shtick

Wow, how long has it been? I wonder who even reads this anymore, but here’s just a flashback which the future me can reminisce in. Ever since the last post, there has been a complete rethink of the life I want to live out. Not to the point of sounding too draggy, let’s have a quick look back at my career in short thus far.

May’07 - Graduated. Assisted Boon. Convinced about photography as career. Shanghai+Hongkong. Shot film. June’07 - Backpacked SEA. Buses only. Started zarlceiss.net. July’07 - Convocated. Made my 阿婆 wept for 1st time. An Old School Affair. Aug’07 - Stardust. A Pixels Photography. Began assisting. $1.4k/mth. Mercedes Benz Car Shoot. Sept’07 - Macau Tower Bungee Jump. Shot for NTU with Ares. Started WAYW.SG. Oct’07 - McDonald’s. KFC. Pizza Hut. Maybank. IKEA. Harvey Norman. Robinson. VISA. Nov’07 - Pay increment. $1.6k/mth. Spent 2 weeks training as a retoucher by Yaowei. Dec’07 - Resigned. Emailed resumes to Shooting Gallery, Cactus Studio, J Studio, Calibre Pics, and Teo Studio. Only Teo Studio called back. Asked if I freelance. Became a freelancer thereafter. Jan’08 - Sean resigned. Went for interview with Geoff Ang. On trial for the Boeing A360 job. Didn’t get the job. Feb’08 - Freelance assist. Geoff Studios. Calibre Pics (Jimmy Fok). Cactus (Aek & Joyce Choo). PA (Production Assistant) with Moviola & Cliqasia. $100/day. Met John. Drove Joyce’s van into a wall. Assisted Boon for Nike ad. Found myself on the Nike behind-the-scenes website. Shot for JUICE Magazine. Little income. < 5 bookings/mth. Hit low point when I had to go back to Eastgear as part-time sales promoter. Freelance for MILK Photography. Impressed Olivier. Mar’08 - Got hired as first assistant. $1.5k/mth w/o CPF. Studio @ Mt. Sophia. French commercial/celebrity photographer. Oli in short. Gay. April’08 - Nivea (Jessica Liu). 12 Lotus (Royston Tan). Gurmit Singh. Adrian Pang. Michelle Chong. Mi Xue. Andrea Fonseca. Wong Li Lin. Allan Wu. Fiona Xie. May’08 - Raoul. Cynthia Koh. Rebecca Tan. Electrico. Utt. Eunice Olsen. Qi Yu Wu. Mindee Ong. June’08 - Paris trip didn’t materialize. July’08 - Resigned. Decided to freelance assist & work on portfolio. Aug’08 - Freelance assist. Increased day rate to $150/day. Pussycat dolls. Singapore Airlines. Shooting Gallery eventually came calling. Went for interview. Rejected them. Worked for Groovy for first time. Worked with Ukay. Sept’08 - Shot Linn’s wedding in Sabah. $1,200/day. Shot Audrey’s wedding in Singapore. $600/half-day. Bought studio equipment with Sean to start on portfolio building. Spent $2,500 each. Borrowed Ukay’s camera. Oct’08 - Worked with Allan for the first time. Worked with $250/day Zam & Halid. Increased my day rate again to $180/day. Focused on still life portfolio. Shoot at Sean’s living house. Nov’08 - Raoul. Gave 阿婆 birthday ang pow and made her wept the 2nd time. Dec’08 - Shot Danny’s wedding. FOC. AMEX. Ran first marathon. Orchard ION. DELL. MOE. Starhub. Jan’09 - Singapore Airlines. MOE. EDB. Worked with Yang Tan for first time. Feb’09 - Shot Sean’s wedding. FOC. Yang Tan again. C3A. Mar’09 - Assisted for the very last time. Coldplay. Vietnam. April’09 - Replanned portfolio. Planned marketing for photography. May’09 - First commercial job. L’Oreal Vichy, courtesy of Honwui. $700. June’09 - Zero jobs. Desperate. Decided to market as still life photographer. Worked harder on portfolio. This time shoot at my own living room. Printed book. Confused about future. Received recruitment letter from MOE. Applied. Receive interview date. Didn’t go. Ran out on savings. Borrowed money from mum. July’09 - Mum desperate. Visited fortune teller secretly. Changed my chinese name. Same phonics, different characters. Bank not enough money to pay insurance. Mum helped to pay. Aug’09 - Cold-called agencies. Had a meeting out of >50 calls. Didn’t turn out good. CJ (ex-colleague from MILK) recommended me to Jane. Jane worked in Toffees & Devs, an ad agency. Commissioned to shoot a series of portraits for Merck & Co. without even looking at my portfolio. Nationwide campaign to raise awareness against cervical cancer. $1,850. So much for building still life portfolio over last 6 months. Borrowed money again from mum to cover production costs of shoot. Sept’09 - Zero jobs again. Booked to shoot for 3M next month. Oct’09 - Shot Gracia’s wedding. FOC. Still no news on 3M. Zero jobs. Desperate again. Rethought about future. Reconsidered MOE. NOV’09 - L’Oreal Vichy Press Conference. $300. Finally reapplied to MOE. Went to Genting. Went for MOE interview. Received offer letter. DEC’09 - Ran second marathon. 3M job is back on. Seoul’d Out Press Conference for KOZINE. $300. 3M Scotch Portrait Shoot. $3,600. Laptop died on eve of shoot. Sent for repair. Borrowed money from mum again. Signed with MOE. 3M PostIt Environmental Portrait Shoot for website. $1,000. JAN’10 - 3M Polarizing Light Product Shoot. $2,800. Planning to start retouching workshops for amateurs with Fad (MILK ex-colleague). Planning to start tuition agency with Sean. 3M PostIt Portrait Shoot with Singapore Idol Jasmine Tye. $1,700. Taiwan trip awaits. to be continued….