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JASON “JAY” TABLANTE

Living in Quezon City, most people knew him as an “uber geek” as he self-proclaimed about it. He was also famous for his cosplay photography together with locally known celebrities like Alodia Gosiangfiao who is known as the “cosplay queen of the country”.

EARLY CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOLING:

His love for pop culture started when he first took his interest in comic books as a kid that started when he was given the first issue of the DC comic book, X-men. Then he took interest in anime (or Japanese animation or cartoons) like “Macross” and “Gundam” when his parents took him to Tokyo, Japan for a trip in the summer around high school. While he originally wanted to be a graphic designer or a game developer, his love for photography started in high school since he was thinking of photography as a natural course, And again, in the latter part of his college life, when his cousin who lives with his family was fond of photography and took summer classes specialize in such study which lead him to take interest in photography. And also, he was casually taking pictures of his friends who were acting like models during that time. It was then his works were taken noticed by one client after his friends gave some of his works for casting calls and auditions. Ever since his seven years of working with photography, he developed a love-hate relationship to it.

WORKING LIFE:

Before his fame to the world of photography, he first started in a start up business and uses his parent’s money to start his chosen career. But it didn’t go on as planned, as there were the business went slow for the first few months. Then he started to do a part-time job as an art director in a publishing company that lead him to a job within the showbiz magazine. He also did some small time gigs in photography thanks to his old school mates who have been working in advertising companies.

He is a well-known photographer to most advertising media, particularly in the forms of fashion, glamour and magazines. But what he is really famous for is cosplay (or costume play for short.) photography due to his interest in comic books and anime. He was working with most professional photographers. He also has worked together also with Filipino Marvel/ DC comic book artists. He is currently has a book entitled “Geekology 101” which his photographic works was mostly represented by famous celebrities through fictitious characters. He is also working in PhotoWorld Asia 2013, specialized in fashion and cosplay photography.

TECHNIQUES IN PHOTOGRAPHY:

His photography style is mostly surreal in his point-of-view. The camera that he used is. a 5D-Mark 3 and for the camera body is a 1DX, He also use three lenses for most occasions: 17-40mm, 24-70mm, 70-200mm and some macro for his advertisement works. While he invested mostly on the lights, there is a particular way of handling the lighting towards his models that he doesn’t want to do, which is repeating the particular format. He rather do different styles in creating the shoot as a challenge. But his most efficient way of learning photography is by doing what is best for you rather than overloading on topics about photography that you will never use.

TRAVELS:

It all started with his one-man exhibit in Singapore on 2005, wherein 20 of his best photographic works were shown. There were many conventions he attended and guested in, particularly the Singapore Toys, Games and Comics Con (STGCC), NYCC ’11. Malaysian Games and Comics Con (MGCC) and International Cosplay Day Singapore (ICDS) and he also went to local conventions like Komikon and Hero. In 2013, he plans to go to the San Diego Comic Con.

INSPIRATION:

He mostly took inspiration from his comic books collection He also took the wisdom from other fields of the arts beside from his own kind. These inspirations were mentioned in his top three advices for future photographers.

ADVICE FOR FUTURE PHOTOGRAPHERS:

According to one of his interviews, his advices for future photographers would be: (1) they should have a character or work that relates to your personal side of your childhood days; (2) They should get out of their comfort zone and come out outside the box of photography; and (3) they should gather ideas from other fields outside of photography.

His final given words which was read from an interview was: “Never lose the child in you”.

REFERENCES: •	www.cosplayphootgraphers.com •	www.photoworldmanila.com •	http://reddotdiva.blogspot.com