problem

I have this issue, and it's that I always get these ideas in my head, be it for stories or for photoshoots. But I can never bring myself to fully execute them. I write up one chapter and I get tired, so I stop writing. I think of wonderful ideas for shoots but with the excuse of lack of logistics, I dare not try to do the shoot. Maybe it's because of my lazy nature, or my lack of motivation. But I never ever set out to finish what I can imagine. And I always found it a shame, because my imagination is wild and I dare to imagine things that break all sorts of norms. But sadly, this is the problem I will always face.

vsco aesthetics // back to my roots

I have said it many times, but Instagram has become a place where every photographer is copying another, where everyone is jumping on trends, where everyone is too focused on the "perfect photo", and every photographer is too concerned with what everyone likes / wants to see. There was barely any photos or photographers that would inspire me there anymore. There was simply nothing creative, or aesthetically pleasing to me. Nothing weird. Nothing out of the ordinary. Just safe photos of cityscapes, and boring portraits. 

Of course, I was no exception to this. I found that my portraits were getting boring, and hence I stopped taking portraits for the most part. Just a different model, and a different backdrop, but the same posing and the same framing. Rinse and repeat. What even was I doing anymore? This was never the photography that I wanted. Sure, I did some really cool concepts. The all pink shoot with Michelle was amazing. The 'I hate u, I love u' concept I did with Nehe and Bev was also fairly interesting. My recent shoot with Megan at Hawpar Villa was also a little weird and retro. But apart from those, all of my other shoots were simply boring. 

And being deprived of inspirations made it harder to create. 

I found myself on VSCO editing some phone shots. I decided to take a scroll through VSCO's feed since it's been years since I last did that. And I was blown away. What really amazed me was that even after all these years, VSCO was still curating photos that they felt were aesthetically pleasing. These photos did not belong to any one genre or aesthetic. They varied from style to style. There were many weird concepts for portraits, there were photos of random objects on the floor, random aesthetics. For once in years, I was actually inspired. "This was what I've been searching so desperately for", I thought to myself. 

I'd always taken a weird approach with my photography when I first started. Photos of chairs, of brooms, of flower pots, of slabs of meat found on the floor. But Instagram changed me to conform to all these "perfect" shots. Because it was all that I saw, it narrowed my mind and perspectives so much. Being on VSCO widened my perspectives again, and I've been scrolling through the feed to find more and more inspiration. I don't think I'll be doing much portraits in future, to avoid boring photos, unless I have some weird concepts I want to try. But mostly, I want to get back to my old VSCO aesthetics, taking random photos of this and that. Capturing fleeting moments on both my phone and on my camera. It's hard to explain what this aesthetic is, but basically, I've decided to say screw what everyone thinks. What matters is that I like what I'm shooting. 

The High is Epik

When it comes to Korean music, I've always had a preference for their raps. And the one band who really shaped that preference of mine, was Epik High. I first got to know their music when they joined YG entertainment back in the day and released '99'. I was in love with mainly two songs from that album - 'New Beautiful' and 'Don't Hate Me'. 'New Beautiful' was an anthem for me at that point in time because I was struggling a lot with my self-image and that song really helped me in feeling better about myself. 

But it was their subsequent albums, 'Shoebox', 'We've Done Something Wonderful', and 'Sleepless in ___", which solidified me as a fan. 'We've Done Something Wonderful' in particular hit me in the feels real hard when I first heard it. The raps were mostly on the emotional side, and they inspired me to write even more. 

Throughout the years since I first discovered them, I knew I wanted to catch them live at least once. It was on my bucket list. But I knew it was near impossible, they only ever performed in Korea and America. Not once in 6 years did we ever hear news of them having the possibility of coming to Singapore to perform. That was, until this year. A few months back, a friend of mine shared with me a post by Tablo, announcing their concert in Singapore. So you can imagine how happy I was to hear it. 

I'll skip the unnecessary details, but long story short, on the day of my shoot with Megan, we both decided to go for the concert together. And Epik High was hands down the best performers I'd ever watched live. The energy, the interactions, the live rapping. They were simply the best. I never thought I'd get to hear Tablo's machine gun rapping in real life, and my ears were blessed. I enjoyed myself much more than I even imagined. 

