The Beginner Photography Podcast

Unlocking Emotional Depth Through Photography with Sean Kim

• Raymond Hatfield

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#569 Sean Kim is a passionate photographer whose journey explores the ways photography can help process emotions and discover meaning in life. Originally from South Korea and now living in the U.S., Sean transitioned from running a family business to finding profound purpose and self-expression through photography. His story is a testament to how picking up a camera can become a deeply personal tool for processing emotions, spiritual reflection, and connecting with the world, especially during times of personal upheaval.

KEY TOPICS COVERED

  1. The Transformative Power of Photography - Sean reveals how photography helped him process emotions, find meaning during hard times, and discover beauty amidst chaos. He describes how immersive engagement with photography—especially during periods of personal struggle—can be both therapeutic and spiritually fulfilling.
  2. Learning Through Practice and Reflection - Emphasizing self-education, Sean advocates borrowing books from the library, consuming a broad range of resources, and returning to them as skills progress. The iterative process of shooting, reviewing, and reflecting enables growth, even when early results seem confusing or flat. The importance of reviewing past work to chart progress is highlighted as a motivational exercise.
  3. From Technical Mastery to Personal Style - The conversation covers Sean’s evolution from technical naiveté to developing a distinctive style emphasizing light, silhouettes, and the interplay between small subjects and vast natural backgrounds. The discussion includes practical insights on editing, the value of natural versus artificial lighting, and how artistic intent shapes both gear choices and compositional decisions.

IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS & CONCEPTS

  • Silhouette Photography: Capturing subjects as dark shapes against a brighter background, often used by Sean to convey emotional stories and symbolism (like hope or introspection), relevant in his beach and landscape work.
  • Iterative Learning: The continuous cycle of shooting, reviewing, learning, and refining one’s craft—a central theme as Sean encourages learners to revisit educational resources as their understanding deepens.

DISCUSSION & REFLECTION QUESTIONS

  1. How can photography be used as a tool for personal or emotional growth?
  2. What are the benefits of returning to older work or educational materials as you develop your skills?
  3. In what ways do your life experiences shape your creative vision or the subjects you are drawn to photograph?
  4. How do you balance technical mastery with personal expression in your photography?

RESOURCES:
Follow Sean Kim on Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/seankimstyle/
"People Pictures” by Chris Orwig - https://www.amazon.com/People-Pictures-Exercises-Authentic-Photographs/dp/0321774973

Learn What Camera Settings to Use in our free guide!
https://perfectcamerasettings.com/

Sign up for your free CloudSpot Account today at www.DeliverPhotos.com

Connect with Raymond!


Thanks for listening & keep shooting!

Sean Kim:

Go to a local library, borrow a bunch of books and read them. And even if it doesn't make any sense to you right at the moment, just consume it. Do what you want to do with your camera. And then over time, once things start to click, you'll have more question about those things. Go back to the book and read it again, and it will make sense 100% and you will master whatever you need to master and you don't even have to worry about it.

Hey, welcome to the Beginner Photography Podcast. I'm your host, Raymond Hatfield, and here each week I interview one of the world's most interesting photographers to learn what it really takes to capture beautiful images so that you can start to do the same. In today's rewind episode, we are chatting with community member Sean Kim, about using a camera to process your emotions and discover life's meaning. But first, the Beginner Photography Podcast brought to you by Clouds Spot. With Clouds spot, you can sell your photos through prints, products, and of course digitals. You can set up a storefront in minutes and start earning more with every gallery you send. So grab your free forever account today over@deliverphotos.com and only upgrade when you are ready. So today's guest, Sean is a member of the Beginner Photography podcast community and he's one whose images are, as incredible as his journey, honestly, but as active as he's been in the group, he's a pretty private dude in his personal life. And today I learned so much about him. Everything that I learned, I would say, gave me context to his work. It's fascinating to see somebody's work for so long and then have just a simple conversation with them and you realize how much life influences you and your creativity. I mean, we all live unique lives. We all struggle, we all have wins. We're all really good at something. All of that goes into our work, and I'm so excited to share this interview with community members, Sean Kim, with you, and I hope that it causes you to, pause, and both take photography less seriously and more seriously at the same time. I really hope that makes sense. And if you're not a part of the Beginner Photography podcast community, we would love to have you. Come join more than 6,000 listeners of the podcast and photographers just like yourself, who are looking to learn and grow their photo skills by heading over to beginner photo pod.com/group now. With that, let's go ahead and get on into today's interview with Sean Kim.

Raymond Hatfield:

So really, since this is just kind of easy, I just wanted to know a little bit more about you as far as who you are, where you're from and what it is that you do.

Sean Kim:

My name is Sean. I am originally from South Korea. I moved here in 98 and went to school here and we began to own a business, uh, cleaners business back in 2002, 2003, somewhere there. And, I just picked up my camera maybe about three years ago.

