A week has passed in July 2024, writing down my recaps, thoughts and views on my article, “Reflecting Q2 2024 and H1 2024 (Photography | Travel | Creative | Heritage)”, took me much longer than I was planning for. I decided to push myself, finally getting this article off my back and publishing my reflections article for Q2 and H1 2024 in my photography, travel, creative and heritage sectors.
Photography
Photography Business
On the topic of my photography business, Q1 2024 was not too bad. However for Q2 2024, that wasn’t the scenario. While there would be always be ups and downs in any business, Q2 2024 didn’t go as planned and the situation wasn’t good. While part of it could be attributed to the slowdown in the economy during Q2 2024, the increased competition along with a smaller pie doesn’t make it any easier.
Personal Photography
Having your own personal photography is important for us professional photographers, where we can dedicate our own craft and passion in photography and visual storytelling without the demands and expectations from clients or agencies. I am enjoying my own personal photography, on my own terms and time.
I have recently got onboard Everything is Ephemere platform, a small photography space in Tokyo as a contributor. This is an eye-opener for me, interacting and knowing more visual storytellers from different parts of the world. This would be an excellent opportunity to bring my visual storytelling and writing to another level with all these invaluable experiences and opportunities.
Uploading backlogged photographs to TGH Photography portfolio and Flickr
Finally, I am working on my vastly backlogged photographs from my past few years. I am curating two different sets of photographs, the first set would be curated for my TGH Photography portfolio website. The other set would be for my Flickr photography collections.
Web Hosting Migration
I am still considering to migrate my TGH Photography and Travel website to another hosting company as I am pretty frustrated with my current hosting company customer service and backend server issues.
Travel
Local Travel
While I have pretty much travelled around exploring Singapore, I am going to revisit and re-explore some of my local travels and visual storytelling around local Singapore, updating my Flickr Photographs from Singapore Collection.
Overseas Travel
Enough said and repeated like a broken recorder of my previous reflections. I think I really have to take action and plan a real and proper travel holiday break away from Singapore.
I am still planning and looking for travel photography opportunities overseas, whether on assignments or working on travel photography trips. The start would be regional Southeast Asia before going into Asia markets.
Creative
Photo book projects
Publishing photo book projects are back on my cards, I recently tested out this publishing firm TinTint from Taiwan, with this GenAI artworks photo book project. The platform, the user interface and templates for making a photo book are really useful and handy for me, who is not trained nor have the flair in design and doing photo book layouts, versus MagCloud platform whereby I have to be on my own in doing design and layout.
As for the print quality, I would need to do a few more test prints before I can come up with a more conclusive view.
Interviewing Creatives, Artists, Visual Storytellers, Photographers
A feature that I was doing in 2023, they are making a comeback in Q3 2024 – interviewing creatives, artists, visual storytellers and photographers. I would love to continue where I left off last year, interviewing creatives, artists, visual storytellers and photographers.
Content Creation
Although I have been actively doing content creation over the years, there were many a times whereby I felt jaded and burnt out, sometimes I just don’t wish or want to post on my social media channels.
As I am reflecting and re-looking at my content creation, pitching to companies/brands and agencies, how I would utilise and build my short form video further on TikTok and Instagram Reels, and vlogging for long form video for my visual storytelling in travels and photo stories.
Heritage
As for my heritage sector for my visual storytelling and documentation, I would continue with my ongoing small scale heritage projects and visual storytelling documentation. Balancing and scheduling between my photo book prints on other areas of interests/projects, I still plan to bring one of my personal heritage projects to life, in the form of publishing a photo book.
Personal Thoughts
Geo-political Tensions
The ongoing geo-political situations around the world are a big worry, amidst fears of further escalations that might draw countries in that particular region into this rabbit hole. Personally, I hope those geo-political tensions don’t escalate further or else, the consequences will be much worse.
Fatigue
For my readers, followers and that folks (brands and PR agencies) that I have been working with, you would have noticed a slowdown in my articles publishing. There is a part on fatigue that I didn’t mention too much, maybe it’s a signal that I need to take a real and proper travel holiday break away from Singapore.
Reflecting Q2 2024 and H1 2024 (Technology | Business | Personal)
Do also visit my TGH Technology and Business website and read the other of my reflections article – Reflecting Q2 2024 and H1 2024 (Technology | Business | Personal).
Definitely not a walk in the park!
This TikTok video that I created for my Reflecting Q2 2024 and H1 2024 (Photography | Travel | Creative | Heritage) article sums it up – This is definitely not a walk in the park, everyone of us is seeking our own rainbow at the end of the tunnel. Sometimes, it’s like slow motion, sometimes it’s like a crazy paced hyper lapse race.
Let there be light! H2 2024 has begun, start of a new Q3 2024. Let’s continue to press forward!
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