folder Filed in Announcement, Work
See You Again
Edward Suhadi comment One Comment

Sit back and get a cup of coffee, because this one is gonna take a while 😀

I started shooting photographs profesionally (as in people pay me when I take their picture) in 2002. I think my first job was a 300k rupiah gig shooting a high-school class photo for their yearbook.

Then I started shooting commercial images: for banks, restaurants, factories. The most memorable trips were hauling borrowed camera gears through the forest in Kendari, Sulawesi, shooting a rattan processing factory.

Not long after that, people started to tell me that I was good at taking pictures of people’s emotions.

“Why don’t you try shooting weddings?” they said.

This was the time when shooting weddings was not like the everyone-is-shooting-weddings-industry like it is now. This was when a 512 MB (yes megabyte) compact flash card cost around 2 million rupiahs, hehehe… could you imagine that?

So I started to shoot weddings.

Starting from close friends ones, then not-so close friends ones, then I started to shoot stranger’s weddings.

And, according to some people, I was good at it.

In fact, they told me I was very-very good.

I was so good, that when people said ‘capturing genuine moments’ – my name popped up in their heads. At least that’s what people told me 🙂

So I went places.

In business and career, and literally: I went places. I got to see the world.

The business grew, and I got to work with some of the most amazing people as my team-mates.

Sugeng, Victor, Evy and Charles were the very first people that believed in me.

Here are some pictures of our first office:

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It was so small that when I moved my chair back even just a little, I would bump into Evy’s 🙂

Then we moved to a bigger place. And we got more teammates.

And then we moved to an even bigger place. This time, we bought it 🙂

It was cozy, but it was so small and on a narrow street, clients cannot drove their cars in. They often had to go through my mom’s house (which was next door) to get to it. Fun times when clients passed your shirtless, surprised brother 🙂

It was uncomfortable to have clients gone through that, but it was home, and it was all we got.

The team grew, and it was the time I was starting to become a manager and a businessman, not just a photographer. A lot of transformation in my head happened in that office.

And then, we moved to our current home The Disco. We made a cool announcement video for that:

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Also along the years I get to work with amazing clients. Kind, trusting clients. Clients that shook my hand like I was doing this for free. Believers. Many, many, many of them still is our biggest supporters until now. I was on countless trips to amazing places eating endless great food. I was the luckiest man alive.

Then the vendors. Oh the vendors. Everytime we got together in an exhibition or a gathering, I always said to myself, “This group of people here maybe act like clowns, but when they start to do their craft, they are the best people in country. Amazing craftsmen and highly dedicated people. They are literally the best at what they do.” I cannot mention them one by one, there’s just too many.

So there I was. With the greatest team and the best job there was.

Then this new season came along.

In the past four or five years, I met with a lot of new and awesome people that I got to call friends. I was invited to work together on pro-bono projects like Indonesia Mengajar, Anies Baswedan campaign and the buzz around the 2014 presidential election, and then I got offered paid jobs based on that work I’ve done.

I am no stranger to commercial work, like I said, I was doing commercial work even before I became a wedding photographer. Believe it or not, ever since junior high I know that one day I would become an advertising man, meaning that I like concepts, pictures and films and writings come together into a clear and moving message.

And people say, we’re pretty good at it. Well, at least two or three people say that 🙂

So here we are with two kids, one wedding and one commercial (we named it Ceritera).

We tried in the last couple of years to raise these two, giving them our best time, effort and financial support. We love them both.

But after a lot of long meetings, extensive reviews and many consultations, we know we have to let one of them go.

The decision is not easy, and definetely not one we take lightly.

So with this blogpost, I am announcing that: Edward Suhadi Productions humbly asked to be excused from the wedding industry.

For now until an undisclosed time Edward Suhadi Productions we will no longer be taking any new queries for weddings and preweddings.

*sigh*

I know, I know… It’s shocking. I myself still cannot believe it 🙂

How about we move to questions?

So you’re not taking any more weddings and preweddings queries?
Yep.

