt their style
and technique to the client’s needs and
wishes. I would certainly do the same
if my fine art work did not give me any
income!
Mention one word that describe
your photos
Sorry, I cant : ) I will leave that answer
for somebody else



What kind of picture deserve labeled
as “the great one”?
I think a book could be written on
this subject! In fact, many have been.
I believe a “great” photograph is in
the mind, heart, soul and spirit of the
beholder. Some photographs may be
considered “great” by consensus, others
by single individuals. There are “great”
photographs by ordinary photographers,
and ordinary photographs by
“great” photographers. Ultimately,
“great” is a label, subjectively applied.
You regularly do exhibition. Do you
think all photographers should do
exhibitions regularly? How often?
And please explain the reasons.
I cannot speak for other photographers.
For myself, I think it is important
to share images, whether it is through
exhibitions, web sites, books, calendars,
posters, notecards, etc. I think one
of the prime reasons to be a photographer
is the willingness and even
necessity to exhibit what is created.
Being a photographer means that I
hunt for experiences. I am privileged to
witness amazing things. I try to record
and interpret them. I don’t believe I
should hoard the results. I like to think
that I am a medium for others to see
things they might not otherwise have
the opportunity to see. I think that I am
really a guide.

Practically, exhibitions give me deadlines
to finish prints. They help me to
survey a body of work objectively, and
I am always interested in the viewers
reactions and responses. Exhibitions
also enable to me to survive because
my livelihood is very much based in
print sales.
If there is some kind of checklist
to achieved before you press the
shutter release, what aspect/point
should be on the list?
I would suggest that there is some sort
of resonance, connection or personal
response with the subject matter. But it
is different for everybody. Sometimes,
it is a form of therapy just to wander
and photograph. The results may not
even matter. Sometimes it helps to
see, understand and connect us the
world. Sometimes, it does precisely the
opposite and rather than experience
the world itself we hide behind the
camera. I like to think that I am having
a conversation with whatever I photograph.
I try not to steal an image, but
rather acknowledge that a photograph
is being made.
I look for an interesting composition,
an arrangement of shapes and tonalities.
I am drawn to certain lighting conditions and atmospheres. But it is
all so personal. For example I’ve always
liked to photograph in “conditions”;
mist, rain, snow, etc., where distracting
backgrounds are eliminated or subdued.
Sunshine and blue sky has never
appealed to me. Too much light tends
to reveal all the details of a scene and
I am not interested in a perfect photocopy.
I prefer suggestion over description.
I like to use the analogy of haiku
poetry where just a few elements act as
catalysts for one’s imagination. Often
I make long time exposures so that
detailed water becomes floating mist,
clouds in the sky become blurred masses
of tonality and a populated scene
becomes empty. The world is pretty
chaotic, seemingly always speeding up
and getting louder and more visually
dense. I am interested in finding and/or
creating calm shelters from the storm,
places where quiet solitude is encouraged
and inner contemplation is possible.
I think we could all use a break
from time to time…

You know, I don’t really think I’m a pure
landscape photographer even if, it’s a
fact, I often shot landscapes… I’m going
to try to explain..

Mainly, my photographs are my way to
show and express some of my feelings
and my personal perception of what
surrounds me. Photography, for me, is
not about reproducing the world. I’m
not really interested in making an accurate
copy of what I see out there. In
fact, I really prefer the power of suggestion
over description. What you can see
in my photographic work goes through
my own filters. OK… all the elements in
my photos exist, and everybody could
easily see them, but my goal is to offer
an artistic interpretation and above all
an emotion.

When everybody have a camera,
the first thing they shoot is landscape (beside people
around them). But not so many
people can shoot landscape on
a very good quality. What have
they missed on shooting landscape?
Why not so many people
can shoot good?

It’s really a very difficult question. I
don’t know. And I don’t know what is «
a good photo

I just could speak about what amazes
me, what touches me but certainly not
what is good or not. Creating image
isn’t easy. For me it’s just a need, a must
do, pics are a great part of my life, I love
doing that, and that’s what I do the
best in life.

You shoot landscape mostly (or
even all) in black & white. Why?
Don’t you like taking landscape
on color?

As I’ve already said, b&w was a revelation
for me, it’s the way I found to
express all of my feelings. I love the
colors of life, but my pics don’t speak
about reality, just about my emotions
and feelings. I can’t express my feelings
in colors.

What inspired you & triggered
you on taking photos?

More than landscapes which surrounds to do a good photograph
me, my goal in my photographic work
is just to share a poetic feeling in order
to emphasize imagination, a door
opened on the dream of the light. But
to answer more accurately, I would
say I just show the elements I see and
use those elements as catalysts for my
own imagination and hopefully for the
viewer’s imagination. I’m generally attracted
to places where stories can take
place, where imagination can be fired.