Raymond Hatfield:

Tell me how that happened because you've been in the group for a few years. Since, since the beginning of 2018, right? Yes. And then since then, you've just been gracing us with your, your amazing and incredible photos that everybody enjoys looking at. So what was it that got you started? You know, you said that you just kind of picked up a camera one day, but it doesn't just happen like that. Tell me, what were your earliest influences in photography that kind of made you or made you feel compelled to, to pick up that camera?

Sean Kim:

So it's kind of a long and sad story behind it. So back in, I think like, end of my high school year, I just bought a just point and shoot camera just to shoot. Nothing about composition, nothing about color, none of that existed during the time. So just very close up shots of my friends hanging out. Drinking and things that nature. and I recently looked at all the album, the photos that I took in the past. And it's literally a closeup shot of them doing, a foolish things. And it looked great, but during the time you can tell that I had no sense of composition or I could care less with those things. And then over time, I just stopped taking photos and, I went on a two weeks journey doing a road trip from LA to New York, on a tour bus, Korean tour bus, and I bought a, it was a very good smartphone camera, Nokia Lumia nine 20, I think that's the name of it.

And

Sean Kim:

I just began to take more photos. Sadly, if I was into photography, then I would come up with a lot more photos than what I had. And during the, during the trip, I met, somebody, met a girl and, she had a camera. Canon Rebel, which is what she gave me, uh, towards our, our end of our relationship. And I began to take photos with that. The reason why she gave me that camera is because she realized I had a very good eye. so whenever we go on a trip. People will come up to me and ask me to take photos of them. So I would not end up getting any photos of myself, but of others. But I didn't think none of that, until I said, you know what, I'm gonna just go buy a decent camera, which was Fuji X E3 that was, End of 2017, I think. And then the camera was too tiny for me, so I exchanged it to XT two, and that's when I joined, Beginner Photography podcast. And ever since then, I consume all knowledge of photography, books, podcast, YouTube videos, you name it. I, I was just consuming everything and then. Everything started to click. I was like, okay, this is why this composition work. Cause of the color leading line, S line, whatever. so yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

So those early days, let's step back for a moment and talk about those, right? You got these photos of your friends. in high school, uh, you took a big trip, which made you, invest in a better camera system, essentially, which was, which was a cell phone at the time. And then you started, taking photography more seriously once you got that Rebel Series camera. Just, taking more photos and kind of understanding a little bit more about how photography works. So then when you got the story. I get the timeline right, you bought, say, the X T2, right, at the, say, the beginning of 2018 or the very end of 2017? Yeah, something like

Sean Kim:

that. Okay.

Raymond Hatfield:

And then, right away, like, your first photos in the Beginner Photography Podcast Facebook group are like, photos from the top of a mountain, just like looking out these beautiful vistas. So tell me where this relationship of nature came for you as far as photography goes, because most people get a camera and they're like, well, I'm going to shoot my daily life. I'm going to photograph my kids and all these sorts of things. And you're like, no, no, no, we're going to the top of the mountain.

Sean Kim:

So, during the relationship I had with my ex girlfriend, we went through Sequoia, Grand Canyon, just a bunch of places together, and we just take lots of photos. And I think, I think I always liked hiking. I always hiked. I always went to, not like far away, but locally. I would go look for places to hike. But I wouldn't never take photos until I met my ex. And then after we broke up, that's all I did. I went on a hike because you know, you're so happy about breaking up. You had to hike.

Raymond Hatfield:

You went the opposite way. Most people are sad after they break up, but okay.

Sean Kim:

I was, yeah, I was, it was very sad moment. So, so I went on a journey of hiking, especially like at nighttime'cause you know how like when you go through a very sad stage in your life, you kind of feel dead inside. So what end up happening is by, at night, it spooks you, you realize there is actually mount lions, there are coyotes with, you know, animals out there. Thanks. Uh, yeah, snakes, not, it doesn't really intimidate that much, but I would, I would say bigger, bigger animal would. So it kind of made me feel alive being out there. Yeah. And then this was during a time of me having some battle going on within my own faith too. So, yeah, this was a camera camera in a sense, photography in a sense, kind of, helped me. It was a gift. It was a gift.

Raymond Hatfield:

Also, talk to me more about that, because there's a lot of people who can go out and they can take a photo, but I really feel like you're somebody who, you know, if we look at some of your earliest photos to where you are today, I see the consistency throughout your body of work that I've seen, but also I don't think that many people are going to come home and maybe study their photos, see what they like, see what they don't like, and then go back out readjust and then shoot for better photos where I really feel like you've done that. So when you say the photography has helped you tell me in a sense, what areas of photography were you trying to progress through that helped you kind of get through the stage?

Sean Kim:

Hmm. Great question. so I'm pretty sure you have a background image on your computer, right?

Raymond Hatfield:

I do. It's the, uh, it's the standard Apple. actually I don't know what mountain it is, but it's beautiful. And it's no, no, no, it's not. It's um, it's like orange and it's, it's beautiful. It's just beautiful. It's a landscape photo. So yeah, I don't know what mountain it is, but I love

Sean Kim:

it.

