Yeah, so right now we're gonna do what pretty much started my journey, was, I just used to
do this for fun, we used to hunt for really cool locations and different perspectives in the city.
As a content creator, I definitely feel that I'm a photographer first
but at the same time I'm also a filmmaker, online personality, digital artist.
Art has become content
and in this new age, it's more beneficial to kind of balance all these different skill sets.
You want me looking in the camera.
Okay, all right, three, two, one.
My name is Alex Qian, I am a creator based out of Los Angeles.
I am back in my hometown of Chicago.
The plan for today is that there really is no plan.
We're going to run around to some of my old stomping grounds, my favorite spots here in the city
and just see what we can get.
I'm actually going to revisit one of the old classics in Chicago,
chances are, if you have been on social media, you have seen this shot.
We're actually gonna go up into this, this innocent looking parking garage.
Yeah, so this is one of the most rewarding parts about urban photography is that
every location, like a random looking parking garage can turn into something really really neat.
Oh, see look someone put up one of our stickers.
Kind of a little bit of the culture.
Like this
and just lean out,
perfect timing we got a train.
I'm actually going to get a really cool shot here.
This is one of those things that's just a, almost like a cult classic.
Yeah, so that was the reflection garage, Chicago classic.
Okay so I'm looking for the next spot.
What I found is that, a lot of my best work has come from
just kind of unexpected situations,
so that's kind of what we're going to do today,
is just kind of like go with the flow.
These flowers look really nice,
I'm gonna go run over here.
Tulip season in Chicago is this thing, it's always kind of been like a photographic event.
and for some reason, every year I've just missed it.
I really want to get up here without trampling these things.
I'm gonna try my best to not destroy these flowers.
We've got great light, all these colors and I think that a yellow cab would just make the shot complete.
It's a game of patience now.
Here we go,
cab's leading the way, we got a clear street ahead of us
and I'm finally gonna get the shot.
Yeah, look at that, a little slow shutter with the cab, a little traffic moving by and then
the tulips are all still, a pretty iconic part of the city.
I miss doing this, I haven't done like slow shutter stuff in a long time.
Right now I'm thinking about heading to a classic,
which is the S curve in Chicago to photograph the L train.
So we'll head over there, we'll see what we can get.
The beauty of Chicago is that it's really compact, all these spots are within a really
small distance from each other.
Here we are in another obscure looking parking lot
but once you see the shot you'll understand.
Right now we're waiting for, there it is, the classic shot right here in Chicago.
It's always a little bit better when the tail end whips around because
it's almost the train is the subject, right.
That's always the beautiful thing about Chicago is that with the trains and kind of like
how the city moves, it's almost got its own little personality.
Yeah there's one coming right now.
Boom, nailed it, it looks great.
Even to this day I think photography wise Chicago is really obscure and a bit underrated.
Especially when I first started, that's what got me into it,
it was just exploring every single nook and cranny of the urban landscape.
There's always, it felt like something new to discover.
I always kind of view Chicago as that place that I keep kind of really close to my heart.
We're headed right now to one of my favorite spots, a classic cityscape shot.
We're gonna head out there and see what we can get for sunset.
The thought is, I'll just do a time lapse.
Right now I'm capturing the whole sunset, so we're getting a whole range of light.
This is what you would call a holy grail time lapse, it's a day to night.
There's actually a lot of stuff that the camera has to do because the light is changing.
So you have to set up the camera so you compensate for all those changes over time.
Took a lot of practice to learn that technique.
One of the things I just love about urban photography is you really look for, like, lines and symmetry.
This is one of those spots in Chicago,
literally like one of the perfect lineups, have train tracks leading straight down to a tower
and now is actually a great time to shoot it because
you have the light from the street below bringing this glow up.
Yeah we nailed it.
The city of Chicago aside from being, you know, the place that I grew up and started photography in,
has always kind of given us the freedom just to kind of like run around.
As you can see the city kind of shuts down after a certain period of time,
it's really just a playground after a certain hour.
It's coming, It's coming.
Yeah, I think it's a wrap. We've been running around all day,
I think we definitely have enough.
It was really cool to just kind of do this again,
to be back, kind of in like my element, no pressure, no, no deadlines, no work,
it's just finding the joy and like, fun in it again.
So yeah, that's, that's a wrap. Let's cut it there.
Let's go edit.