Weekly Photo Journal - Week 2025/10
Welcome to the first of what I hope will be a weekly series!
Or at least a biweekly one... or maybe monthly?!
In order to motivate myself to get out and shoot more—and to write more blog posts—I thought I’d start doing a weekly review of my photography.
This isn’t just for sharing photos I take during the week, but also for discussing my process, projects I’m working on (or want to work on), and things I’m experimenting with—whether in composition or editing styles.
The main thing is just to start and see where it goes!
So let’s get right into Week 10, which covers March 3-9, 2025.
Wednesday
On Wednesday, I met up with my buddy Tom to shoot at 骏豪中央公园广场 (Junhao Central Park Plaza). I’ve photographed here before—it’s home to a building I like to call the Batman building.
I was excited for this day because I’ve recently been thinking about picking up the Fuji 27mm f/2.8 pancake lens, which Tom owns. I asked him to bring it along so I could try it out.
After exiting the subway, I lingered near the station entrance and put on my 50-140mm. I had brought it just in case, but often I end up forgetting about it or feeling too lazy to swap lenses. So I decided to start with it right away.
After shooting for a while with the 50-140mm, I borrowed the 27mm from Tom. Almost as soon as I saw it on my camera, I thought, I need to get one of these.
For the past two or three weeks, I’ve really wanted to start carrying a camera everywhere—my everyday carry. I looked into some of Fuji’s smaller cameras, like the X-E4, the X-T50, and the recently released X-M5. While they’re more compact, I struggled to justify buying a new camera just for everyday use, especially since I only bought the X-T5 last summer.
When I shot with the 27mm, I immediately felt less pressure. I was just walking around, snapping photos, and enjoying the moment. Of course, the size and weight are much smaller, but if I didn’t enjoy the experience—or if I couldn’t see myself bringing it with me every day—that wouldn’t matter.
A selection from the 27mm experiment
That short experiment convinced me—I wanted my own. I even offered to buy Tom’s lens on the spot 😂, but he wasn’t ready to part with it.
After this, it was time for refreshments, so we stopped into a local bar.
Good times
A few drinks later, we headed back outside for some night photography. I swapped to my 16-55mm f/2.8 for the rest of the evening.
Thursday
Today, I really wished I had the 27mm. I just wanted to do some simple photography and spend more time with that lens. Since I didn’t have it, I figured I’d do the opposite—rather than using a tiny lens, I brought out my biggest one: the 50-140mm.
There’s a small riverside park along the 坝河 (Ba River) right beside my apartment. It recently opened, but I hadn’t taken any photos there before.
The area has a lot of orange and green tones, which made me curious to see how they’d look using the Vibrant Arizona film recipe. So I headed over and started shooting.
A while later, I remembered that this week’s Hiro Photo Composition Challenge was Frames, so I shifted my focus to finding interesting framing compositions.
Here are some of the shots I ended up taking:
"Frames"
I’m happy with how some of the Frame shots turned out. The 50-140mm telephoto lens really helps when trying to find interesting framing opportunities, making it easier to isolate subjects within a small frame.
Saturday - Songzhuang Art District
Over the weekend, my girlfriend and I, along with a couple of friends, went to Songzhuang, an art district in Tongzhou, east of Beijing. It’s a hub for artists selling their paintings and other artworks. It was my first time visiting, and while it wasn’t as busy as we expected, it was still interesting to explore.
I didn’t take too many photos of the area itself, but I snapped a few of Wanyang in a vintage store—there were lots of cool clothes and interesting decorations.
Of course, we had to stop for some coffee, and there just happened to be a very nice coffee shop in the area.
On the way home, we caught the sun in a beautiful position, just as it was setting. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my telephoto lens with me, but I took a few shots with the 16-55mm from the front seat of the car.
Zine Update
Last autumn, soon after Tom and I both got our Fuji X-T5 cameras, we tossed around the idea of making a zine—either from past photos or something new we’d shoot in the future. But as life got busy, the idea faded into the background.
Recently, though, we started talking about it again, and this time, we’ve decided to make it happen. Next week, we’ll carve out some time to start planning the details.
No matter how the zine itself turns out, I think this will be an amazing learning experience—and who knows where it might lead in the future?!
Sean Gallagher Mentorship
Sean is a professional photographer and filmmaker with over 20 years of experience, working with renowned publications and brands worldwide. I recently joined his Community Mentorship program to elevate my photography—particularly in storytelling.
Our challenge for March is to create a series of images with similar compositions, ideally centered around an environmental or societal issue. I’ll start brainstorming ideas for what I might choose to focus on.
That wraps up the first Weekly Photo Journal! See you next Monday—next week, I plan to buy the 27mm lens, so I’ll be sharing some photos and thoughts about it.
Remember to sign up for my free newsletter, you can do that here...
I would love it if you followed me on Glass, Threads, or Instagram.
You should also follow Tom on Instagram!