What kind of picture deserve
labeled as “the great one” on
your opinion?

One which could touch my heart.

Mention one word that describe
your photos.

Two words, please.. I would say light
and motion.

Share some tips for them who
want to learn photography appropriately.

I’m afraid I’ve no serious tips to share.
The best advice is to have fun, to open
your eyes to the world and let your
feelings going on… techniques is techniques
and it never speaks about how
More than landscapes which surrounds to do a good photograph

How did you know photography? Tell us from the beginning.
It started as a hobby, and from hobby it became a profession and later it became
a passion. Photography has become a big part of my life. I can only remember
shooting around with a compact camera when I was 13 years old. I took photography
seriously only while I was studying at graphic design school, and that was
14 years ago.

What interesting to you in photography?
I am more of an artist, a trained graphic designer. Photography to me is the fastest
way to create an art piece. My passion is to bring to people pictures of God’s
creation and pictures that touch lives.

You had a graphic design formal education background. Does it
help for your photography capability?
Definitely, we were trained to have eyes for colors, balance, line-arts and flexible
mind to create, etc. I often find myself out there try to create pictures instead of
taking good picture.

What’s the most difficult thing
shooting landscape?
I love the mother nature and the challenge
of the unpredictable weather. We
can have the best equipments in our
hands and as creative as we can be but
if the weather does not cooperate with
us, there’s nothing we can do. To me
that’s a great challenge.

We have seen so many landscape
picture. There are some
photographer that shoot the
same spot but get different
result. What should we pay attention
more to create a better
shot even in the same spot with
others?
Capture with your heart, it will be your
style. The idea is to be creative and not
to follow others. Remember, if the result
of what you are going to shoot will
be the same as others’, what’s so great
about your photographs then? What
impact can it make? A great photogra-
pher’s work will bring the audience to a
new level of visual experience.

Are you a kind of photographer
that tell a message on any of
your photos or a kind that only
pursuit a “good visual”? Please
explain why?
A good picture is when it tells a story.
Often what I capture does not have
the same impact. My job is to build the
stock photo library for the company I
work at, so I literally have to capture
almost everything.

What kind of photo satisfied you
most when creating it?
The kind of pictures that would make
me jump up and down when they were
captured and those that bring smiles to
people’s faces.
Whether it is a portrait, animal or
scenery….I love them all. Today, I enjoy
doing fine art photography and pictures
that leave strong impression to
the audiences.

Mention one word that describe
your photos.
Touching Lives

What is the most attractive spot/
location for you on shooting?
This is a tough question. Every place
I visited had its own beauty, it is the
question of how we appreciate it.

You said “photography is all
about opportunity. An artist
doesn’t make art – art happens.”
please explain.
As an artist, you may plan in mind the
kind of pictures you are going to shoot
but the results may not be what you
expect. You may agree with me that
sometimes the accidental shots are the
best ones.

What should a photographer
have in their mind when creating
a picture regarding that
statement.
Arts can happen anytime, anywhere.
It’s a challenge for a photographer to
always be ready and alert to capture
the moment

Please share us some tips to create
a good landscape photos.
Picture tells a story
Every picture tells a story. As an old
adage goes: “ a picture tells a thousand
words”, so the next time you take a
picture, ask yourself what story are you
going to tell. A good picture is the one
that speaks to you.
Foreground & Background
Photography is about composition. You
can go to a beach and take a picture,
but when you reach home and look
at the picture you took, what do you
see? You probably only see the sky and
the sea. The picture doesn’t look as
beautiful as the real thing. Why? That’s
because you don’t capture the atmosphere.
There are many things present
but you can’t capture them all into your
frame because it’s too big of an area.
That’s why the understanding of foreground
and background is important.
Try to bring a subject by the beach into
the foreground. It could be a flower, a
driftwood, a seashell, etc. This will give
depth to the image you are about to
take.

Colors
My pictures are often very colorful
because I know that colors attract
people’s attention. When I took a shot
of a bumblebee on a flower, I took time
to select the background. Remember,
whenever you take a picture you must
not only concentrate on the subject
matter but also to select a nice background.

Clean-cut
Focus on the subject that you want to
share with others, do not let unnecessary
objects distort your story. Many
times when you take a picture that
you think will be nice but turns out to
be not as nice as you thought it would
be. Why? There are many reasons, one
of them is because you have included
too many subjects in the same image.
Remember, when there are unnecessary
objects come into your frame, crop
it off. That is what I mean by Clean-cut.

Angle
It will be interesting if you can capture
your images from an angle that unpredictably
different from what others
would expect it to be/ from what others
would normally see . Capture your
images at a different angle and not at
eye level. It will give your pictures a
different feeling. If I shoot a picture from
the top of a tree, I’m also taking my
audiences up to the tree with me.

