Today we’d like to introduce you to Tommy Nguyen.
Tommy, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
My photographic journey began when I was in high school, snapping black-and-white film off my trusty Canon AE-1 camera, which I still have. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing really but I had a great time doing it with my friends. I didn’t know my f-stop from a hole in the ground but I’m a big believer in learning by doing and learning by experimentation. People who know me know that I’m forever pursuing some artistic or intellectual endeavor. For example, if it isn’t sketching, it is writing; if it isn’t researching a topic, it’s painting (which I do very poorly, I might add).
When I finally started taking photography seriously around 2012 or thereabouts, it seemed just a linear extension from my obsession with beauty and form. And for me, not all beauty has good form; not all forms are beautiful. Maybe because of these interests, it was inevitable that I was drawn to portraiture, headshots and fashion.
In any case, I started taking pictures of friends and that led to taking pictures of people I don’t know personally. About that time, I knew I wanted to be able to craft images more carefully, have the images contain some kind of theme or story, and that led me to the famous (or now infamous) website: Model Mayhem. Remember when that site was cool instead of the – ahem – questionable profiles now all over the site? For all its faults (and there are legions of them), Model Mayhem allowed me to explore and experiment in a way that I think is very difficult if a website like it wasn’t there.
Around that time, I started receiving inquiries from people and strangers for photographing gigs. I’ve done birthdays, bar mitzvahs, family portraits, baby showers, weddings, lookbooks and even product shots. It’s been a strange buckshot of different types of photography, all of which I enjoyed.
For the past year or so, I’ve been more focused on mostly portraiture, headshots and fashion. Even though I still do weddings and events, I mostly do portraiture, headshots and fashion. I suppose it suits my aesthetics and I love working with all these incredibly talented men and women. From makeup artists to stylists, from beautiful models to hairstylist virtuosos, there is something very satisfying about having multiple people who are experts in their respective trades working together to achieve a singular goal of a beautiful image.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
No, the road wasn’t very smooth, but neither is life. If you’re one of those anointed people who flies through life like a straight arrow, you’re incredibly lucky. For the rest of us, we push our neuroses and those bumps in the road around until its livable.
For instance, one of my first paying photo jobs, it was a campaign shoot for a makeup company and I wasn’t really sure how I was going to light the models or to organize the shoot. There were five models that needed to be photographed in a short amount of time. I didn’t have an assistant and the client wanted to have at least three very different lighting situations. I kept thinking, “How the hell I am going to pull this off?” Luckily, one of the client’s friends helped out and the client ended up happy with the results. Phew!
I think in this field, there is a lot of “Fake-it-till-you-make-it” mentality. It’s true but I hate that part of it. You’re caught in a catch-22. If you don’t pretend like you have it all figured out (who the hell does!), people won’t hire you for a gig. If you pretend that you got it all figured out, the client expects you to be Annie Leibovitz. Occupying that middle ground confident, humility is a tough tight-rope act.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
As we all know, photographers in Los Angeles are like Starbucks to the rest of America, we’re practically on every street corner and people run into us snapping away when they least expect it. In such an environment, I’d like to think that I distinguish my business from other photographers by what I bring out in my subjects. I mean, let’s face it. Anybody with an iPhone can snap a selfie, post it on Instagram, and garner a few hundred “Likes” if they really tried to attract attention to themselves. The inevitable question of the professional photographer at this point in history is the question you asked, “What sets me apart from all the others?” Seriously, why would anyone pay me good, hard-earned money for my photographic services when many cellphones can take fairly decent pictures. For me, the answer is two things: my ability to bring out the best in my subjects, and the artistry and aesthetic sensibilities that I can bring to image. This is why Tommy Nguyen Photography focuses on portraiture, headshots and fashion (and the occasional wedding). I can bring my aesthetic sensibilities to each individual moment and craft a compelling image from it.
No doubt, it’s been an interesting ride. Since I first started promoting my photographic work with a business mindset back 2012, this may sound cheesy but most of my clients remarked on how focused and how hard I work when I’m on the “job.” I haven’t really stopped to think about it until now, really, but I’m fairly proud of that.
What were you like growing up?
I guess I was a quiet introverted kid who made the occasional smart-ass remark in English class. It was a strange time growing up. Computers were around and the internet was this new shiny thing that everyone was starting to get into. I was raised in Houston, Texas and my family lived in the no-man’s-land between a bunch of farmland and the Houston suburbs. It’s now overgrown with subdivisions, strip malls and paved over Walmarts, but back then, there wasn’t a whole lot of things to do. I turned to drawing, reading, and writing to pass the time. And I’m glad I did. I nurtured my imagination and the whole lot of nothing going on allowed my imagination to flourish. That’s right; in retrospect, I was glad I was bored all the time because I got use my imagination to entertain myself. I wrote bad angst-ridden poetry, read stories about vampires and aliens, fought the good Kung-Fu fights with my friends and cousins, and sketched everything I saw. Yep, the 90’s were a strange time to be a kid but it sure was fun.
Pricing:
- Summer Headshot Special for $99 – price will revert back to $200 after August 4th
Contact Info:
- Website: www.phototommy.com
- Phone: 310 658 2987
- Email: phototommy5@yahoo.com
Image Credit:
Breena Ylaya
Mathieu Szymkowiak
Phoebe Phillips
Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