Raymond Hatfield:

So,

Sean Kim:

earlier during the time when, I don't know exactly when, but I remember looking for a specific image for my background photo, but I did this throughout my owning, my own desktop that I made, I couldn't find a photo that I really like, but there are a lot of good photos. I couldn't really figure out why I didn't like certain images. I couldn't. Right now I, maybe I could, but my background image was always just blank, blue screen. That's it. Cause I didn't like none of the images. It's just very distracting images. But now I could figure out why those photos were distracting and it's interesting cause you can take a lot of good, beautiful photos, but it's just a beautiful photo It doesn't speak to you. It's just, it just is. And I think, just throughout my journey in photography, finding the beauty of what's there sort of was a key for my own journey. I guess. What's beautiful within my stage of sadness? What's beautiful within this like, ugly, chaotic scene that I have right in front of me? figuring those things out was a positive way for me to find, you can say, the true beauty of, of my journey, I guess? Yeah. I was pretty aggressively seeking out for those things. So I think that's why I was really going out like literally every night to take images.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. So what were some of those things in the beginning that once you finally decided to, I don't know, up your game, if that's the right term, by getting that XTT to and going out and shooting, what were some of those earliest things that you realized? Oh my gosh, I've been doing, X wrong about photography all this time. And I enjoy this part much more.

Sean Kim:

I don't think I've ever had that moment. Oh, really? No, I don't think so. It just the camera is so pretty.

Raymond Hatfield:

We're talking about Fuji cameras here. I'm right there with you. I get it.

Sean Kim:

I was, I was just searching for a camera. I was looking at Nikon, Canon, didn't really think about Sony at all. Cause I didn't, I didn't think Sony existed during the time. But I looked at Fuji camera. I was like, wow, that is, that is cute. That is way too cute. So retro. So I had to buy it.

Raymond Hatfield:

I think phrased my question totally wrong there. I suppose from the, technical side of like actually shooting, you know, there's a lot of mistakes that we make early on when we're taking photos. Like, as you said earlier, when you were photographing your friends in high school, there was no focus on composition or lighting or nothing. You look at that photo and you can tell like, Oh, this is what I did. this is why this image doesn't work. But today, when you go out, you have more of an eye, you're looking for something specific. Where do you think that change happened?

Sean Kim:

realized some of the photos that I took was boring. How so? just doesn't make sense. Like you look at the photo, you're like, okay, it's a photo. But then you have a photo that says, wow, that tells like million stories. Look at their expression. Like those things started to click. And then you, once those things started to click, you started to seek out for those things more and more. Like some of people's expression, knowing their body languages, learning their body languages as you're, you're photographing them, And, standing at the right location, composition, so that, that brings up more story and their face expression more. so those kind of things, I think, it just began to start gradually, happen.

Raymond Hatfield:

so, Let's continue to talk about humans here, because, when I think about you in the group, I think of landscape images, right? And then it kind of, or at least top of mountains. And then it sort of transitioned into beautiful beach vistas. Right. We don't see too many mountaintops anymore, unfortunately. But we do see, occasionally photos of people, people who you meet on the street. And there for a while, I think you said that you were shooting with a rebel and like a 50 mil lens just to go out and just like, and just shoot. And a lot of those photos that you were posting Photos of just people on the street and when I went back and did a little research within the group You had won photo of the month contest back in April of 2018 So pretty much like right after you got started in the group and the photo that you had was of this The skater on yes. Yes This woman, it was a silhouette, a beautiful sunset, and in the background was the Santa Monica Pier.

Sean Kim:

Yes.

Raymond Hatfield:

And you had said that you took the photo without her knowledge, but then afterwards, you showed the photo to her, and then you guys became great friends. And then, looking at that, Have you ever had any, I guess talk to me about your relationship with photographing people and interacting with them versus I think the kind of traditional street photography style of just being totally hidden and not wanting to be seen and I'm just going to do my own thing here. Did that question make sense?

Sean Kim:

Yeah. Yes. So generally speaking, I don't really go up to them and I tell them I took a photo of them. but I do take a lot of majority of my photos at the beach are all candidates. but if I knew I caught like something, I go gently tap their shoulder, excuse me. Could I show you what I just took? They're like, sure. California people are pretty loose. So once I showed it to them, majority of times they're very impressed. I can tell you a short story of what happened last week. I took a photo of this couple holding a torch. I don't know if you've seen that photo. and I showed them the image. They loved it. But they haven't seen the final image. So I processed it over the week and I said, I think I sent it over to them on Monday. And the gentleman, I guess he's some type of marketing director up in Seattle. And they're just vacationing here. And we just been going back and forth about, him wanting a huge metal printer, this house.

