Another month is closing, which means another collection of visual snapshots from my daily life. August has felt particularly summery and long mornings, strawberries constantly in the fridge, plenty of time spent with my camera, and one small ritual that somehow ended up becoming part of the visual landscape of the month.

Strawberry matcha.

I’ve been making it almost every morning this summer. It started as a very convenient way of eating an unreasonable amount of strawberries while they were in season, but eventually it became part of the routine: strawberries smashed with a little honey, a glass full of ice, matcha oat milk on top, and usually some particularly nice morning light hitting the whole thing.

With August ending and strawberry season slowly going with it, it felt only right to give the official drink of my summer its own little photography collection. It hasn’t just been part of my mornings either as I’ve been making it for friends and loved ones whenever I get the chance. One of my love languages is making my people try whatever I’m currently obsessed eating or drinking.

I also revisited Spike Jonje’s Her this August, and I think it might have unintentionally found a way into my photos. Dominant reds combined with warm neutrals became the colour palette of the month.

And because I already know some of you will ask for the recipe, I’m leaving it here. It’s incredibly simple, and while it might be a small detour from photography, it feels perfectly at home in the slower side of Low Battery.

Sharing is caring, after all.

You’ll need:

• 500 g fresh strawberries

• A little honey, to taste

• Ice

• Matcha oat milk of your choice
  I use Matcha oat milk by Oatly
  

  Blend the strawberries with a little honey using a hand blender until completely smooth.

  Fill your glass with ice, add the strawberry mixture, and slowly pour the matcha oat milk over the top.

  Stir. Drink. Enjoy.

See you in September, presumably with a new hyperfixation.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

Hello to the people tuning into Low Battery!

Good news is that I have discovered there is a fairly reliable rhythm to freelancing. You work very hard. Nothing happens. You work harder, because clearly the problem was that you weren’t working hard enough. Still nothing happens.

You update your website. You rewrite your bio. You change the order of three ph…

Read more

I’ve wanted to put together a minimum effort cheatsheet for quite some time now. The idea first started wandering through my head during a recent photoshoot on location. I was working with a model, trying to problem-solve on the fly, and stuck with some of the most boring weather imaginable. When you’re on set, running low on battery, and the environment isn’t giving you anything to work with, you start pulling moves out of your wizard hat.

If I were to curate a gallery of every time I’ve had to pivot on the spot, these three low-friction lighting setups would take center stage. I know I’m not the only one who runs into those moments, so don’t worry … I got you! These are some low effort techniques to pull out for your next concept, people or still life.

A Note on Cinema

Backlight really initiated this research and why it’s subconsciously rooted in my brain. Is it because I'm lazy or can't move on? Like most photographers, my work is built on references. Mine just happen to come from cinema. I’ve always been drawn to black & white imagery, so I decided to trace that instinct back to its source.

In my early twenties, I worked my way through directors’ filmographies, but there is one Bergman film that might have influenced me.

Persona

Ingmar Bergman’s Persona is a masterclass in visual tension. It taught me that light doesn’t always exist just to reveal a subject clearly or make them look traditionally pretty. Light can exist for emotion before beauty. It can create mystery, carry a mood, and tell a story strictly through what it leaves in the dark.

It took me nearly fifteen years to connect the dots and realize that those stark, high-contrast frames built the blueprint for how I photograph today.

Backlight

So yeah, backlight is one of the most approachable techniques I experiment with. Whether I’m shooting portraits, fashion, products, or still life, backlight asks surprisingly little of me. Often all I need is a window or the sun.

While I can definitely use backlight with color, it requires a bit more intentional control over my tones and exposure. For me, black & white is the move, especially when I’m feeling a bit lazy on set and want to try something different on the spot. Modern digital camera sensors give me so much latitude to pull back highlights or roll shadows into deep blacks when color isn’t in my way.

The photos I’m sharing below cover a mix of setups: in-studio, on-location with flash, and natural light outdoors.

How I Shot These:

• In Studio with Flash: The first shot was created by taking two flash heads and aiming them directly at the background on high power. Overexposing the backdrop essentially turns it into one massive light source, causing the light to bounce back, wrap, and spill onto the subject. How much spill you get depends entirely on distance: move your subject closer to the background for heavy wraparound light, or push them further away to keep it controlled. If you want to reveal more facial features while keeping that strong backlight, just place a reflector directly in front of them to gently pop light back into the shadows.

• On Location with Softbox: The second shot was taken indoors in the model’s apartment. Rather than lighting the front of the subject, I used the softbox to create a gentle rim of light that defines the contours of her body and separates her black outfit from the bright background.

When I am shooting outdoors with natural light, the sun or a bright open sky becomes the easiest tool to rely on. Positioning the source directly behind a subject naturally catches the stray texture of hair, turning it into a glowing halo that separates them from the surroundings while keeping the face in a rich, moody shadow.

Other times, I will expose strictly for the shadows on the skin, letting the background blow out into a soft, organic wash of light that wraps gently around the frame.

And when I want to strip away distraction entirely, I let the subject drop into a deep, heavy silhouette against a blazing background, keeping things raw, cinematic, and entirely focused on form and emotion.

