This blog could be one of the most difficult blog I ever wrote. You know nowadays blog becomes the perception door for others to know what we are doing for living. That makes it so difficult for me to share my thought.

But I really want to make this blog to be my reflection of my proud time. So this following blog could be one of the hardest blog I’ve ever written.

Last year was a successful year for me because I achieved pretty much what I planned to do. It’s worth to look what I have achieved in this blog.
One of important decisions I made in 2011 was to reduce number of commitments in wedding assignments. Initially the plan was just to direct my works to what I wish to do because I could commit in every project that I was assigned to. I am not only happy with the result but also I could have my spare time to explore my other options.

One of the options I love to do was to inspire and educate. I was fortunate to be able to travel in South East Asia to shoot weddings while meeting a bunch of coolest Asian photographers in this past 2 years. It made me realise that we all had the same problems and hope for the same dreams. That is to have a better place for creative people to be treated respectfully in Asia.

Of course one of the common problem is how easily people call themselves a professional wedding photographer just by having a nice Digital SLR and after being an uncle bob in one of the weddings they attend.

Please don’t get me wrong, I am encouraging people to turn into a professional wedding photographer/cinematographer. It is simply one of the best jobs in the world. No kidding. I thank God for the opportunity and I wish others can feel the same. I am definitely happy with the competition.

Who am I to judge who is ready to be professional or not / good or bad? After all, they are also making couples happy right (super affordable package)? I know exactly how it felt like them, after all I am also one those stories because of the affordable digital SLR era.

That’s why back in the late of 2010 I created a project named Wiki School Pedia (WSP), a school or place for wedding artists to share, inspire and educate peers to be a better professional. I see this place where I am not the only one but also for other professionals to contribute for this vision.

I knew from the start this project would require a lot of commitment especially for me who’s still a full wedding photographer/cinematographer/businessman.

I was committed to do it with slowly better than nothing. Until late 2011, we thought it’s time to look at this project on a more serious note. It’s not everyday we are given some opportunity. It’s never about success or fail when comes with the opportunity. The question is that whether we have a heart to embrace it.

If 2011 is the year of achievement. We called 2012 was the year of investment. We say 2012 is the time we need to go out from our comfort zone, the time we need to have a faith on ourselves.
The first move will happen in 1-2 weeks time from now when we send our kids to settle in Jakarta, Indonesia where a lot of helpers from family can help us out.

It’s one of the most difficult step to make for this commitment. It’s easy to think growing a family in Sydney, Australia is way better than Jakarta, Indonesia.
But that’s the step we must take because Jamie + Ryan deserve to have full attention of their education and welfare while we are super busy with wedding assignment back and forth in Sydney and South East Asia particularly in Indonesia, networking and looking for quality teaching contents for Wiki School Pedia and of course managing our growing team in Foto Expression, Foto Xpress and the BIG films.

We printed this precious family photo print (1metre). Photo taken by Ken Kawitana of Foto Expression

The meaning of investment in my dictionary is gamble + education.
In order to realize our dreams in Wiki School Pedia and other dreams, we must gamble a lot of things that we knew that I was happy for it. We must gamble a lot of different things where the chance of failure is bigger because you don’t have any business model to look up to.
But it’s not a pure gamble because we have done our homework before making this decision. It’s an investment that we know that we are prepared for a loss rather than a gain.
Thus, we prepare to see that 2012 will be one of the exciting years for me because this could be the second times I made big decision in my career that I could be so proud of (after leaving my full time office job to be a wedding photographer).

Wish us luck! Keep supporting me and the team in Foto Expression especially in Sydney, Australia and Jakarta, Indonesia.
We have nothing but to be super excited for the future ahead of us.

Note:

Yes, I am still available in 2012 wedding assignment either in Sydney, Australia or in Jakarta, Indonesia or anywhere. There are a few dates to book if you are interested.
And Yes, Foto Expression and the BIG films are still my babies. We have so much plan to explore creatively in this year. At least we have just added 5 new members to our photography and cinematography team in Sydney.
Check out here some behind the scenes photos taken from last Sunday’s training

Ilona turned into a pretend make up artist on the training.

I pretended to be the groom.

No wedding dress, we used a tie as the laces in wedding gown

Adiv showed how to use the steadycam using 70-200mm lens

Lastly, Ilona and I pretended to walk down the aisle again, but this time I turned into the father of the bride

Yayyy, what a pleasant surprise that I end this year with two awards from one and only the coolest wedding photography Fearless Photographers. Please check out my first award.

Fearless Photographers is an online community to meet up the most creative and awesome wedding photographers in the world. When I said they are creative, it means they are out of the world. They are full of photographers who were my idols during my early career of becoming a wedding photographer like Huy Nguyen, Ray + Erwin of Apertura and also Ben Chrisman. In other words, yes I am competing with my own idols. It’s a super tough competition.

This time I sent five images to compete. I can tell you I was so fortunate to nail to win one among 1850 images to compete for. The feeling is wow. It’s like winning a world cup.

I am not only winning just an award, but this time my photo is one of ‘Best of Show’. I hope you understand what I mean, I am one of the BEST

But check out my award winning photo. Please tell me if I deserve to be part of the elite

Normally, I am not that sentimental with no of likes, but this time I am happy that a lot of people agree about the photo you can also certainly send your vote to this

This photo was taken during my trip in Jakarta, Indonesia in last July. I was honour to tag along my friend Jeff O’Neal of Poetih Photography to shoot this traditional javanese wedding of Adrianto + Tanya’s wedding. I hope that I can get the chance to blog the wedding separately.

