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- [00:00]
Anami Tonkin
I first met Trish Chung in 2018 when she was a teacher at the Family Narrative Conference that I was co hosting. We had been invited to go host the conference in Australia, which was amazing and very exciting. And it opened my eyes up to a whole new set of people, photographers and educators who, you know, I might not have met otherwise. And Trish was one of those. She came and spoke at the conference about sort of work life alignment and she was such a compelling human, to be honest, just such a genuine and clearly very emotionally attached to the work that she was doing. She was a big believer in what she was doing and was also just such a huge champion of other photographers following their own passion. And we got to be friends in the way that you can make a friend in the course of a short week and have kept in touch over the years. I have really enjoyed not only watching her work on social media, but also just getting to periodically converse. When I was in Australia, the most recent time, we went out and had dinner and had such a lovely time. And she's just one of those people that reminds me of why I love doing the work that I do, of how incredible the people in our industry are, the sort of deep well of inspiration that, that making those connections outside of social media, you know, it's the only way that you can really connect with people in that way. But I was so excited when she contacted me about coming on the show. She had taught again more recently this past fall and was teaching specifically about a project that she calls the January Project, where she each January takes on a personal project. And I won't get too far into that because she's going to be telling us all about that. But as soon as she reached out, I was like, whatever it is you want to talk about, the answer is yes. But I'm so excited about this topic. I am so excited for you to get to know her if you haven't already or if you, you know, are unaware of her. Her business is called T Lily Photography. She'll share that information at the end and of course we'll have it in the show notes. But I think that, you know, we're scheduling this for the beginning of the year and I think it's going to be the perfect time for you to maybe follow her lead. I think that many of us, it takes us, maybe January is a little ambitious, maybe we need a little bit of time to kind of check off the various things that need doing. But then I think setting aside time and specifically setting aside time each year to refocus on why we do what we do, why we put so much heart and soul into this business. That is not always easy. It can be so valuable. And so I'm excited to share my conversation with Trish because she does a much better job of saying all that than I just did. Welcome to this Can't Be that Hard. My name is Anami Tonkin and I help photographers run profitable, sustainable businesses that they love. Each week on the podcast, I cover simple, actionable strategies and systems that photographers at every level of experience can use to earn more money in a more sustainable way. Running a photography business doesn't have to be that hard. You can do it and I can show you how. Trish, welcome to the this Can't Be that Hard podcast. I am so excited to have you here. It is also just so extra lovely to see your face. I don't get to see it often enough. How are you?
- [03:51]
Trish Chung
I am very well. We are at the beginning of a long summer break for us Australians here down under. And, yeah, there's lots to look forward to, crazy things to try and achieve before Christmas, I think.
- [04:06]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah.
- [04:07]
Trish Chung
Yes, it's a, it's a lovely stretch of. We've got almost eight weeks or something. Crazy.
- [04:13]
Anami Tonkin
Oh, wow. Yeah, yeah, I'm jealous. My older son just got home for the winter break here and then, yeah, my younger son finishes up this week and then we've got just a couple of weeks. It's not a big break here, but I'll take what I can get. It is nice. And in the meantime, work feels like breakneck pace until then. And I'm really looking forward to January and some, like, quieter time. The season always kind of puts you through the wringer, I feel like, in all the ways, so. Which actually is a, an unintended and perfect segue into what we're going to be talking about today. By the time this episode drops, it will be January and people will be in that period. And so I am excited to have you on here to talk about, you know, you've. Well, you know what? I'm not going to even let you take, take the microphone and tell us a little bit who you are and the project that you have been doing. That is the reason for our conversation today.
- [05:17]
Trish Chung
Yeah, well, thank you, thank you for having me on here. I've been a long, long, long, long, long time listener and I love the vast array of people that you get on here. So it's really an honor and a privilege to be here. So thank you for that.
- [05:30]
Anami Tonkin
The privilege is mine.
