I photographed John Chin, the Executive Director of the Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation, for the July 2024 issue of Philadelphia Magazine. It was a fun and inspiring shoot on a picture perfect Spring afternoon. John was friendly and easy from the jump!
I met him at the PCDC Offices at the corner of 10th & Vine Sts. While we took a walk down 10th into the heart of the neighborhood, stopping for portraits along the way, an interesting thing happened. Throughout our time together passersby walked right up and started conversations with John! Seriously, every ten steps a new person would be in the mix. They all seemed like close friends - talking about how college is going, what’s new at the club, giving each other style tips, etc. The good community vibes struck a chord with me so I captured some of the interactions and then included the shots with the gallery of selects provided to Philly Mag. Super happy when they decided to run some of them in the feature! In subsequent messaging John wrote, “I am elated to see the street photos of me and community folks in the magazine. It means a lot to me - these people. It's why I do what I do.”
There’s a lot going on in and around Chinatown these days… check out Victor Fiorillo’s interview with John in the July 2024 issue of Philadelphia Magazine - available now!
Towards the end of the shoot John was watching me closely as I moved from adjusting the direction of the softbox on the lightstand to raising the level of my tripod, doing a test shot, checking for critical focus on the laptop, then back to steady shooting. He paid me the best compliment ever,
“You move with such purpose and intent - like a Kung Fu master!”
Look for this testimonial to be plastered in extra large type all over my next promo, lol.