I can’t believe almost 5 months has gone by in 2023!
It’s been a whirlwind of a year on a personal and professional front, which meant I haven’t had a lot of time to devote to personal photography and this blog. As months go by, I’ve contemplated skipping my yearly review.
But I have shared an annual review on this blog for the last 6 years (since the inception of this blog back in 2016) and I’m keen to continue the tradition even if it’s 5 months late!
The purpose of my yearly review blog post is for me to reflect on my photography and aspects of my life related to photography, and also to discuss what I’m looking forward to for the rest of 2023.
If you’re interested, my previous year in reviews can be found here:
2022 in review
2022 was a challenging year on a professional and personal level.
The COVID pandemic was still a big challenge professionally (I work in healthcare in my day job) and work was demanding. I came face to face with burn out on multiple occasions that needed significant self-reflection and changes to my situation.
This naturally had a negative impact on both on my health and creativity.
I just didn’t have as much energy and head space as I would like for photography and sharing my passion for visual story telling and photography in 2022.
But it wasn’t all bad for sure. There was so much to be grateful for in 2022. I manage get back into travelling again (overseas as well as locally) and that really helped regain some energy and perspective back on life.
Blogging & Photography
For the last 8+ months while this blog remained inactive, I’ve been contemplating whether to continue this blog.
I’ve published 261 blog posts since 2016. I can safely say it’s still a passion project I love (when I do have time for it). Photography brings so much joy to my life. Keeping up this blog and remaining in the photography community is my way of staying connected to my creative self.
In 2022, I wrote 17 blog posts (short of my aim of 20 blog posts goal I set for myself at the end of 2021).
My most popular post in 2022 at 1.8k views was My initial impression and review of Wandrd Roam Sling camera bag. I had the privilege of trying out Wandrd’s new line of sling camera bags and it’s still a bag I use today!
Photography
In 2022 I did a couple of client assignments which was fun – that was mainly around personal branding photography, which I always love doing.
Between the presence of COVID restrictions being on and off in WA, and our own busy personal/professional lives, the Fuji X Aus Perth reps (a team which I’m part of) didn’t end up organising as many FXA Perth events as we would have liked to. But we did at least manage to organise 1 event in 2022. It was so great to get out and do a photo walk around Perth with fellow Fujifilm camera enthusiasts.
A lot of the photography that I did do in 2022 was all personal and travel.
As borders gradually opened up in Australia, we managed to get out and about quite a bit.
Travel
After almost minimal amounts of travelling in 2020 and 2021, I travelled somewhere almost monthly in 2022!
This means I have a big backlog of 15,000+ photos just waiting to be edited! Here are a few trips that I took in 2023 that were my highlights:
- A trip to Cairns, Queensland to April. It was a postponed honeymoon trip. A mix of relaxation in a tropical rainforest and a once-in-a-lifetime experience of snorkelling in the world heritage site, the Great Barrier Reef. I recorded a ton of video and I’m looking forward to experimenting with creating a short travel video with it.
- We had a relaxing staycation in Fremantle for a friend’s beautiful wedding in February.
- We headed down to the Margaret River region 3 times in 2022! Each occasion was a different kind of trip, but always involved some great food and wine, and a relaxing time.
- We took our (almost) yearly trip to Melbourne to catch up with friends and family in June. And of course, can’t help but try out a few eateries with fantastic food.
- Made a trip to Malaysia in October after almost 3 years! It was also our first international trip since the borders opened up. Fantastic to see some family and friends again, savour some delicious Malaysian food and unwind at a beach side resort.
- Explored our great outback with a 3-day road trip to Bruce Rock, Western Australia in September for a friend’s wedding! It’s the first time I headed out to the wheat belt region of WA. It was so fun to explore the region and re-visit the giant Wave Rock once again. It was chilly during the night, but the days were beautiful.
- We ended the year with a big bang, experiencing a white Christmas in Europe. It was a dream trip I always wanted to take both for photography but also as a personal experience. I came to realise that a cold and wintery city holiday isn’t my favourite kind of holiday. But the Christmas vibe in Austria, Switzerland and Scotland was nothing short of magical, and well worth tolerating the wet and cold weather!
I certainly didn’t achieve all my 2022 goals that I outline in my 2022 plan, especially in terms of photography and blogging. But I ticked off more than I expected in terms of travel, a heap of memories with friends and family, and a ton of travel photos that I can’t wait to dive into and share in future blog posts
Looking to 2023 and beyond
The first half of 2023 has been focused on some professional and personal pursuits. Hence the radio silence on this blog.
But this should be changing in the second half of 2023!
I’m anticipating that my second half of 2023 will give me more time back to focus on this never ending passion of photography, writing and sharing my images with a vibrant photography community online.
I want to continue to do documentary-style Personal & Business Branding photography as I find it so much fun to meet new creatives, side hustlers and solopreneurs, learn about them and tell their stories through imagery.
If the pandemic taught us anything, I think one of the lessons is that those who are closest to us will not be here forever.
I’m more driven now than ever to explore “day in the life” style documentary family photography to help families have a visual record of their history and love ones to keep for the ages.
People photography isn’t something I’m super comfortable with, but it’s such a powerful thing to have people in images. And it’s something I absolutely want to push myself to get more comfortable with through practising that muscle.
We don’t have firm travel plans for this year (after a big year of travel last year). But I plan to dive back into my travel photo archive from the last few years and start sharing more photo stories.
I’ve been toying with the idea of a photography newsletter for a little while now, so that is something that could come to fruition by the end of 2023. Perhaps dive into some educational photography content around photography side hustling, Fujifilm cameras, travel photography and visual storytelling for beginners.
And here’s a small teaser of what’s to come… There will be a collaboration with Adobe on using Adobe Express as a photographer that I’m excited to share in the coming weeks!
Conclusion
If you have read this far, thank you! It’s been a challenging 3+ years of the pandemic for everyone in the world, turning our lives upside down.
I’m excited to see how the rest of 2023 turns out creatively and photographically. I have a ton of photos, stories and educational content ideas that I would love to share with budding photographers.
I’m grateful for for the amazing Fuji X Aus community and fellow readers of this blog.
I hope you’ve had great first half of 2023 so far! And I’m keen to hear your 2023 plans in the comments below.
Thanks for stopping by today and happy shooting.
Leave a Reply