- [05:33]
Trish Chung
So for me, I've been a photographer for a long time, so 2025 will mark, like my 18th year of business, which is crazy. Yeah. I think the longer I'm in it, the more I'm just so grateful. So I started out as a wedding photographer and due to having kids, it's like, okay. I think I really want my focus to be family photography, for freedom, flexibility, lifestyle, all of those things. And so that's sort of been my main focus for the past ten or so years. We've been an educator into that in the last five to 10 years, I guess, just doing. Sharing what I love, really. And what we're here to talk about today is the Jennu project, which is something I began. I didn't begin. Begin it. I am not the originator of this. If any of you guys have heard of Kristin Cook, she is a beautiful, beautiful human being and photographer in Melbourne. And I saw her do it on Instagram back in the day and I was like, oh, this looks good. This looks like something I can jump on board with. And my kids were, I think, like, I had one kid at the time, and then I was like, I'm going to start this next year after my second kid was born. So my kids were 1 and 2 when I started it. And essentially it is a project that I undertake every year in January. It is one black and white photo each day alongside just like a written reflection of something about the photo, something about the day that relates. Yeah. Keep it up for the entire month. And there's just been. Oh, it's just such a. It's a personal investment, but it has paid off in so, so many different ways, both personally and in business. And I think only seeing it through the benefit of having done it for over a decade. So I think 12 years now, you really just kind of see how much it gives in so many ways. And so I'm here to encourage people to take on something that personally speaks to them. Maybe it's a January project. Maybe if you're in on the Other side of the World becomes a July project. Is that when your big holidays are. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just something that just, you know, really speaks to you. And just your, I don't know, your reason for picking up the camera in the first place, I think is something that it grounds you to. Yeah.
- [07:54]
Anami Tonkin
So talk to me a little bit about how these projects have been similar over the years and how they've varied over the years. Like, do you take on kind of a different subject matter every year? Is that similar? But it's just kind of your different perspective because you're in a different place in life. Like how, how does that all go?
- [08:14]
Trish Chung
Good question. So to me, I feel like they're more same than different. It's essentially just my family. So it's always just been centered around family life, around where my kids are in that season of life, and I guess a reflection of as a mother, where I am in that season of life too. So initially it's all about having the kids all on you, those moments that you want to remember. And then I don't always just focus on the happy side of things. Sometimes I like, you know, focus on the like grumpy faces because they're just hot or they just need some comfort, something like that. So it's sort of just a, I don't know, a capture of a time capsule in a way. I kind of, when I speak about it, I'm like, yeah, it's like how I time travel. I can like revisit that pocket of, of January life. And it's a time where I don't really work through January, so it's summer. I could probably work a lot because everybody else is on holiday. But I choose to just try and keep that time to be my family, time to be present. And it's like, this is what I, you know, this is why I chose to run my own business, because I get to choose to have presence when. When I guess it counts, when they need someone around and when we can just enjoy that time of the family. So it's a representation of that.
- [09:31]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, I love that. And then, so you are all in on this for a month. You've got sort of your images, you've got a written record. What are you doing with those? Are you posting them as you go? Is it just for you the whole time? Do you bind it up in a book like, you know, what's the, what's the end? What's the wrap up at the end?
- [09:55]
Trish Chung
Yeah, the end goal is to have something that my kids can look at and be able to hold and touch and remember and look back on when they're older. Especially with all that written, all that time that goes into writing something. I really want them to be able to find that again when they're older. And they already have started to do so. So my kids are now 9, 12 and 13. And I do, I take a photo every day. I write a little thing, a little caption every day. And it's a real practice of gratitude and reflection as well. I find I try and post it every day. And I think for me, that's kind of part of the inbuilt methodology of making it work because there's some kind of accountability there. It's like, you know, when people start doing the gym stuff and they're like, okay, but if they post it, they're more likely to keep on going. So I encourage people that want to do something like this, you know, if you need. If, you know, you personally need that extra push to actually carry it through, then, yeah, post it every day. So originally, so for most of the first part of the first 10 years, I posted it on my grid. And so it was a daily post. I was literally there like 11:58pm trying to get it up for the day. But as my kids have gotten older, like last year, I just posted it on stories because I wanted it to be a little more transient in that sense. But for our own records, I will put it all up in a nice little hardcover linen bound book that says just January 20th something or other. And we have a whole collection of those on our shelves. And I mean, when they were younger, the kids were like, like, you're taking photo again. Like the camera's out again. They're annoyed. But as they got older, as I could start to read and they were reading back on their own lives, I guess, and just laughing at themselves, at the silly things they'd say or the stuff that they were doing, they began to just really love it. And so there's always some kind of quiet time in the year where they just kind of pull out the albums and sit on the couch and read it together. And as someone who finds it, there's a lot of discipline to actually get through the month. That kind of those moments make it all worthwhile. Just knowing that that exists for them. Yeah.
