MICHAEL
CHAN
IT ALL STARTED WHEN...
When my cousin Joanna got married. I remember I was in the second year of my journalism program, and I wasn't supposed to go to her wedding. I was busy with school and midterms, and didn’t feel I had time to spare to head from Calgary to Toronto to be a part of Joanna’s big day. But I couldn’t fight the feeling that I had to go, and the day before the event I packed my bags, rushed to the airport, and caught a standby flight. I got there around 12 a.m. the day of the wedding, and was excited to start the party with my family.
During the reception the wedding photographer surprised our family with a slideshow of the day, and it completely blew my mind. There was one image that will be forever be ingrained in my memory and it was then my obsession with wedding photography began...You know what's weird? I wasn't supposed to go to that wedding. I wonder if I went back in time and didn't go what would I be doing today....
Anyways.
When I began this journey with wedding photography, I did not tell anyone about it except for my sister.
When I graduated from University I entered the period I like to call my double life. I was a journalist in Wetaskiwin, paying the bills and making my parents proud(kinda, not really), and photographer by night, doing random shifts, odd jobs, and taking all the photos I could in order to grow my portfolio and share my work. I worked in secret, keeping this hidden from everyone, working long hours and double days to both pay the bills and do what I love.
The past few years have been a whirlwind filled with so many incredible experiences. From giving up my job as a journalist to pursue photography full time, to traveling to Mexico, Iceland, China, to being named one of Canada’s top 30 under 30 wedding photographers. I am so grateful every day to get to have a job that allows me live through my camera.
I'm born and raised in the prairies of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. My parents were immigrants from the Vietnam war, a journey they recall as being hopeless. Every day they remind me to appreciate the small things I have, because I'm not supposed to be here or have anything I do today with where my parents came from. With that appreciation comes expectations, they had given me all the opportunities in the world they never had to succeed. My parents, like so many second generation Canadians, dreamed of giving me a better and stable life. They dream of their son becoming an engineer, accountant, lawyer, or doctor. For me doing anything else felt like disappointing my parents, not honoring the sacrifices they had made to give me a better life. To this end, I failed. I spent my early 20s trying to live up to traditional expectations of what my life’s calling could be. During those times, did not know where I was going or where I wanted to go. I felt unrooted, disconnected, and lost. It all felt like a blur.
I place emotion and human connections in my photos above all else. The ‘Epic’ and the ‘Wow’ are the last things I look for in my images. Trends are forgotten over time, your laughter, your smiles, your hugs…Those are timeless, those are what will be remembered and cherish from your wedding day.
At the end of it all, it is each and every incredible couple and family willing to share their experiences and love with me that allows me to do what I do. To be invited to share and capture happiness is an incredible honour and responsibility I do not take lightly.
I appreciate every single couple I get to work with, because I know I wouldn't be doing this without you.
I thank you for trusting me.
“His work was more experimental and unlike what we’d seen from the more ‘traditional’ wedding photographers around the city. We were drawn in by his ability to take the seemingly ordinary and mundane turn it into something captivating. Despite our hesitation that he preferred to run solo on the day of, or didn’t have the same ‘experience’ as other photographers we’d met with, his kindness and unique perspective on what wedding photography ‘could be and look like’ convinced us that it was ‘worth the risk’. We now know that going with Michael was the furthest thing from a risk, as his work and photos of our wedding day is now one of our most prized possessions.”
latest from the
JOURNAL
pa·thos |
Pathos is an appeal made to an audience’s emotions in order to evoke feeling. Pathos is one of the three primary modes of persuasion, along with logos and ethos. It is also a key component of literature which, like most other forms of art, is designed to inspire emotion from its viewers.
I hope my images connect with you on an emotional level, in a social media world it is easy to get lost in the ‘wow’ and the ‘epic’. I want my work to be basic, to be felt, to be honest. To create images your children can share with their children saying “this is what grandma and grandpa were like” and mean it. To create part of your visual legacy.
Featured on Instagram