Warm Up
Most good pictures come unexpectedly.
Usually when I go on a photography
trip, I only shoot rubbish during
the first few days. You need to warm
up in order to get your system ready
to capture images. I remember on one
occasion I saw a man walking down the
road carrying two piles of wood one
on each side. Suddenly a gusty wind
blew his hat away up to the air. When I
finished focusing my lens, the hat had
already landed on the ground. A good
shot was missed! I said to myself if only
I had warmed up, I’m sure I would have
captured that moment.

Think Out of the Box
Do not think too technically because
it takes away your creativity. Get out
of the box! You will probably agree
with me that many experimental shots
turned out to be quite good. Allow
yourself the latitude to explore. Especially
with digital SLR camera today, no
film cost, so why wait?
In conclusion, photography is about
practice more than possessing a
creative eye, it is about making an
effort. You don’t wait for the picture
to come. You go for it. You must have
the attitude of mind that everything
has its own beauty and your role is to
bring out the beauty of each subject.
Remember you are the creator of the
image. You are the author of the story
that you are about to tell.

Share us some tips on how to
discover our distinct personal
style in our work.
This is probably the question I cannot
answer for you. If you are doing any
form of art whole-heartedly over a long
period of time, you are actually doing
a study about yourself. It is a journey
of discovering who you really are in
person, the deepest, unseen fragments
of yourself.
When you have a body of work in
which people can recognize you
through, you’ve successfully formulated
your style. So keep on doing
your art and reflect back on your own
work continuously. It is a journey and it
won’t happen overnight.

Share with us also the mindset &
habits that we should have to be
up to date to the current trend.
(I don’t quite understand this question)
Look at other photographers work and
study them carefully. Question them
why, why and why? Why are they good
or why are they not good?
Find a few artists whose work inspires
you the most and move towards that
direction.
Now I’m not talking about the work of
Joe the photographer from around the
corner here. You should be looking at
world’s best photographers’ work to
inspire you. Aim high and it is okay to
be a little bit ambitious, because that’s
what will take you far.

What words describe your work
best?
If I can only choose one word, it would
be the word ‘sultry’.
Sure I have made many non-feminine
images but I always tend to fall back
to my own nature – soft, feminine, and
sultry.

In your opinion, what makes a
great fashion photographer?
If we look back, the iconic fashion
photographers have always been those
who can reflect and respond to the
social issue happening in their era. And
they dare to respond to that controversially.
Helmut Newton is one good
example for this. And we have photographers
like Steven Meisel and David
Lachapelle in our time now.

And whats the definition of
“great image” for you?
Oh wow, it’s like asking what is the definition
of delicious food! Everyone will
have different opinions about this.
But art is about self-expression and it
is something that comes from inside
the creator’s feeling. So it works on a
personal level. Hence, in my opinion,
a piece of art is great when it is able to
evoke the emotion of the viewer.
This applies to photography. If you can
create an image that can evoke the
emotion of the viewer, whether it is
love, sadness, grief, awe, or even anger
or whatever it may be, you have made
a great image. And an image with emotional
level impact like that will not be
forgotten easily.
A great image has to work on a deeper
level than just being ‘eye candy’, like a
postcard photo that you will forget in
no time at all.

Could you share with us, beginners,
how to learn photography
effectively?
I think when you start learning photography
there are a few things that
you have to do. You have to start by
learning the basic camera operations
like shutter speed, aperture, white
balance, ISO, etc. You really need to
get very familiar with these. Also, learn
about what different focal length of the
lens have different effects on your image.
And finally and most importantly,
learn how to use artificial light sources,
flashes and tungsten.
This is photography not cameragraphy,
so please stop wasting time arguing
about which camera is the best and
which lens is the sharpest. Many photographers
spend way too much time
discussing about their equipment. My
advice is, to buy the equipment that
you can afford and get over it and start
shooting. Working professional photographers
treat their cameras as a tool
to create their work, just like a painter
uses a brush to paint.
After you pass that basic stage, you
need to learn how to make striking
images more than just correctly exposed
or correctly composed. This is the
stage where you have to think a lot and
prepare a lot before you shoot. Learn
about colours, learn about light, and
most importantly learn about making
conceptual images.
And the last stage, which I have discussed
before, is finding your work style.
This won’t happen overnight and will
take many years on the field to develop.