- [12:09]
Anami Tonkin
Hang on, guys. I have a quick message for you. Hey, friends. Just a quick interruption. I wanted to take a minute to thank you, as always, for listening. If you're a new listener, I have a special welcome basket that I've put together just for you that includes three of my most popular, actionable resources to help you build a more profitable, sustainable photography business. You can grab that@thiscantbethard.com welcome. But if you've been a longtime listener, if you've been here for a while, I would really appreciate it if you could take a second to leave a review on Spotify or Apple or wherever it is that you're tuning in. Your support helps the show grow, reach more photographers like you, and elevates the industry as a whole, no matter who you are or how long you've been listening. Thank you so much. And now back to the show. Totally. So this is totally off topic. I'm currently reading that book, Crying in H Mart. Have you read that?
- [13:11]
Trish Chung
Oh, I love that book.
- [13:12]
Anami Tonkin
Yes, yes, I am loving it too. I'm not done with it yet, but sort of going through that book or reading that book and thinking about the ways and I'm sort of in this place in my life where I'm grateful to still have both of my parents and of course I've got two kids. But I sort of see it from both perspectives now. Right. Where I think about my relationship with my own parents and sort of what they have been able to give me and the fact that I'm still lucky enough to be able to call them up and have conversations and all that, ask questions. And then you know, I think about with my relationship with my own children and what I am trying to create for them such that God forbid if I were to disappear off the face of the earth, like what, you know, what do I have left behind for them? And I like to think that there's some. But you know, listening to you talk about this. And I do want to talk next about how this applies for someone who maybe doesn't have kids because I think that this could absolutely be a project and a process for anyone. But yeah, I mean I do think that when you add the parenthood layer on top of it, it has sort of that just our, our children tend to have the cobbler's. Kids have no shoes. And I love the idea of setting aside a finite period of time where you are committed. Yeah, yeah. Where you are committed to that sort of daily practice. I think that's really smart.
- [14:44]
Trish Chung
Yeah. I think if it was not finite, like I see some people that do like 365 projects and I'm like, oh, I cannot. Honestly, I get to like day 10 or 11 and I'm like, why did I do this again?
- [14:56]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, but you 31 feels doable by comparison.
- [15:01]
Trish Chung
Yeah. And I think that, you know, it's also a self growth thing and a self discipline. It's like building your own habits and realizing that if you push through you can do things like this. And it just, I don't know, it gives you just a perspective for other things in life as well, I think.
- [15:16]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, yeah. So since you have been doing this for a long time and I know that you've had sort of, you've talked to other photographers about this. Or helped other photographers do this as well. Have you seen examples of people who are doing this in a way that is not related to family life and children?