Megan and I thought it'd be packed and because our queue numbers were in the 900s, we thought we wouldn't be near enough. But we were wrong. The audience was so chill, you wouldn't think they were here to watch a Korean concert. Most K-pop concerts are usually filled with screaming teenage girls who are pushing and shoving. But the audience this time was mature, and since there was a makeshift "bar" at the side selling drinks, a lot of them were actually hanging at the back with those drinks. No one was trying to squeeze to the front or anything. Just a bunch of few hundred people here to enjoy Epik High's performance. It was the most enjoyable concert I had ever attended, honestly. A lot of my favourite songs were sung, so you can imagine how happy I was. I was just a little bummed that they didn't sing a few more slow songs. 

But overall, it was the greatest concert ever. Thank you Epik High. It was worth burning a hole in my pockets for this. 

Evoking Nostalgia

When one mentions Hawpar Villa, it will almost certainly evoke some form of nostalgia among Singaporeans. Our parents thought it would be fun to bring us to this place when we were kids, which features rather abstract statues and sculptures of Chinese folklore. In fact, they often tricked us into thinking that it was an amusement park. Well, amusing for the parents indeed, when they see our frightened faces. Hawpar Villa is probably most known for its depiction of Hell. Inside their "Ten Courts of Hell", horrified children can take a look at which sins / crime would land them in which parts of Hell. While parents standing behind their kids would take the opportunity to tell them to behave, and be a good kid or they would end up in Hell. 

There is also a whole segment dedicated to "Journey to the West" and if you're a true Singaporean Chinese, then you know it's quite possibly the most famous Chinese folklore there is. Of course, most of the sculptures would seem as "scary" to most kids, and even some adults. But despite everything, and how our parents tricked us, this place still holds some form of nostalgia and memory to us. 

I revisited the place in 2017, many years after my first visit as a child and I saw the place with a new perspective. I was, and still am, very in love with @uuanjie's work and his earlier works featured Hawpar Villa. He managed to bring forth a sense of nostalgia through his style in those photos, despite the models being in fashionable clothes. It was through those photos which I realised that I was lacking in perspectives. But my photography wasn't what I hoped for back then, so the photos didn't exactly turn out the way I wanted them to.  

Fast forward to just last week, I went to Hawpar Villa again. This time with a very sweet friend of mine, Megan (@meggychiaaaa). I was also equipped with better editing, framing, and a piece of cling wrap. Right from the start, I wanted to do a very nostalgic / retro-ish shoot. So I got Megan to dress like she was from the 70s and she did not disappoint, since she loved retro too. The cling wrap was to act as a soft filter of sorts. It softens the image so much it gives the photo a film-like look, and when there is sunlight, the cling wrap gives it an additional glow. Bless Natalia (@natalianaa) for having gifted me this tip because it honestly gives me the kind of look I've been searching for for the past two years.

I did this shoot hoping it would evoke some form of nostalgia in all Singaporeans who looked at these photos. And also to connect myself with my childhood in a way. Many would call Hawpar Villa a "unique" choice to shoot in, and that not many would do so because it just doesn't seem "aesthetic" by most photographers. But I've always been a sucker for old things, and old locations. As long as I can make my photos look like they're from decades back, I'm sold. Hence, Hawpar Villa serves as the perfect location to me. Not many people would appreciate, but I hope a few of you do. 

exciting updates in my otherwise boring life

Updates:

Many of my friends know that I was applying for NIE to be a teacher, but not many know that because NIE is part of NTU, I applied for four other courses as well. First off, NIE rejected me. I can kinda understand why too. If they searched up my social medias, I'm pretty sure I'm not someone they want teaching their kids. My second choice was a degree in English, which I really hoped I would get into, but didn't as well. My third choice was psychology, just because I did it back in poly. And guess what, I got accepted into that. Of all things. I really have no idea how I'm gonna survive this because I lost a lot of my passion for psychology a while back, and a lot of my compassion for people while I was in army. 

To be very honest, I didn't think I was going to get accepted for any of the courses. My grades are average after all. And because I was waiting a long time for any sort of responses, I was already ready to sign full time at Chug Chug. I was offered a manager role with a really decent pay, so I honestly didn't mind. I enjoy working there after all. Sure, I complain a lot about being tired and about the long hours, but I complain about everything anyway. 

