On being a foreigner, wedding photography and facing the challenge.

Finally, here comes the blog!

Lost in translation might have been a better title, summarizing pretty much the whole situation I’m facing here.

Life in Taiwan for a foreigner is a strange mixture of different feelings, requiring a good sense of humor. I could go on and explain it but I doubt I can, so I invite you to come around and have a look for yourself.

As I’m trying to develop my studio, doing mainly wedding photographs, I realised how different both cultures are.

Traditionally, in Taiwan, couples who are about to marry would have their pictures taken in a studio, and maybe on location, those wedding pictures would normally be taken a few months BEFORE the wedding and then turned into a big fat wedding album to display for all to see on your wedding day.

The style is usually “kitch” or cheesy (whichever one you prefer!), if not VERY “kitch” or VERY cheesy, but it suits the market, the customer is king after all; and the job they do, if not to my taste is, in most cases, very professional.

To sum up : they do Cheesy and they do it well!

So in order to do business one must adapt, at least that’s what I was told, and being stubborn it is exactly the opposite I’m doing, persisting in taking natural, relaxed pictures. Let’s face it: I cannot compete with Taiwanese cheesy studios, they are too good at being cheesy, one might say they have reached some kind of cheesy heaven (might sound appealing to a Frenchman though…), so I go the other way, and keep taking the pictures that I love, because after all this is why I got in the business in the first place: making a living out of my passion.

I will build a niche market for people who enjoy natural, modern and relaxed wedding photography.

Do what you love!

Nico