And

Sean Kim:

he also wants it for his mom and his dad. And I guess they have a club for that type of meeting torch type of meeting. And the clubs want to buy the metal prints. Wow. So those kinds of experiences I had, it is a little bit different than traditional, like street photography type, because what I'm trying to do right now here is, you know, I never know if I'm going to continue to stay here in California or not, but mountains, there are mountains everywhere. Unless I go to not in

Raymond Hatfield:

Indiana. Don't

Sean Kim:

come to Indiana. There's no mountains here. It's very flat. It's boring. Yeah. So I'm trying to document as much of beach scene as, as much as I can. So I can have those photos to myself. And I'm actually hoping to make a, potentially a photo book for, for myself or I could make, several more and then try to sell those books, but just have it documentation, for my journey, I guess.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, I see. So that was, That was the decision that you made as far as why you're going to stop getting up at four in the morning and go

Sean Kim:

hiking.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, I

Sean Kim:

want to go hiking. I want to go hiking. I want to go to the mountains. I want to breathe the fresh air. I don't want to breathe the salt air. But knowing the fact that I have such easy access, it's only like five minute drive to the beach. Yeah. Why would I spend two hours of driving and then go hiking and come back? And I only come with maybe like one, maybe two or never, or not at all. But yes, images. But if I go to the beach, I know I will, even if I don't get any images. Hey, I saved gas.

Raymond Hatfield:

So we're looking at this as a bit of a, a time, save as well as, uh, in

Sean Kim:

a way, in

Raymond Hatfield:

a

Sean Kim:

way.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah.

Sean Kim:

Yeah. And I really liked You know, the funny thing is my dad really hates my photos that I take at the beach. What? Why? Yeah. Yeah. He said it. he doesn't understand why people are so small. They're in the corner. it makes him sad. I said, dad, maybe, maybe I am sad. No. Have you ever thought of that? And he goes, no, Oh, that's too much. But it's, it's good. I really like his heavy criticism because it helps me to think because some people think like that, um,

Raymond Hatfield:

yeah, yeah. That's really interesting. when I look at your photos, I don't, obviously, you know, I see the tiny people and like this beautiful landscape, but what I see is just like how big earth is and like, look at how beautiful this is. Like there's so much, we are so small. in this world that I don't want to say that we're insignificant. We're not insignificant, but like sometimes, people can get in our heads of like, we are, we can do this, we are powerful. But then really, if you just take a moment and look at how big this earth is. And this is just like a tiny rock in our solar system, you know, like that feels very empowering to me. And it's really interesting to hear your dad's take is, is on the opposite spectrum there.

Sean Kim:

so interesting thing is, I don't know how the listener is going to take this, my perspective, but it is my perspective is on my first post on Instagram, I did mention that I want to start to take images that has. huge surroundings, sky, landscape, and tiny people. The reason why I wanted to do that is because, when we focus ourselves, the surrounding seems very small, but when we focus on something bigger, our problem seems to be small. Our depression or whatever seems, like you said, insignificant because my focus currently is in a way that I, I do want to glorify God as a, I'm a Christian. and I want to show that through the, through my images, how small humans are and how great our God is in that sense. So that I want to put that in a perspective, in a image to show, comfort in a, what my dad said, your photo looks very sad. So I said, you're right. That's my point.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, interesting. Try to bring comfort. So talk to me a little bit more about that. Cause I feel like I kind of understand it, but I want to hear it from you. you said that you wanted to put comfort in images that look sad.

Sean Kim:

There is a discomfort when you put a certain, subject in a corner of the photo. You don't feel comforted in a sense. if they're right in the center of the image that speaks volume and it's very, it seems balanced, but when you put subjects in a corner, it doesn't seem balanced, but yet trying to find that balance with the huge surrounding. It's a challenge. Um, and I

think that's what

Sean Kim:

I think that's what I'm trying to do. And if you look at like my, most of my Instagram images that I have, there is a subject who's silhouette looking toward a light, looking toward the plane that's far away, flying, you know, away from the surfer or whatever. so there is always a leading mind from the subject to the light.

Mm hmm.

Sean Kim:

So darkness to the light. Darkness to a hope. So in that light to a, yeah, in that sense. Ah. And I think like this image, can you see it? Yes, I can see it, yes. So it's like little three, four surfers, but there's a huge ray going off. Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

So,

Sean Kim:

something like that.

Raymond Hatfield:

So I would love to know more about your, um, relationship with light because, I think, are you pretty exclusively natural light?

Sean Kim:

Yes, unless I get hired by, um, it's really weird to say that hired, but hired by people who wants me to take a photo of their, wedding or, engagement shoot or, I don't really have a lot of experience of getting hired to do an event shoot, but I do have a lot of experience doing, event shoot at the church, which I volunteer.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh yes. And there's lots of stage lighting there as well.

Sean Kim:

Yes, but I don't, with that, I don't really take my own flash.

Raymond Hatfield:

Sure, sure. Gotcha. But, but

Sean Kim:

for these like, for the past Genshin Ida that I covered about, what was it, four weeks ago?

Uh huh.

Sean Kim:

I did take my off camera flash with those, the, you call, not strobe, what do you call it? The speed light?

Raymond Hatfield:

Octobox? Stand? Oh, yes. Yes. Okay.

Sean Kim:

Yes, I took that with it. I talked to the pastor because uh, Quinceañera's, her grandpa is the pastor of the church.

I

Sean Kim:

said, could I use this here? He goes, Oh, do whatever, do whatever you need. I was like, right on.