- [15:35]
Trish Chung
Well, I think mostly it has been as a mother to a mother, I think has been. It's a real connection piece. And people like, oh, yeah, this. This can work for me too. And it doesn't even need to be on a fancy camera or anything. But to be honest, I relate it to just finding things in life, like wherever you're at, in whatever season you are, finding things that you can reflect on and find gratitude. Gratitude with where. Whoever you are, wherever you are, and whatever speaks to you. So I think it's. To me, it's kind of the container of a personal project as a whole. Like, I think especially for us as photographers, we start out with a. With this passion. It's like a fire. And, you know, if you think back to when you first picked up the camera and why you started your business, it was all about how much of a love you had for what you do. But as you know, you listen more to business things. And I'm definitely more a business person than I am, I think, the creative artist. But yeah, the nature of the world and the hustle culture of this world is so much more of the doing all of this, like, kind of to do list. To do list things. And while they all have their points, I think they need to be grounded in, you know, in why it works for you and why it speaks to you. So whoever. Yeah, whoever you are, whether you have kids or not, I think it can just be a practice of gratitude and if you can weave it into your visual practice, because as photographers, that's who we are and what we do. I think it will bring. Yeah. Amazing benefits throughout your. Throughout your career as well. I think it's. It's really like, almost like a remedy for burnout. Right. If you can keep yourself grounded to what you believe in and yourself. Your values and to build out your story from there, I think that's how we keep on going. Yeah.
- [17:17]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah. Well, I talk a lot about, you know, my sort of purpose on the show is helping photographers profitable, sustainable businesses that they love. And the. That they love part is the piece of it that really does require. I can talk about sustainability and profitability as just business all day long.
- [17:40]
Trish Chung
Yeah.
- [17:41]
Anami Tonkin
The fact of the matter is, most photographers, the part that they love about their business is the art. It's not, you know, the rest of it is sort of a necessary end rather than the purpose. However, it's important to talk about that. And it's important to talk about staying true to the things that you love, because as soon as that starts to fall apart, then the whole, like, motivation for getting up and being profitable and being sustainable, like, then, you know, that fizzles out. And that is not a recipe for sustainability in the long term. So I think that this is, you know, although it's an art project, it is so vitally important to, you know, maintain your love for the work that you're doing.
- [18:27]
Trish Chung
Yeah.
- [18:27]
Anami Tonkin
In this industry, I think it really shows through when you're kind of phoning it in, so. So I love this idea of kind of, you know, making it an annual practice to come back to it and just make photographs for you. Question. Just like a tiny one. But you mentioned in the beginning that all of these photos that you do for this are black and white. Is that just a personal preference? Is there some sort of, like, specific reason for that?
- [18:56]
Trish Chung
It was the way I saw Kristen do it. I also have a love for black and white.
- [19:01]
Anami Tonkin
You do? Beautiful black and white.
- [19:02]
Trish Chung
Yeah. I would like, you know, deliver most of my Image In Black 1 if I could, but I don't. But for myself, it also just brought a cohesiveness and a consistency to the photos throughout the years, especially when my kids were just wearing Fluoro. I'm like, yay for black and white. It just helps a little. But no, I just love how timeless it becomes as well. Like. Yeah, it also becomes. Yeah. More relatable and consistent and cohesive, really. And just because I love it. So, yeah, there's no. There's no real rules for this project, I think. Sure. Just the ones you put on yourself. And so just in addition to that, I also only ever use, like, one camera and one lens, which is the 35 millimeter lens. Just because it allows me to take more of a documentary approach to what I'm seeing. And for years, I was a 50 and 85 girl, so putting the 35 on was like, okay, I'm going to stretch myself in doing this. And now, you know, that's become part of how I see and how I. How I do my client work as well. So I think one of the things I did also want to mention was just how doing things like this for yourself, for your personal kind of passions also just by nature seeps into the work that you do for others and helps shape your voice. So for me, when I first started, I was mainly a wedding photographer, and this was just my personal thing for my own family. And I think at that time, what like 12, 13 years ago, documentary photography wasn't the same as it is now. So I was really able to just by nature of doing what I did for that one month every year, kind of create, I guess, be known for doing this type of work and by just natural, organic kind of follow on. I would get people saying, I love the way you shoot your family. Can you do that for me? And I was like, oh, that's all I want to do. I want to shoot January project for people. But obviously it's not very practical to do that.
- [20:51]
Anami Tonkin
Right.
- [20:52]
Trish Chung
To take the same approach and perspective, trying to just capture their beautiful every day is what I like to refer to. Yeah, to do that was just lovely to be able to connect with the people that also loved that. So I think that's like, you know, wherever you start, if you start in a place that you love, then you will attract people who love that and then you get to just keep doing what you love. And I just think that's awesome.