But speaking of Chug, I was recently granted the position of 'Social Media Manager' along with my fellow part-timer, Shannon. We got it much more easily than we expected. We simply asked Xinde if we could run Chug's Instagram, and he gave it to us. And it truly is fun to do something other than portraits. I've been so used to doing portraits, it has gotten boring. Food and products have been a challenge for me, considering I suck at them. And the occasional behind the scenes photos have brought back some memories from when I used to do photojournalism.

I've also decided to stop making my Instagram look professional. It isn't sparking much joy for me that way. I don't know what I wanna do with it as of now, but I'll take it one photo at a time. Maybe finally more photos of myself? Or maybe just nicer photos of food and sceneries and friends.

The Strawberry Girl // My Dream Shoot

What you are looking at and will continue to look at in this post is the fruit of our labour (pun fully intended). It started off with Michelle volunteering to do a shoot for me in a pink outfit and pink gloves, as inspired by @uuanjie. But the concept slowly evolved over two really productive planning sessions in the middle of the night, and we started including more and more things. We used reference photos from @kingvuddha, @jhfxxng, and @xenia.lau to further plan out this concept.

Obviously, this was a shoot that had to be done indoors. We came to this conclusion at the end of our first planning session. We had too many props we wanted to use. But we obviously don't have money to rent a studio, or an airbnb. Michelle is after all, only a student. Luckily for us, my boss allowed us to use the second floor of Chug Chug as our "studio" space.

We bought ourselves strawberries, dragonfruits, grapefruits, strawberry milk from Meiji (please sponsor us), a pink shower curtain from Daiso to act as our backdrop, heart shaped stickers from Daiso, and a huge pink cloth from Joo Chiat to be the tablecloth. We borrowed wine glasses from my bartender as well.

Now, I'm sure most of you reading this would know this, but I have no sense of aesthetics or DIY. You see, the original idea was to use the shower curtain as the table cloth and the cloth as the backdrop. But the cloth was way too heavy, so Michelle thought it would be a better idea to swap them around.

Our original idea was to draw red hearts on her cheeks, but we couldn't figure out what to use to draw without staining her cheeks, and we were lucky that Daiso sold such big heart stickers. Which was perfect for our shoot. Sticking it on her cheeks on the other hand, was tougher than I thought. Because these stickers weren't the thin kind that can bend to any shape they're pasted on. These ones had to be stuck delicately on her cheekbone and then pray that they don't drop off.

The shoot quickly evolved from posing with fruits and milk to "killing" them. I just went "Michelle, hold the knife and stab that dragonfruit". From there, the 'sweet but psycho' mood took over, with Michelle digging her fingers into the dragonfruit like she was murdering a heart. 

She was afraid of staining her fingers at first, so she wore the gloves to dig inside the meat of the dragonfruit. But after a few minutes, she felt ready to use her bare hands. The results were instantly ten fold better, you could really feel that "don't you dare cheat on me" vibe. The dragonfruit juice dripping down her hands made it all a bit more horrifically aesthetic. But it ultimately led to her saying "I hate you Sean, my hands are stained pink." And because she couldn't be the only one stained, she poked my face with her finger that was still dripping with dragonfruit juice. Thanks Michelle. 

Our all pink set-up got the attention of my boss, Xinde, when he came back to Chug for his own shoot. He was so amazed he came over to compliment it. And the best part? Dee Kosh saw our set up and actually wanted to borrow it for their shoot LIKE SIS. The both of us were so damn happy about it I swear. Getting noticed by such a huge Singapore public figure is definitely something to be proud of, and would be placed in my resume if it's allowed. 