Yeah.

Sean Kim:

And, and I took a bunch of photos there, with the off camera flash. no one had any issues. I'll literally put the strobe right next to them. Of course you won't see that in the, in a photo. The images came out great. the amazing thing with that is, I delivered six photo albums to, to them and the daughter, you know, their customer here at the cleaners, daughter came in and she brought in a bunch of dry cleaning and she's like, I love my photo album. I sleep with it. That's wonderful. I was like, Oh, right on, right on. So in that event, I did use the off camera flash a lot. And thanks to your course. Um, that actually your, your course was the beginning of figuring out how to use flash. Um, it took me a while to start looking at watching those videos. Cause I wasn't really interested in, flash photography. But I do remember how you said that you're, you're gonna put a course if anybody want to, pitch in to, to be a tester. Yeah. Yeah at the time. Yeah, you were a beta tester for sure. But I didn't, I didn't test. You signed up but you didn't test. Yeah. Yeah. But you

Raymond Hatfield:

finally, you finally took control and you went through the course and it helped you out, you said? Oh big time.

Sean Kim:

Big time. Oh wonderful. Because if I, If I had just my own set of knowledge and start doing a search on how to do photography course or the off camera flash or on camera flash course, I think I would be lost in how to do a correct search. But you gave so much knowledge within that videos, within those videos. It helped me to figure out, okay, since I'm lacking here, I need to more do more search here and figure out how they're doing it. I don't know where to start, kind of thing. Right,

Raymond Hatfield:

right. I mean, it's kind of like photography, where it seems simple. How do I take pictures? But then once you start Googling it, you realize, I actually have no idea what I'm talking about here. Like, I'm so not well versed in this world, that once you start to get a little knowledge, it starts to make a lot more sense. So, I'm good. Yes. I'm, I'm, I'm very glad that that, uh. But I do want to talk about, once again, your relationship with light when it comes to natural light and silhouettes. Because, I feel like you master them. I feel like you really truly master silhouettes. You do a fantastic job. Obviously it's real nice to have a very strong backlight with, uh, with the sun, come sunset time. But even when I was looking some of your earliest, you know, mountainscape photos, you always focused. And whether that be very early in the morning and lots of, atmosphere and we can see different layers of, mountain ranges, I suppose we could see. You always, I felt like had a very strong understanding of, of light. Can you talk to me a little bit more about that? Like, was there a time when you realized the importance of light or was it just more organic than that?

Sean Kim:

I think it was organic. because even now I'm trying to figure out, I think trying to figure out how all these things work technically, I don't think I have that understanding, but seeing the scenery itself and knowing how it's going to work, I just follow through what's what's there.

I

Sean Kim:

think that's, that's how it is. I mean, even with the silhouette at the beach, I can't control the beach. I can't control people to stay here, stand there, then it doesn't, it's not natural. I think my eye just began to develop what's good and what's bad image, yeah. So over time it's just exercising my own vision. And then putting that into practice and that, you know, a lot of times, let's say I took like 50 photos, during the sunset time I'll go home, chances are I'll have like. One image for sure, sometimes none, but then I try to figure out, okay, why did this not work? was it lack of composition? Is this too much distraction? Is the person too small? It's all those things I try to figure out. And you know, you're, you're cropping things like here and there. And of course, thanks to the medium format camera, you can crop it as much as you can.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yes.

Sean Kim:

So there's a benefit of that. Sometimes even though I thought it was a bad image, by cropping much, it's like, okay, that works. So that kind of helps.

Raymond Hatfield:

Interesting. How often would you say that? How close is the image that you get in camera versus the image that you deliver?

Sean Kim:

What do you mean?

Raymond Hatfield:

Like when, you know, you talked about cropping there a lot. How close is the image, like when you're finished with an image and you're like ready to post it on Instagram or in the Facebook group, how close is that image to the actual image that you captured? Oh, I guess. Oh,

Sean Kim:

so it's, it's pretty, it's pretty rare that I crop. But there are times that I do crop quite a bit. But it's, I would say about, 90 percent of times, it's what it is.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah,

Sean Kim:

yeah. Only difference is maybe like it's a square crop, or 4x5, or, 4x3, 3x4.

Raymond Hatfield:

What about, um, like the actual editing of your images as far as like, exposure, all these things? Talk to me a little bit about your editing workflow.

Sean Kim:

lot of times it works completely as how it is just by converting to black and white and then controlling the highlights and shadows a little bit here and there. That's the finish, but sometimes by adding a little bit masking, it helps to bring out the light more. So for instance, if I'm taking photo of a sunlight in the background, chances are the strip of the beach, the water in the ocean, it's kind of darker. So what I do is I'll mask the ocean and then bring up the highlight a little bit to, bring more life to a silhouette person in the background or the, the one in the front, because otherwise the person is kind of blend in with the ocean itself. So you can't really see the person itself. So those kinds of things I have just here and there.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. You don't want, if somebody is already small, you don't want them blending into the ocean for sure.

Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

I want to know what you're struggling with right now. Like what's something in photography that, that you struggle with on a daily basis to go out and shoot?

Sean Kim:

I'm kind of bored out.

Raymond Hatfield:

Really? You're, you're feeling, you're feeling kind of, kind of bored with photography.

Sean Kim:

No, no, no. I'm kind of feel bored with this, taking photos of small people. Oh, I see. cause kind of it's, I'm going to similar location over and over and and trying to figure out those things. And if they're not there, I can't really take a photo of people. So I'm trying to figure out, okay, what may be more interesting for me. And then not move on from what I'm doing, but add on to what I'm doing. So I'm trying to figure that balance, maybe going back to like taking more landscape, but even though in landscape, I mean, I get props for people who do landscape for living. Man, landscape photography gets so boring. How so? I mean I mean, you can enjoy the beauty of the mountain scenery, the beach scenery, the pier, everything, but at the same time, when you do things over and over and over, it just gets boring I'm sorry to say, but even the beautiful scenery gets boring. You would rather just capture with your eyes than pulling out your cameras to take a photo of it and then edit it. Because I think what happens is as a photographer, you get so saturated with so many beautiful photos. So I think, I think for me, I need to keep finding something new for me to photograph, otherwise I'll get bored out of it.

Raymond Hatfield:

And what do you think that is? I don't know. You still gotta figure it out. You haven't yet. So obviously, like this past year, you did a lot of photographing things like, protests, with a lot more people in them. Right. Did this give you some sort of boost in excitement when it came to, to photographing?

Sean Kim:

In the beginning it did, but towards the end, not so. I really did enjoy taking photos of people, um, being very vibrant in their environment. And you know, you, I mean, you'd be taking, you'd be taking your camera right onto their face. They're so focused on what they're doing. They can care less if you're taking photos or whatever. So that kind of gave me a little bit more understanding of, okay, what, what journalists would do. But at the same time, I can definitely tell that even those type of photography, you can get bored out of

it.

Sean Kim:

because I, I don't know how many protests I've been to. I've been to so many of them, just

Raymond Hatfield:

in the past

Sean Kim:

year. Oh yeah. I mean, I drove all the way up to, Sacramento. Oh, really? Take one event. and that was, that was crazy. That one was real crazy. but if you tell me to do that now, I probably wouldn't do it.

Raymond Hatfield:

You mean just photograph a type of protest?

Sean Kim:

Yeah. I mean, if you tell me there is a huge protest going on in Sacramento, and then would you go? If you ask me that, I'll say no.

Raymond Hatfield:

Right. Do you

Sean Kim:

think that's because you're

Raymond Hatfield:

bored of it? Or because I think so. I think so.

Sean Kim:

I'm kind of, I'm kind of okay with that, um, journey. But hey, you never know. If something happened again, I may pick up my camera and start shooting, for that, protest or whatever.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. That's like a seven hour drive

Sean Kim:

for you, right? Right. Yeah, like more than seven hours. Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh my

Sean Kim:

gosh.

Raymond Hatfield:

Was it worth it though? Going to that event?

Sean Kim:

Oh, yeah, that was a huge. That was a crazy experience. That was a great experience. There's 13, 000 people just piled up together. And everybody was so passionate.

Raymond Hatfield:

I want to ask because I just remembered, towards the beginning of last year, you had mentioned that you were thinking about making a book of what 2020 was to you. how's that going?

Sean Kim:

so that may happen maybe like 10, 20 years when you, maybe when your grandpa, I hope that I am not a grandpa in the next 10 years. Oh my gosh. 20 years, 20 years, maybe 30 years. I'm not in a rush to make the book. but I think even just having one made and, uh, maybe, uh, I'll give it to a library or whatever, and then they can have a short documentation of what happened in 2020.

Raymond Hatfield:

I got to ask

Sean Kim:

why, I got to ask

Raymond Hatfield:

why, why wait so

Sean Kim:

long? Hmm. Good question. Oh, well, I think one of the main reason is maybe because, there's so many photos that was taken last year. And there's nothing unique to it. Uniqueness. You mean in general or by you? Uh, by in general, generally. So it's the 2020, protest photography was so saturated. even if I make a photo now, I think people will care less about what the book says. However, if the photo was presented, maybe 20, 30 years down the road, people may see it and be like, Oh, I do remember that. It will kind of give a different perspective It'll bring them bad memories, maybe good memories I'm, pretty sure bad memories. Yeah, and I think it will just bring back a lot of, a lot of memories to people. So that's why I think I would like to create the book, 20, 30 years later. Cause it will give a very different perspective from very different people's beliefs.

Raymond Hatfield:

What is it that inspires you to go out and take photos? Why do you keep doing it?