- [21:17]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think that there is something to be said for posting personal work regularly. And I think it's, it's hard to stick to that when you're in the thick of just when you're not doing it really intentionally. Because of course we have client work that we want to post and we're trying to book more client work and there's this whole thing. But my, my brother is a furniture maker and I feel like his marketing, he now I will say he has to book many fewer clients over the course of a year than I do because his projects are more expensive. Like he, you know, an individual project takes longer and costs more. However, the way that he has grown his social media over time, it's, you know, he's not on there showing finished pieces and talking about that all the time. He does post those when they're ready. But he is always talking about like the little issues that he's coming up with in a piece that he's working on and he'll, you know, show a bit of a process. And I recognize that what you're talking about isn't exactly a process driven thing. However, if you're sort of introducing the fact that you're, you've got this process and then you're letting people watch over your shoulder over the course of that. People love that. Like they get invested and what's nice. And the reason that I brought my brother's stuff up is that even though what he is doing is 100% marketing his business and he Gets a lot of business through Instagram. His, his sort of out loud purpose there is very rarely like contact me to get, you know, he's breaking all of the marketing rules. There's very infrequently a call to action, but it feels less salesy. So I think that, that people then are more engaged and you may find that, I don't know, you tell me, do you feel like that has been a really good tool for you, for, specifically for booking clients? I mean it sounds like some of that.
- [23:19]
Trish Chung
Yeah, it's definitely for aligning the right clients and I think that's really big. The longer your own business to really be working with aligned clients. I think, you know, in today's day and age, I see everywhere that storytelling is currently what's, you know, what's what marketing is at the height of it. Right. And you do that so well. But you know, but by showing things that you love and by, you know, just putting little things out there, it causes people to like maybe have a little comment or a question. Especially when, I mean in the business of family photography and it's like a mother to a mother really. And you, you speak about an issue of motherhood that you're dealing with or something that you're learning from or on this of five years down the track or something, you look back and you see things with a different perspective. People like, yes, there's hope or yes, I understand or I feel that too. And it's all about those little connections and conversations that just come from a place of value really. As in you're not trying to sell, you're just being one human to another and you're connecting first. Which, yeah, marketing makes things hard. Sometimes you're like, oh, does that person have an underlying motive here? That.
- [24:31]
Anami Tonkin
Right, yeah.
- [24:33]
Trish Chung
You know, it's just hard. I think if we can just all connect as a human to a human, then whatever comes about is what's meant to come about.
- [24:41]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Are there other ways that you feel like this practice has affected your business over the years?
- [24:51]
Trish Chung
Yeah. So I think becoming like being able to teach other people photography I think is also kind of come about from this approach because I think I've always tried to do something as long as within my world at least a little bit different to what I can see other people doing. Yeah. So in one of the early years of doing the January project, I met up with another friend, well kind of acquaintance at the time. And she was a real memory keeper, but in the way of journaling. And so we Collaborated. And we did like, this series of like in person and online workshops all about memory keeping. So I was in charge of all the visual storytelling element of memory keeping from the perspective of like doing a type of January project or documenting life in that way. And she did all the how to journal and memory keeping prompts and writing about it. We even. I think we even released these like actual hardcover journals and they were called like, write your heart out. And we went to Melbourne and did the whole, like, you know, saw them actually bind our books and it was just a whole labor of love, you know, one of those. And anyway, so that, you know, that had its season and I actually someone that I met, because I met you through the family narrative, but someone else that I met there, Amy Oliver, who is in Melbourne. So we connected through that and she was like, I just, I want to teach moms photography, but I need someone to do it with. And I was like, well, I've already done all the content work here. So we really put our heads together and then created a course for moms to just teach them how to use their big fancy camera, essentially. So, because we know. We just knew so many moms who were like, oh, we had a baby, we got this big fancy camera, and it just collects dust.
- [26:28]
Anami Tonkin
Totally.
