December 05th 2012 by Andrew S Gibson
This article is part of a series of interviews with long exposure photographers to celebrate the release of my ebook Slow. You can keep track of the interviews by clicking on the Long Exposure Photography Interviews link under Categories in the right-hand sidebar.
Will Le is a photographer from Malaysia. He started shooting long exposure black and white photos in 2010. With the majority of photographers in this interview series based in Europe or the United States, it’s nice to have a representative from Asia.
How would you describe your photographic vision? What kind of look do you try and create in your photos?
I always wish to tell a simple story through my images. In other words, I try to use whatever things or sources I can find from my surroundings to tell a story to the viewer. For me, the message I want to share with the viewers is always more significant than the context in the shot. The stories might relate to myself, or to old stories told by the elders or some past memories I went through that had a profound impact.
Life is a long journey and when we stop and look inside ourselves during part of the journey, we can see a lot of things. If we evaluate it closely, we will notice we are still carrying some of those memories until this moment and feel the emotion like it was just happened yesterday. I wish I can express that emotion through my images.
When did you start taking photos? What made you decide to explore photography as a means of artistic expression?
I start bought my first compact digital camera when I was a college student. I didn’t have any basic knowledge about photography at that time, but I did have some simple practice with digital editing. I also love sketching portrait and still images although I never feel I am good at it. Therefore taking photos became my way to express the vision I want to create in my mind without really owning the proper skill to draw it myself.
I am never good in expressing my feelings using words. Sometimes it is impossible to label everything we feel about our surrounding by using only the letters. I think images in other ways enable me to express feelings in a deeper, unspoken and subjective way.
Name three photographers you like and why.
It is a bit difficult to name only three photographers because there are so many photographers who inspire me in understanding black and white images. If I really had to name a few, there are:
Nilgün Kara. She is one of the photographers who really brought my attention to the beauty of the minimal world at an early stage when I still busy using colour in my photography. Her very unique way of presenting her grey, minimal world had a huge impact on me. I love the simplicity in her images and her way of using some very handy subjects as a medium to tell a simple story.
Jeff Gaydash. I really love the way Jeff presents the tones in his images. After following his works for a few years, the impact he has had on me in creating my own images is undeniable.
Mark Voce. There are a few photographs I save on my phone and browse whenever I need to. Mark’s photographs are definitely one of my collection.
Long exposure photography – what’s the attraction and why do you do it?
I love how long exposures simplify everything around us and reveal the hidden world behind the screen of reality. Personally, I love the experience of shooting long exposures, it forces me to slow down and evaluate even more closely the subject I am working with. But setting up the tripod, composing the subject, adjusting the exposure and putting on and taking off the filter for every trial photo were really testing my patience to its limit at the beginning.
After a few years of practice, I notice long exposure photography is really the best way to still my mind and be more aware in the present moment, at least during the shooting session. It is impossible to think about the problems of life and try to get the good shots at the same time.
Where do you live and how does it influence your work?
I live in Miri, in the Malaysian part of the island of Borneo. I think I live in a place where most of the people would think that landscape photography doesn’t have much potential. In certain way, I have to admit that they are right. I think that’s why I have come up with the idea to use some handy objects as a main character in my images and try my very best to make it ‘work’.
The subjects I ever work with include the broken chair I found beside the highway (broken dream), some branches I found on the beach (hope), the rotten steels that the kids carried around (balance) and some tubes I found in my house’s backyard where my mother use them for gardening purposes (emptiness). One thing I certainly be grateful for is that my town is not far from the beach where I do most of my long exposure photography. The idea of minimalism with its emphasis on simplicity seems match with everything has been provided to me in the place I live.
Why black and white? What’s the appeal?
Black and white creates a space for imagination and allows tolerance of differences. That’s how I view my own work as well as others. After a few years practicing black and white, I become more convinced that the shooting session in the very first place is just a very small step in completing the shot into a final image.
Sometimes, I am hardly 100% sure how the final shot would look like and revealing the mystery and potential behind the shot during editing is sometimes a wonderful experience. This is because the digital darkroom gives a huge amount of freedom to photographers to use their own imagination to materialise their vision through the images. It hard to find right or wrong in black and white photography. There are only differences of interpretation in how photographers read their own world.
There is a sense of space in your images. And time, solitude, loneliness. Are these conscious themes you are trying to express in your work?
I am not sure whether that is conscious, or if they just come into my work naturally, or if they’re simply part of my personality that unconsciously sneaks into my work. Sometimes, I even not sure what kind of ‘style’ I am practicing when producing my own images. I don’t follow any specific rules and I don’t believe in any specific rules. I think in certain way, this gives me more freedom to use my own imagination to create images which speak to me. For me, the important thing is allow true feeling to flow from within, and only do what works best for myself.
What is your approach to long exposure photography? Do you plan the shoot first, and try to take an image that matches your vision? Or do you go out without a fixed idea, and respond to what you find?
Most of the time, I go out shooting without any specific idea of what am I going to get. I respond to whatever I can find which I think has potential to become ‘great’. I believe in coincidences that sometimes giving me a chance to be in the right place and at the right time. For me, I am okay with these unknown elements that might be waiting for me every time I go out for shooting, and to be in line with those elements and find whatever possibility I can to get a good shot. Although sometimes I came back with nothing, but I think is important to keep trying.
How important is light in your imagery? What types of light do you prefer for long exposure photography?
I prefer a moderate amount of light in my images but definitely avoid shooting under sunlight as it casts strong highlights and shadows on the subject. Sometimes, I even don’t want any light and wait for the sun to settle fully on the horizon before starting my shooting in the field. Although it might cause the shot to be underexposed, at the same time it is easier to control the exposure and capture more tonal range which is essential for editing purposes.
You crop some of your photos to the square format. Why do you do this and how does it affect the composition? How important is aspect ratio for you?
For me, the square format is a very balanced composition. It emphasises the subject directly without losing the control over other elements. I think this is significant as it makes the composition even stronger.
It definitely impacts how I make my composition during the shooting. Holding the idea I am going to make the square format later on during editing, I need to give more space for the subject than I normally need so that I will have enough room to crop it into square.
You can see more of Will’s work at these links:
Here are some more of Will’s photos:
If you’d like to learn more about long exposure photography, my ebook Slow takes you through the creative possibilities of using slow shutter speeds, from blurring motion with a shutter speed of 1/30 second all the way to long exposure techniques using shutter speeds of five minutes or longer.
All photos in this interview are protected by copyright. Please contact the photographer for permission to use in any way.