KUCHING: Wedding photographer Shen Yeo from shensnaps.com photography, who saw most of his bookings from outstation clients, aspires to increase his local client base from the current 40 per cent to 70 per cent.
“For this year, 60 per cent my bookings are based out of Kuching and to increase the number of local customers, I set up an exclusive boutique style gallery to meet their demands,” he said in an exclusive interview with The Borneo Post.
Besides being a professional photographer, Yeo also maintains a blog that showcases all his wedding photography works. When visitors visit his blog, they will also be able to virtually know him and his works. Besides blogging, he also interacts with his followers through Facebook.
Yeo explained that online presence had its advantage and disadvantage; the advantage was people would know that he was an exclusive photographer, probably not the cheapest, but worth trying out.
The disadvantage was he did not have walk-in customers as all his customers were only by appointment.
“I don’t go for the mass market. For those who don’t do their research online, they probably won’t know of my existence,” he highlighted.
As a true enthusiast in wedding photography, Yeo believes in having different breakthroughs in his work which were different from the work produced by other photographers.
“Breakthrough is basically an achievement which has never been done before. It can be achieved by constantly learning from different people and adequate practise. With that, you’ll find out that you have improved,” he explained.
“I spent more money in education than buying my camera gear and that is where I progressed. Personally, I have gone through a few breakthroughs which helped me in my career as a professional wedding photographer.”
In the international wedding photography arena, Yeo achieved the first place in the Wedding Photojournalism category, Wedding and Portrait Photographers International (WPPI) 2009 First Half 8×10 Print Competition with his work entitled ‘Father’s Prayer’.
“I submitted 10 entries but before that, I emailed the pictures to my mentor for comments. After some improvements, I sent the pictures over to be judged and I didn’t expect to get the first place in the competition,” he enthused.
The award has made him the first and only Malaysian wedding photographer awarded first place in Wedding Photojournalism. Other than that, he also received four accolades of excellence for the work that he had submitted to be judged.
WPPI is the biggest organisation in the world for wedding and portrait photographers so far and there is a yearly convention held in Las Vegas.
Yeo said there were no secret to success as there was nothing to hide in photography. He believed the passion of learning and continuous improvement were the keys to be successful.
“Probably, my biggest motivation in my career is the support from my family members,” he added.
Yeo opined that the one of the challenges as a photographer in Malaysia was that people do not recognise photographers as professionals, unlike countries such as the US, in which they were highly regarded as professionals.
“Since we have yet to achieve that level, customers are not willing to invest their money for our professional services,” he added.
Yeo stated that to be recognised internationally, photographers needed to have different marketing strategies besides continuously educating their target market.
When asked about his opinion on the quality of wedding photography in Malaysia, Yeo said that the industry had progressed a lot in the past three years which saw many photographers coming up.
“Generally, there is still a gap to fill and we are slowly filling the gap,” he added.
Yeo pointed out that setting up his own gallery was one achievement for him as he never thought of having a gallery before this.
“Other than that, being recognised is also an achievement besides venturing out from Kuching but I will try to slow it down and focus on the local market,” he said.
He believed that people in Kuching could afford to invest in good photography.
“Education plays an important role in educating people to invest in good photography.”
Yeo advised aspiring wedding photographers to find a mentor who would guide them from time to time. Besides that, they might also get guidance from the web portal. He said that professionalism would be the key in becoming a successful wedding photographer.