- [26:29]
Trish Chung
Yeah, yeah. So equipping moms to just document life for themselves in that way because often they just kind of have a regret of like, I don't take enough photos of my kids or I'm not in them as well. So just trying to help them with that, but also teaching the value of memory keeping for yourself as a family.
- [26:49]
Anami Tonkin
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It really does all come back to. Or it feels like it all comes back to this idea of resetting your own personal focus on what you do, on the art and the why behind what you do. Because this business. And I feel like maybe it's just because it's currently the end of the year and people are on the tail end of busy season and. And I know that this has been a tough year for a lot of photographers, and I just feel like the communities out there are kind of chock full of people experiencing form of burnout. And. And I think that this. And so I'm particularly grateful to you for coming and sharing about this because I think it's something that people need. You know, somebody actually posted in one of my Facebook groups about, like, questioning whether they want to maybe close their business next year. And I was like, well, maybe wait until you've had a chance to take a couple of Weeks off. Give them.
- [27:52]
Trish Chung
I think I saw your reply to that one and I would be very well said.
- [27:56]
Anami Tonkin
Oh, thanks. Well, I mean, the thing is, like there are seasons in life and far be it for me, you know, I'm not some sort of like, no, everybody should keep going all the time, push through. I think that we have to listen to those inner voices. But I do think it's important to make sort of a, A more reflective decision around stuff because giving up when things get hard isn't the right. Always the, you know, it's not the right answer in any part of life. And, and I think that what you're describing here is just such a. It's such a simple and yet like so frequently overlooked part of what we do. And when we get into the business side and we're just business, business, business, it does. I mean, you know, even, even I can over, you know, get over saturated with. To go back to, you know, why am I doing this? And what's the, what's the, what's the pleasure like the true joy that I get out of this work? Yeah. So it's so good. I understand that you've got a place where people can go and sort of see examples of your projects over the years or one year, I don't remember which one that was.
- [29:13]
Trish Chung
I put together just like a little slideshow of kind of, I guess almost 10 years worth of imagery so you can kind of watch my children grow. I love it. I love, love it.
- [29:25]
Anami Tonkin
I bet, I bet that I can't wait to go see it.
- [29:28]
Trish Chung
Yeah. So just a little slideshow there and then also something that you can download to just help you think through this project, I guess even not just this project, but any kind of personal work that you might want to jump into. How you can make it work for you. Just some prompts that you can think through. So. Yeah, I'd love for people to check that out. Let me know. Yeah, yeah.
- [29:49]
Anami Tonkin
So good. And such a good season. Even though the northern hemisphere is not on this big long break. But, but I, I still feel like January, February is such a good time for these kinds of projects in just about any photographer's business. So it's exciting.
- [30:05]
Trish Chung
Yeah.
- [30:06]
Anami Tonkin
Well, Trish, thank you so much. Yeah, tell everybody where they can find that link.
- [30:11]
Trish Chung
Yeah, so it's. My business is Taylorleephotography. So it's t e a l I l y photography.com freebie. So we'll find you there. Yeah, I guess I'll just leave people with one thing and I think that you know that question that says, what would you do if you couldn't fail? Right. And I think for this type of work, if it's just personal work, there's just no way you can fail. So if you want to put your thoughts into that and give it a go and maybe take, like, one action step, maybe you write it down, maybe you put a date in your diary to just have a think about it or to do something about it, I think it will. Yeah. Reward you in more ways than you know.
- [30:58]
Anami Tonkin
So good. It's so great to see you.
- [31:01]
Trish Chung
Likewise.
- [31:03]
Anami Tonkin
All right, I'll talk to you later.
- [31:06]
Trish Chung
Thank you, Anna May.
- [31:07]
Anami Tonkin
Thank you.
- [31:08]
Trish Chung
Bye.
- [31:09]
Anami Tonkin
That's it for this week's episode of this can't be that Hard. I'll be back same time, same place next week. If you like the show, be sure to check out thiscan'tbethard.com to explore all the resources we have for photographers. And, of course, it would mean the world to me if you would leave a review of the show on itunes or Spotify. As always, thanks so much for joining me. I hope you have a fantastic week.