Being a photographer, regardless of the genre of photography, means capturing a moment or image for all time. It sounds like a daunting prospect, and to be fair, it kind of is. There’s a lot that goes into getting a perfect shot, from staging the moment just right to lighting it perfectly to even the equipment you work with, and we don’t just mean the camera you use. This is where photographers come in, and why photographers charge the rates they do is because this knowledge is vital for getting that elusive perfect shot, and the equipment photographers need to use doesn’t come cheap either.
But with today’s technology, you don’t always need the big cameras and fancy equipment to capture the perfect photo, and this – just how they can capture the perfect shot even without the equipment of a professional photographer – is something conceptual and food photographer Tai Hsin Shiek hopes to show a select group at an upcoming workshop, “Learn, Edit, Shoot” on 24 April, hosted by THE OFFICE in partnership with Tai.
Brunch caught up with Tai ahead of Learn, Edit, Shoot for a little more insight into the workshop and Tai’s own journey as a photographer.
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Tai Hsin Shiek[/caption]
Getting to know Tai
Tai started out as a software engineer (an avenue he pursued at his mother’s behest) and worked in the field across many positions to test himself and discover what he would like doing best. Tai’s work in the software engineering field included, among other things, being a beta QA tester, and technical writing. While finding his feet in the software engineering field, Tai understood that he likes taking pictures, and in his words “there were a few transfers here and there and then I got into photography”.
A powerful moment in Tai’s photography career was when photographer Dylan Seedin reached out to him, having been impressed with one of Tai’s photographs. “He’d seen one of my pictures, which was really impressive,” Tai shared. “It had been taken in low light and in a tricky place. Dylan understood that I could take a shot in any situation.”
Tai went on to work with Seedin for one-and-a-half years before going on to work with many other Sri Lankan photographers, including Geeshan Bandara and Praveen Mirando, before finally narrowing down his preferred genre to conceptual shooting and food photography.
“About two years ago, I worked closely with Lanka Comic Con, taking photos of cosplayers at the event,” Tai explained, adding that working with cosplayers, he gained a deeper understanding of the effort cosplayers put into their creations. “Cosplay is not simply the replication of a character; it’s a personal depiction of who you are and how you relate to the character, and who you want to be with that character, regardless of your body size or anything like that. You do that cosplay because you are comfortable in your own skin and the cosplay makes you feel like a different person. As a photographer, I thought I should take this chance to show them what they really love.”
Tai’s work with Lanka Comic Con led him to connect with SFX makeup artist and cosplayer Opula Fonseka, and they formed a creative partnership where the two worked on shoots together. Tai shared that one of Tai’s shoots with Opula, “Alpha”, inspired by the Kali Goddess and influences of Kandyan jewellery and culture, was very well received and even went viral. Their next collaborative shoot, incidentally, comes out later this week and has to do with the model’s idea of being a mermaid and creating a shoot that has something to do with water. The shoot is titled “Naiad”, which means water spirit.
Another project in Tai’s pipeline is a storytelling project in collaboration with creative movement Good Grove Society Founder and CEO Mahesh Dharmadasa.
Learn, Shoot, Edit
Tai’s upcoming photography workshop Learn, Shoot, Edit is hosted by contemporary co-working space and cafe THE OFFICE in partnership with Tai as an endeavour to promote top-notch photography skill, whether professionally or as a hobby.
Part of Tai’s motivation behind Learn, Shoot, Edit is the chance to provide young entrepreneurs and microbusinesses with the opportunity to learn how they can take the best pictures possible with the equipment they have.
“What I’ve understood is that phones nowadays are really sophisticated, and a lot of home bakers, for example, want to get stuff done but don’t have big budgets. When they want pictures taken, there is sometimes no point hiring professionals,” Tai said. “That’s part of why we’re doing this workshop – to educate them as to what they can do on their phones besides just taking a normal picture, because we’ve found that many people have phones like the iPhone 12 but have no idea that there is so much they can do. We want to show people how to use and harness the power of their phones.”
Learn, Shoot, Edit is an interactive workshop and is meant to be for all kinds of photographers, from people looking to pursue photography as a hobby to those looking to do it professionally. The workshop will cover common issues in photography to struggles in editing to learning how to draw up a production.
“At the end of the day, we want to see Sri Lankan photography grow,” Tai shared. “And this workshop is a chance for people to see what professional photography is and what you need to get to this level and show that it’s not just taking a picture.”