Overall, I am just so proud, ecstatic, and obsessed with how the photos turned out. This was really a dream shoot for me. Pink backdrop, pink outfit, pink everything. I was kinda worried about lighting issues but the window light was more than enough to light up Michelle's face and the whole setup. While Michelle's concern was if a pink outfit would be too much with all that pink in the setup, but it turned out pretty amazing. So our worries were for nothing. I have never been so in love with my own photos, but this set is easily my favourite. I've always wanted to try shooting with a backdrop like this, with an elaborate setup, and they have all come true in one shoot. Huge thanks to my iconic strawberry girl for helping make this dream come true. (My only regret is that we didn't take any selfies with our setup SIGH)

Model: 
@michelle.emmanuelle

"Studio":
@chugchugsg

Photographer:
@dustyrobe aka me

Inspirations: 
@jhfxxng (main inspiration for the setup)
@kingvuddha (for his exceptional use of strawberries)
@xenia.lau (makeup idea)
@uuanjie (original inspiration regarding the pink gloves)

2015

2015 me was a very interesting me. Interesting in the way I wrote. When I look back at old blog posts, the ones from 2015 always end up being my favourites. And I do know why. It's because 2015 me was so obsessed with Kinfolk that my writing was very much influenced by it. It was beautiful, and I wonder how my writing style has changed so much. Maybe it's because I haven't been reading much Kinfolk, and instead have been focused on reflections that my writing style have drastically changed.

Now, I can only look back at admire what I used to have. That being said, I don't think there is anything wrong with the way I write now. After all, it feels more real and raw. 2015 me was trying to sound like someone he wasn't. I would know. But of course, from time to time, I do wish I could write as well as I did back then about my projects. Or anything lifestyle in general.

Sad Love Story

I’m trapped in this sad love story

A movie that ended with an abrupt ending

One that started out sweet

But finished with a bitter plot twist

Every scene is still fresh in my head

I remember holding hands on our first date

Do you remember our first big fight?

Or the time we spent our first night?

But you were never a fan of happy endings

Maybe that’s why we ended in tragedy

Because you felt that I didn’t know what sadness was

So you decided to teach me as a good cause

I was nothing special before all of this

Now I’m romanticising sadness of all things

Thanks to all the scars you gave me

I ended up loving heartbreaks and tragedy

But all stories have to come to an end

Like you, I’m curious how this one ends

You kicked off the gears into motion

But it’s up to me to decide the direction

Would I choose a happy ending

Or proceed on with tragedy?

Lana Del Rey Vibes

One of the concepts in my to-shoot-list is to shoot swimwear one day, and when Xue Ning asked if I wanted to shoot with her and Charissa at the beach, I was like why not? So we're at the beach, and seeing Xue Ning in the outfit and the hat, it just felt like I was in 1950s-1980s. It was like she was channeling some Lana Del Rey vibes. So the whole time we were shooting, Lana Del Rey's songs were playing at the back of my head. I knew I had to edit this set of photos like I was editing for Lana's album cover. 

So I get home, I cull the photos, then I start blasting Lana Del Rey. But when it comes to edits, I'm really bad at it. So I sat in front of my laptop for days, listening to Lana Del Rey everyday while staring at Lana's photoshoots. I kept changing the edit, and kept restarting from scratch over and over again. Until I eventually got a look I was satisfied with, and thus, the Lana Del Rey preset was born. Honestly, I wanted to do it 'Ultraviolence' style and edited everything in black and white. It felt a lot more vintage that way. But I decided to challenge myself and edit in colour, and I have never felt more proud of myself.

Xue Ning really killed it that day, both the look and the mood. We wanted to do something really chill, and we did.

Of Valentine's and Bad Memories

14th February 2014: I asked and you said okay, the day we started dating
14th February 2016: I figured something was wrong
14th May 2016:         Before I knew it, you were gone

I don't particularly like Valentine's anymore. Or the 14th of every month. Every 14th is a reminder of what was, what could have been. A reminder of you. Valentine's is drawing near once again, and my heart still aches, it still cries. Every year, it brings forth a flood of memories, both good and bad, and with it, the pangs of pain.

They tell me that this torture is caused by no one but myself. That if I move on, it will all be fine. But how do I tell them... that I have no control over this pain? I tried to forget it all, I tried to bury it all. It didn't work. It never does. I end up feeling it all at once instead. The pain never lessens with each year, and it probably would never lessen.

They say that one day I will meet someone who will change things for me. That there is someone out there who will help me move on from this pain. That someone would help me believe in love again. And... I really wish to believe in that. 

But until then, I guess I don't particularly like Valentine's.