Sure has been a year, huh?

It is now year 3 (THREE!!!!) of wzhouphoto. This year was slightly different from the previous two in that I strangely didn’t make too many difficult decisions. Maybe you could say that it means I didn’t work hard enough. Maybe you could say that it’s the result of me spending the entire previous year preparing for this year.

Ultimately, this year was the year I started to understand my photographic style, and the direction I want to take my career in. Knowing me, that answer will change no fewer than 5 more times but a start’s a start.

Let’s see what happened this year.

• Started the year by joining VGBootCamp to help run the stream at Genesis 6, one of the oldest Super Smash Brothers tournaments in Oakland, California.

• Got fired from my first office job! Read about the juicy details in my ZHOU 31: Week 2 blog post

• Helped re-launch the Baltimore chapter of Creative Mornings!

• Came back to my last semester of college with a week and a half worth of absences to start and ended up graduating in May! With two minors to boot! Talk about a Costco value pack.

• Made a cookbook! Published that cookbook! Sold that cookbook! (You can buy it here, or check out the blog page here)

• Drove to Wisconsin with some of my best friends

• Attended Combo Breaker for the first time.

• Got to shoot my friend Liams first concert with SoFar Baltimore

• Got three more images published by Red Bull Esports

• Photographed at Glitch 6 and Pound 2019

• Started working with the Baltimore Waterfront Partnership as a photographer and videographer

• Came back for a second plate as the in-house photographer for the Maryland Public Service Scholars Program. You might even see me there for round three this summer (!)

• Helped create and lead a 360º video curriculum with the Sondheim Nonprofit Leadership Program interns through the UMBC Shriver Center

• Switched boats to go Sony

• I got to meet 40 INCREDIBLE couples and their love stories! I’m grateful for every client as well as every colleague, and friend of mine that takes me on to shoot with them.

This year was a lot. Physically, mentally, emotionally. While it is the third year of me working as a photographer, this has been the first 6 months of me being out of academia, and working freelance full time. While the gravity of this privilege is not lost on me, another part of me is starting to understand just how lonely it can be working outside of an office/classroom environment. Even as someone who greatly values his personal space and time, it was a bit much at times. Not to say that I didn’t have wonderful friends I could call up at any time, no. But the emotional strain of being with yourself, even in the midst of client calls and emails was something no one ever warned of in school.

But even so, this year has been filled with momentous occasions, and I’m incredibly grateful for each and every client that trusted my vision to distill their love into photographs. Even more so am I grateful for the friends that somehow decide year after year to stick with me. I won’t dream of chasing some grand, lofty goal in 2020; I just hope that I can better connect with my friends and anyone that hopes to become one.

This year I exported close to 7000 images in total, but here’s a slightly larger distillation of my favorites
(I did a series on my absolute favorite 31 images from the year though!)

Without further ado: here was my 2019.
Enjoy