After a couple weeks ago finally back to Sydney, I started to sit down to think what I learned during my trip. One of the things that I learned a great deal for my wedding business was what I explained during my talk in 4-days Wiki School Pedia events. The events were attended by professional Indonesian Wedding photographers. It’s funny hey, I taught people based on my past experiences and how I did them was also the time I was reminded what I needed to do for my business. That’s the beauty of teaching. I enjoy every minute out of it.

What I was reminded is how the best client education started from when you set the brand. That’s how I realise that I need to re-brand my wedding business to the direction of what we want. So that’s what kept me busy nowadays. So wish me luck! It’s  definitely exciting time to work hard for these upcoming projects ahead. I am also back shooting again weddings (after 3 months sabbatical period). It freshens up my mind and makes me to look forward so much for every project

In the mean time, here are some of very limited snapshots I took during the trip

Sharing time on the photographers’ chill out session with Patrick Low and the gank. I talked my experiences of doing fusion (still + motion pictures)

This below photo was a quick snap for some of the attendance during the practical session day 2 of 4-days event of Wiki School Pedia workshop in Jakarta, Indonesia. Please click here if you wish to see how all the students are performed on that session. And of course please find the full coverage of day 1, day 2, day 3 and day 4 of the event.

As soon as I completed the workshop, I flied again This time was in Belitung Island, 45 minutes from Jakarta, Indonesia. We were there for 1 1/2 days. But it’s sad that the first day was raining.  Normally I always had a back up plan. For some reason, I never thought it would be raining If it is for just a photography, it’s cool. But for fusion, it’s harder to change. Anyway, just check it out, I really can’t wait to see the end product for this

Remember just watch this space to see something BIG

hahahahhaa, yes I am. I just won one award in Fearless Photographers.

Now I can call myself as an award winning photographer Nah, I am just kidding. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to call myself an award winning artist as this is my first ever award in my 5-6 years career. I don’t see myself as so creative and ambitious to be the best artist in the business that really need an award to justify who I am.

Nothing wrong to win an award seriously, in fact I am addicted to the feeling after my first try in the competition. I learn a great thing, especially after looking at all my portfolio I realised that I definitely needed to improve because I said “If only it doesn’t have this” or “I wish that I shot this way”. It’s a positive experience. I will surely participate to more competition in the future. I definitely love to encourage people to participate in such good competitions like Fearless Photographers. Being the best is never an easy step. It is the same way for you being fearless. You can’t be easy and fearless at the same time. Being fearless is not easy. Being fearless is not about style. Being fearless definitely does not define you to be the best in the business. But being fearless is the attitude to accept the responsibility to create something unique for my client. That’s what I’d like to be more fearless to be the best as I can be.

My ambition this year is to taste winning any prestige competition in still/motion pictures. Now, the mission for 2011 is accomplished.

Why I never tried to go to any competition? And why I made the exception now? It’s a simple reason that I shoot for my clients, and my clients are the reason for me to shoot for myself. I definitely don’t see myself as a super creative photographer because I saw so many good ones out there. Obviously I was wrong that going into a competition is never about losing and winning, it’s about pushing ourselves to the limit. I finally made this competition an exception because most of the photographers in this competition are my living idols and legends in their own ways who are very and super creative in their crafts. If you don’t know about Fearless Photography, then you should go and check it out all the winning images you’ll understand how lucky I am to be part of this. I still couldn’t believe that I won one They are the superstars of wedding photographers in the world. Now, I am in the same level as them. Not bad Wiki Definitely I will try to kick their A** someday

Here is my winning award photo.

The photo was taken at Khemara + Maria’s wedding – I hope I can blog their wedding soon That night there was one group of people dancing around while the remaining guests are just too busy with their foods. I looked at them, they just made the circle and dance round and round when the time came they held their hands up. When I learned the pattern of their movement, I placed my off-camera flash inside the circle. I guess I shot it at the right time when everyone’s hands were in a bit up position.

Not only that I am happy that I won an award for my photography career, I also consider myself to have a double winning when my Indonesian friends from Wiki School Pedia – Indonesia won too in this very same competition. This is a very important break through, as the founder of Wiki School Pedia – Indonesia it is my ambition to influence Indonesian wedding photographers to go to the world stage. It’s been tough to start something like Wiki School Pedia in Indonesia as I couldn’t avoid people who started to question my motives in creating WikiSchoolPedia. Obviously, I am not trying to please everyone. But overall, I am very pleased that big numbers of photographers are motivated and inspired in a very good way. To see them winning, I feel that my journey is now starting to pay off in this commitment to teach and to inspire. So It’s a super win for me

Talking about Wiki School Pedia – Indonesia, my friends and I’ll be hosting a workshop, story essay and also a seminar. All of them are 4 days event. The workshop was sold out. However, the seminar that is something for other professionals to meet each other in real life is now open for registration. Check it out!

yeah I know, I was one month late to post this

You know me, always chased by crazy deadline every minute of my life.. hahhaa but I love it to death

Anyway, Ilona‘s hobby is to sleep in. So I gave her a little sleep in while I was with the kids in their bedroom on this year’s mother’s day. I recorded and edited using imovie from iPad2.

I’ll be blogging a lot of me using this video tools to share more the journey that I made to make WikiSchoolPedia (WSP) to become reality in this upcoming few weeks. If you don’t know about WSP, go check it out the web. Especially please do check it out starting next week to hear my thoughts about WSP. If you are not interested in WSP, it’s ok just to have an excuse to see me looking stupid in front of camera talking hahaha *lol*

I’ll be away in 1-2 months to travel in Asia. I spent most of the time in Jakarta, Indonesia where I’ll be hosting a seminar and workshop under Wiki School Pedia. So if you are interested to catch me, please do not hesitate to drop me an email to connect@wikilee.com.

Ciaoo