How about family themed sessions? Families, babies and maternities?
We love portraiture and we’re cooking up something. Stay tuned *senyum penuh kode*

Why stopping now?
We decided to stop now while we are in our best shape and focus, so we can give our (last) best service to our clients.

But all those years?
Like we said, it is not a decision we take lightly 🙁 But we must look to the future and not let our past shackles us 🙂

How about your exisiting clients?
We are still here, we are still a solid team, all the guys are still here, we definetely still honor our commitment, and we decided to give our last gigs the best we got. So don’t worry, we will finish this gloriously 🙂 We also have written to them personally.

How about the guys in the company? Are they in?
All the decisions we made we already discussed at length with our teammates. And yes, all of them are in on this new journey. Evy is now still very busy taking care of her newborn baby, and haven’t really decided yet on what will happen. Henry and Lisa will still be helping Ceritera, but now they are NOT exclusively available to shoot under ESP brand.

Have all the other vendors know about this? Will we still be friends?
Of course we will! In fact, yesterday we hosted an announcement party for all the wedding vendors.

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Will you be opening in the future?
We haven’t deciceded yet on that, but hey, we’re calling this a ‘see you later’ – not a goodbye. So yeah, we’ll see what happens in the future 🙂

Will you still be writing?
Yes. In fact we’re planning to make a more attractive and effective mediums for the writings. We’ll keep you posted.

But you’re not going anywhere, right?
No, definetely. This is an exciting time for Ceritera, and I am definetely will be here and still will be in your social media feeds 🙂

Can we ask more questions?
Please. If you want to contact me in person, please write to edward@edwardsuhadi.com

Can we share this to friends?
Of course? Please pass this to your friends, maybe our clients in the past or people that might care about this news 🙂 Thank you in advance.

Can we say goodbye?
Of course. We’re quite embarrassed to ask this, but we would like to know what is your thoughts on ESP, or maybe if we have shot you in the past, we would like to know which frame is your favorite, or even if we haven’t got the chance to shoot you, what frame do you like in our portfolio. Please tag them, be it an Instagram picture, a Facebook status, or a tweet: #seeyouagainESP – we very-very-very much want to hear from you.

Whoa.

That’s a lenghty post.

In summary, I cannot tell everything about something this big on a single blogpost. We will roll out some more announcements, and please let the conversations going. Will be more than welcome friends who want to chat with me over social media or privately.

That’s it for now.

We believe this single life of ours is all we got, and everything we do on these few moments should count.

We’re still afraid and we’re still stupid and we’re still unexperienced on this climb on a new mountain.

And that’s what we love the most about it.

We are humbled and very-very-very thankful for all the support, well-wishes, prayers and kind words over the years. We would not make it otherwise.

We are the luckiest team on earth to have been a part of your wedding and friendship.

But for now, Edward Suhadi Productions is bowing out.

See you again.

  1. Hai Ko, saya baru baca 3 bulan kemudian setelah iseng menggelinding di IG. membaca tulisan Ko Edward ini membuat saya menarik napas panjang. Saya tidak pernah jadi klien Ko Edward tapi kita scara kebetulan pernah mengurus klien yg sama. kurang lebih 2 th yll saya diminta seorang klien (cant remember her name) untuk membuang barang2nya yg tdk terpakai karena dia tahu saya punya usaha pindahan. Saya ingat ketika datang ke apartemennya, barang yg harus saya pindahkan terserah ke antah berantah di mana adalah sebuah coffee table, hiasan meja, dan 5 frame foto Koko. I was shocked.. I can’t afford your craft how come this lady asks me to put away any place I like.. saya memutuskan untuk menyimpan di kantor kami. bahkan ketika kami pindah ke kantor baru, frame tersebut tetap kami bawa dan saya pajang di salah satu tembok. Org banyak yg bingung itu kenapa frame itu dipasang. Saya bilang karena saya menghargai karya baik itu fotografer maupun pembuat bingkai. tentang siapa orang yang ada di foto itu tdk perlu diketahui. *i will twitt the picture asap*

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