Sean Kim:

Great question. So this, this is another spiritual journey for me, is that, finding beauty in chaos that brings real joy within me. Because the chaotic world. I do say, I will say, in a hopeless world, um, God finds beauty in his people. I believe that wholeheartedly. And whenever I feel down, that's my hope. And I see that within the photos, even those things are chaotic. I can find beauty within those chaos. And I do believe that's how God sees me. yeah. So that brings a different perspective and different, Purpose in my life

Raymond Hatfield:

So it's all about trying to find find the beauty that's in chaos,

Sean Kim:

right? Because i'm chaos. I'm the one who chaos is in chaos Trying to find light in that

Raymond Hatfield:

I was gonna say maybe you should shoot more weddings because they're always very chaotic and you can always create

Sean Kim:

beauty there Hey, man, I tell you I cover one wedding. Oh, man that the man that they had I was just like can I go now? And I can't believe you guys do that. That's your career. That's your bread and butter. Maybe you just got a bad wedding. I don't know. Well, it wasn't it wasn't bad. It was just a demand that they had. Right. And I can't imagine because and there are the there are people that I, I can't imagine for the people that you don't know.

Raymond Hatfield:

No, that's easier. That makes it easier. Listen, for me, if it's somebody who I don't know, you can kind of, and I was talking with Heather Lawton about this the other day, it's like you can kind of become a different person. You can be that person who at least for me I'm pretty easygoing, you know, whatever happens happens, but at a wedding, you kind of looked at as the professional and you have to take charge. And you can be that person who is like, we're going to do this, you can be that, you can be helpful to them by, by providing direction and do all these things. Like I had a wedding a few years ago where, I had, this couple was not the right couple for me. They were not the right couple for me, but, they. don't remember how they found me, but they were like, no, we don't. We're like, when I've interested in engagement photos and engagement session is where I learn more about the couple, how they interact with each other and how I can provide something for them. Right. But they didn't want the engagement session. Okay, that's fine. They just wanted the wedding day coverage. And then I sent out a questionnaire a month before wedding that's like, Hey, give me some more details here, just to confirm where it is and what time you want me to show up or whatever. They never filled it out. Despite me trying to like, Hey, what time do you want me there at your wedding? Like you got me there for eight hours. Like what time do you want me to show up? And I never got a response. So the day before the wedding, I had to be like, Hey, so I guess I'll be there like 10 AM because, I don't know, like when you're getting ready and stuff, so I show up at 10 AM and, sure enough, she was like, Oh, you're here early. And I was like, well, well, of course I am, you know, and for some reason, everybody's in a very bad mood and I could never figure out why. but by the time that my coverage was going to end was right when the ceremony was about to start and I was like look I like I tried, you know I really tried to to get an answer out of you and I didn't get anything and that's kind of one of those situations Where you know if that would happen with? Somebody who I knew who I was comfortable with I'd be like look, it's fine. Like I'll be here It's okay. Like I'm already here, you know with the camera anyway, I might as well photograph but because this was somebody who clearly didn't value I guess what it was that I was doing Sure. it was much easier to say like, Hey, look, I tried all these times. I now have to make a decision. And that is, if you want me to, like, I'll stay for the end of the ceremony, you hired me to shoot your wedding, but I'm not going to stay any longer than that. Unless you request for me to do that. And in which case I'm going to send you an invoice after the fact, but that's on you. and for me, it's a whole lot easier to do that with people who I don't know than people who, who I am comfortable with. So I would much rather photograph people who I don't know. So I think that if, maybe if you were to try to do something like that, it would be. I can

Sean Kim:

definitely see, I can definitely see fun in it. because you know, you're going every day,

Raymond Hatfield:

there's cake

Sean Kim:

you're going into environment where it's like very vibrant, happy moments, you know, parents, parents crying, daughter crying, capturing that moment. And you have it, you were having that in your, your file and delivering it. I mean, they may see it and see it beautiful, but at the same time, if they see those photos down the road, it will have greater meaning to them. So I can definitely see the benefit of a shooting wedding. So do you want to try it

Raymond Hatfield:

again?

Sean Kim:

Yeah, I mean,

Raymond Hatfield:

if people want to hire me, that's the next step. That's all. That's a whole nother interview. That's a whole nother discussion right there.

Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

So I guess, you know, we're kind of coming into the, uh, end of our time here. I got one last question for you and that is, what is it that you love so much about photography? I know that I asked you, what inspires you and you said, finding, beauty in the chaos. But when it comes to the technical side of photography, what is it that you love? My

Sean Kim:

camera.

Raymond Hatfield:

Just looking at it and how beautiful it is?

Sean Kim:

Oh, this thing is huge. Look at how big it is. It's like a, it's like a VHS tape. It's giant. A beast. But you know, I love this camera. Uh huh. And I, I love looking at that camera. And I love holding it. And of course, I'd love, you want to hear the sound of the click?

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh, I don't, I don't want to because it's gonna make me go out and buy one right now. It sounds like film. It sounds like film. Yeah, exactly.

Sean Kim:

Exactly. I mean, sure people say cameras don't really matter. I love my camera. I've had it for about over a year and I still love my camera.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah, that's a good feeling, isn't it?

Sean Kim:

Oh, yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah.