What brought you to do photography?
Could you share with us
a little bit of your background
story?
My passion for the creative world started
when I was very young. Of course, at
that time, I didn’t know anything about
photography. Our family had one camera
and it was this beautiful vintage
Voightlander. At the age of about 4, I
broke that camera into small pieces.
Obviously after that I was grounded;
not allowed to touch another camera
(hahahaha), at least not until I was old
enough to learn.
I liked drawing a lot when I was
younger and in particular, drawing
female figure. I know most kids love to
draw, however I was much more obsessed
with it than the other kids were.
I hardly paid any attention in class; I
just drew and drew and drew. Which
obviously got me into trouble many
times with the teachers. (hahahaha).
So, suffice to say I have always loved
and admired the female figure since an
early age.
My dad started teaching me how
to use a camera correctly when I
was about ten. It was a 1978 Canon
Rangefinder. This time I didn’t break it
into pieces and I started learning what
aperture was and what shutter speed
was, etc. But unfortunately, the cost of
buying films and developing them was
too expensive and so I had to stop.
In 2003, I finally bought my first camera.

It was this plastic low-end 35mm
SLR but it was enough to make me
feel over-the-moon. I bought a bunch
of expired films and soon after that I
couldn’t stop snapping almost anything
and everything. But at that time
I didn’t know that it was a start of a
brand new exciting journey in my life.
How did you learn photography?
Did you have a formal education
in photography?
Yes, I decided to take the full plunge
into photography in 2006 and I completed
a ‘Bachelor of Art in Photography’
degree at RMIT University, Australia.
It was here that I went from being
a “weekend warrior” to a professional
photographer.

What is it about fashion photography
that fascinates you?
In one word, women.
As I’ve explained before, since I was
very young I have always been attracted
to women and admired their beauty
and complexity. So I guess I’m doing
fashion photography because it is what
my personality responds to.
Fashion photography is the closest
sibling to movie making. This is one
genre of photography where you can
go pretty crazy with your ideas. One
thing that fashion photography is not
about, is documenting reality. Fashion
photography is never about reality.
It is about fantasy and story telling.
Very much like building a script for a
fictional movie.
You build your concept, create the
characters and put them into a set, and
then you direct the shoot. So you are
creating images – not documenting
reality. And that’s what fashion photography
is all about.
And that is exactly why I love fashion
photography; the dynamic nature of
it. There is always something new for
every photo shoot. Developing new
concepts, going to new places, new
challenges and meeting new and
exciting people. I just can’t ask for any
better job.

Fashion photography seems to
be the choice of many young
photographers nowadays. Could
you share some thoughts on this?
There are many reasons for this I think.
There is a general perception that
fashion photography is the “coolest”
genre in photography. People think
that being a fashion photographer is
so glamorous and you get to hang out
with beautiful girls all the time.
When you tell people that you are a still
life photographer for example, they will
respond “ahhhh okay” (with a bland
looking expression) but if you say
that you are a fashion photographer,
suddenly people’s reactions change to
“wow”. I think this perception is really
distorted because I believe fashion
photography is no more or less difficult
compared to any other genre. But I will
let you have your own opinion on that.
The problem now is that there are so
many other “fashion photographers”
out there who are doing it for the
wrong reasons. What they are doing is
actually very degrading. They just want
to shoot partially or fully nude girls and
basically take advantage of them.

Like what I mentioned before,
there are a lot more fashion photographers
out there nowadays.
Do you think in general their
quality is growing as fast as their
number?
I don’t believe I am in a position to generalize
and judge the quality of other
young fashion photographers out
there. But just like anything else, there
is a hierarchy that goes like a pyramid.
The quality photographers become
fewer and fewer as it gets closer to the
top.

When you are shooting fashion,
what are your goals? What do
you want to achieve and why?
It depends on the project, I suppose.
But in general, a successful shoot for
me is when every component of the
shoot falls right into place. They have
to feel right and “believable”, not forced
nor over-the-top. It has to have this
feeling of elegance.
First the concept has to be striking, the
photography technique used has to
be appropriate for the concept (more
complicated doesn’t mean its going to
be better), the styling has to be great,
makeup has to be neat and flawless,
and the model has to make the audience
believe that she is the character
we are trying to portray.
After the shoot, my team and myself
will look closely at the images. If they
strike us, it means we have exceeded
our own expectation. And hence, it is
successful. So we use a lot of “feeling”
here. After all, it’s not something we
can measure.
And obviously, a successful shoot also
means it has to exceed the client’s
expectation.

Tell us what is the most difficult
part you normally encounter
when conducting a fashion shoot?
Being a fashion photographer is like
being a captain of a ship with a large
crew. It is a big responsibility to carry.
There are a lot of decisions to make
that will eventually determine the success
of the photo shoot.
I am faced with various options and I
have to make decisions all throughout
the process. Whether it is in the
pre-production stage, when shooting,
or when post-producing the images.
And when a huge amount of money is
at stake, making a wrong decision can
be disastrous. And fashion shoots are
almost always very expensive to run.
So failure is really not an option. The
pressure is high.
So I guess the most difficult part of
being a fashion photographer is to be
a Captain who can drive the team to
success every time under any circumstance;
even when things are going
against you. And have you heard the
saying “You are only as good as your
last job!”

Check out the next part of this discussion.