Stable

Artist: Bowen Yan
Writer: Erick Cheng
Editor: Michelle Lo

Bowen Yan, a 15-year-old sophomore, has just created one of his first big photography projects called Stable, marking the beginning of his photography journey. Yan first got into photography because he was inspired by the works of Erick Cheng, a photographer friend of his, and after he learned more about it in his media arts class.

As a photographer, Yan puts a lot of thought into the way he wants to portray his message through his photography. “This photo is meant to show the stability and recurrence of seasons, showing that you can count on them to always come around even for a while,” Yan said. “That’s why the leaf is stable while the background blurs from motion.” 

From a technical standpoint, Yan used a long shutter speed of 1⁄2 of a second to give the background a motion blur effect. Yan also focuses his camera on the leaf, which was elevated on a cutting board, allowing the leaf to give off a clarity component to the picture. Long-exposure photography is extremely challenging to execute, even for professional photographers, due to its unpredictable nature. “The shot was the tenth try and I shot sixteen in total,” Yan said. “While taking this shot, the leaf moving made blurring worse and the long exposure often made the picture overexposed.” 

Another important part of Yan’s process of photo production is editing using Lightroom. Most professional photographers edit their photos as it’s a great way to enhance photos as well as establish a personal or unique style to their photos. “Using Lightroom, I added saturation to the photo as I drew on inspiration from images with moving cars on the highway or road and they make bright lines in the photo,” Yan said.

Looking to the future, Yan will become more active in the photography world, hoping to tackle more projects.