Sean Kim:

Oh, yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

That's something that doesn't get talked about enough, you know, a lot of people are like, I love capturing the beauty or whatever. And you and me are like, have you seen this thing? Like, it's beautiful. It's fun to hold. It's great to hold. I love to hear that. Well, Sean, I guess I was wrong. I do have one last question for you. Do you have any advice for anybody who is just getting started in photography who's kind of hoping to find their way?

Sean Kim:

Go to a local library borrow a bunch of books and read them. And even if it doesn't make any sense to you right at the moment, just consume it. And once you begin to consume, and don't even bother. Like for me, don't even bother going out to practice what you learn. Just consume it. Do what you want to do with your camera. And then over time things will start to clicking and once things start to click You'll have more question about those things Go back to the book and read it again, and it will make a sense 100 and you will master whatever you need to master and you don't even have to worry about it. So Free education or the library. I probably read every single book that's in my local library and I told them they need to update their books. It's bad. It's really bad. It's like from the nineties. Uh, you recently did an interview with this gentleman. Not recently. his name is Owen? Owen? Chris Owens? Yes. He wrote a book called, People Photos? Pictures. People Pictures. People Pictures. That was a good book. Yes. Cause he doesn't really go into, absolute detail about technical aspect, but how to engage. And that was really great because every time I feel like I'm going up to a stranger or somebody that I'm going to take, take photographs, sometimes I feel like I'm just barking, not talking. And he gave a very great perspective on how to engage and how to be more intimate with the person who's in front of you. So that really, helped me big time. And I think, I think that book should be read by, like,

Raymond Hatfield:

everybody.

Sean Kim:

Yeah.

Raymond Hatfield:

Yeah. I bought it. I got a copy. Wait, is it Authentic Portraits? No, I think

Sean Kim:

it's called People, People Picture, People Photo. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, People

Raymond Hatfield:

Pictures. There it is. I do have it.

Sean Kim:

And I think you can, you can, buy, actually you can get the free ebook right now, I think.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, on his website, perhaps. You can definitely grab something from him. And I mean, he is a wonderful resource. I had the pleasure of meeting him. Yeah, at Imaging. And he is just like, and if anybody follows him on Instagram. Do you follow him on Instagram?

Sean Kim:

No, I don't. I didn't know he had Instagram.

Raymond Hatfield:

Oh my gosh. He is like every single day rides his bike up a mountain. He lives in Santa Barbara and I think he goes on like a 20 mile bike ride every single day. And I'm like, how do you do this? This is insane. But yeah, I mean, a wonderful guy, great educator, and obviously very knowledgeable. So that's awesome to hear. Well, before I let you go, Sean, can you let listeners know obviously where they can find you and see more of your work?

Sean Kim:

There's a funny story behind that.'cause I don't have a business card.

Mm-Hmm.

Sean Kim:

Um, I don't have a photography website. So some customers come in at the cleaners. They'll say, well, how can my friends find you? Or, how can somebody find you to the do the photo? This is what I tell them, I have to find you first.

Raymond Hatfield:

Okay. Tell me about that. That's how you, you can't just, you can't just leave it at that. Tell, tell, tell me the reasoning behind this. Tell me what you mean.

Sean Kim:

That means they have to be a customer at the cleaners. They have to come in and then they have to tell me what's going on and see if I can Because a lot of time people will ask you. Hey, can you cover for this photo? Can you do a portrait for me? And generally of those who are hiring me are people I already

know

Sean Kim:

So I guess it's because I, I'm not really seeking out to become a professional photographer yet. I'm just doing these for recreation

in a

Sean Kim:

sense, but maybe one day I may make it as a full on professional work. But only thing that I have that is available on internet, it's Instagram. Sean Kim style. There we go.

Raymond Hatfield:

Perfect. I'm going to link to that obviously in the shadows of this as well. Sean, man, thank you so much for coming on and sharing everything that you did as far as your journey into photography. After all these years, I had a great time chatting with you today, finally getting you in front of the camera. And I look forward to seeing what you come up with in the future. And you know what, was gonna say what you can discover that is no longer boring to you, but, that's a pretty poorly phrased question. So I hope that you find something here in the future that is very interesting for you. And, whatever it is, I look forward to seeing it.

All right. Today's action item being the one thing that if you implement it, it will make a difference and move the needle forward in your photography is this. I want you to just review your old photos to see how far you've come. If you've been shooting for more than like four or five months, I think you're gonna be surprised at how much you've grown. Now, it may not be, night and day, but I challenge you to sit down and see where your images have changed. See where you've made progress. I know how easy it is to feel like you're stuck in the weeds and that you're not seeing any progress with your work, but being able to stop and look at older photos. And then objectively, see how far you've come can really help you to not only stay motivated, but also to be more creatively challenged in your work as well, because you'll just want to continue to grow. It's a super powerful exercise. I encourage you to do it. Again, even if you've only been shooting for like 3, 4, 5 months. Try to note down those things that have, have changed, that you've made progress in in your photography. If you've been doing this for a year or two or more, do the same thing. It is a super powerful challenge. All right, that is it for today. Until next week, remember, the more that you shoot today, the better of a photographer you'll be tomorrow. Talk soon.