last seen 532 days ago
Member since
February 2007
links:
caniceleung.com
blog
myspace
camera:
Canon EOS 5D
+ 550ex
+ 24-70 f/2.8 L USM
+ 20 f/2.8 EF USM
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I'm not sure how I ended up doing this. Like every other teenaged girl, I went through a delusionary "I want to be a photographer" phase in high school. So I stole my mother's collection of old cameras, and starting snapping terribly trite things just to find out how the camera would react. It was for that reason I started photographing shows in late 2002. I had already been going to small indie and metalcore shows for a few years, so it was a natural extension of my own interests, and an easy to way to play with a flash.
Around the same time, I starting interning at a community newspaper. Adopting the journalistic, documentative side of photography helped me understand the significance of photographing local shows. Though there are a sea of cameras at every show these days, Toronto indie and metalcore shows weren't being documented - or at least, that element of DIY culture hadn't yet been established here.
When I moved on to shooting hardcore shows, being there for a purpose made it less awkward to immerse myself in a male-dominated, aggressive scene. So in a lot of ways, for better or worse, it's become part of my identity.
Now, five years down the line, I'm a journalism student at Ryerson University and working the odd freelance gig for weddings, magazines, and newspapers. What started as a hobby has connected me to a subculture, introduced me to new music, and given me great friends all over the world.
It's bizarre; I photograph the real celebrities, the bands, but in the process I am passed on this second-hand glow of it. At smaller shows my presence is common, but on Myspace and at bigger shows like last summer's Gorilla Biscuits, I met a few kids who've followed my site for years and treat me with an absurd, misplaced sense of reverence.
I've never made any money off of this. I don't claim to be great at what I do. But these photos have placed memories, these bands, these venues, these faces, and a moment of youth affixed firmly, permanently in time.
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