Bounce Lighting

When I want a soft, ambient light cast naturally upon my subjects without assembling a massive modifier, I rely on bounce lighting. The final look is completely defined by the size of the room, the position of your composition, and where you place your bounce spot. Because you get different results depending on where you point the flash, you can easily shape the mood of an entire space.

A great example of this is the still life setup, where you have multiple reflective surfaces that cooperate brilliantly with light bouncing off white walls and ceilings.

How I Shot This:

I used a bare strobe pointed directly at a white surface (like the ceiling or a nearby white wall). Because the light expands and wraps around the room, it creates rich, creamy reflections across metal trays, glass packaging, and glossy liquids. It gives you that high-end campaign look instantly, with zero harsh drop-offs and smooth, natural gradients everywhere you look.

Side Lighting

When I want a versatile, reliable approach that works effortlessly for both still life and people, soft side lighting is my go-to. It is an all-round technique that I use constantly because of how easily it can be controlled using V-flats and reflectors to either fill in shadows or deepen them for extra drama.

The beauty of this setup is how different the final images can look depending on the subject and the scale of the composition, even when the exact same lighting is used.

• The Green Composition: Take the green tabletop composition with the ring and dice. That same soft side lighting technique produces a striking mood here because the composition relies heavily on intentional shadows. Those deep shadows create a great contrast against the reflections of the emerald ring and the bone-colored dice.

• The Lipstick Collection: On the other hand, look at the red grid of four images featuring the lipstick. Every single one of these frames is lit with the exact same soft side light, yet they feel very different from one another. Because of the size and texture of each item - from a macro applicator to an embossed logo - the light interacts differently across the board while making it clear they belong to the same collection.

That wraps up this edition of Low Battery.

Next time you are on set, running out of steam, or dealing with uninspired locations, remember that you don’t need a complex studio setup to make compelling work. Strip things back, let a single light source do the heavy lifting, and lean into the mood.

Before we sign off, I’d love to hear from you: What is your go-to lighting technique when you’re feeling lazy or running low on energy on set?
Drop a comment below, and catch you on the next one!

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

Hello to the people tuning into Low Battery!

One question I get asked surprisingly often is how I make my photographs feel cinematic. It's always one of my favourite compliments because cinema has shaped the way I've looked at images for as long as I can remember.

Fun fact: I’ve always been a cinematic person at heart. My very first job was actually working in a movie store, pretty much something straight out of Clerks. Spending all those hours surrounded by movies really shaped the way I look through a lens. Over time, I realized there’s a visual language in cinema that you can use and apply to almost anything you shoot.

Over the years, I stopped trying to make photographs look perfect and became much more interested in making them feel like fragments of a film. I found myself moving away from the clean, evenly lit image that explains everything at first glance, and gravitating towards images that leave room for atmosphere, depth, and mystery.

Out in the real world, under unpredictable skies and open landscapes, I found myself returning over and over to a few things whenever I wanted my work to carry a more cinematic feeling.

Natural Light

Shooting with natural light is easily the most cinematic language you can speak in photography. There’s something raw and irreplaceable about it.

Cinema has always been about chasing that organic feel, the way light actually hits a scene in real life. The changing colours before sunset, soft overcast skies, imperfect shadows, and unexpected pockets of light all introduce a sense of realism that is difficult to recreate artificially.

I found that whenever I worked with the available light instead of trying to overpower it, my images immediately felt more believable.

Anonymity: The Universal Language

Relatability thrives on mystery. When a photograph gives away all the visual clues up front, it leaves zero room for the audience to participate.

Shooting into backlights to build silhouettes, or cropping tight on details, helps me strip away the person so the experience can take over. Anonymity becomes a universal language.

It forces the viewer to stop decoding a stranger's face and start connecting with the mood of the space, making the image feel less like a portrait they are looking at, and more like a memory they once lived.

Bringing Motion to Stills

Cinema is built on movement, so I want my photos to suggest that same feeling. Instead of freezing every gesture with a fast shutter speed, I often allow movement to remain inside the frame. By dragging the shutter to record the trace of a path or capturing the fluid lines of a model walking, dancing, or swaying, the photograph gets a sense of rhythm.

The subtle blurs and directional trails give the image a visceral, tactile energy - a sense of time on life that is continuous, fluid, and always in motion.

Perspective: Scaling the Atmosphere

Sometimes, to tell a bigger story, I like to pull the lens back. There’s also mood living in the negative space like the vast sky, the harsh shadows on raw concrete, or the sweeping geometry of an open road.

By giving the environment dominant real estate in the frame, you create breathing room. The viewer’s eye isn’t forced directly onto the subject; instead, they are invited to wander through the scene first, taking in the scale, the light, and the physical environment.

This shift to cinematic perspective restores scale and context. The photograph stops answering who is standing there, and starts evoking the sensory feeling of where and when you are.

Depth

Cinema rarely feels flat, and I found myself chasing that same sense of depth in my photographs. Rather than placing everything on a single visual plane, I enjoy using foreground elements like sub-framing & reflections to build layers inside the frame.

It definitely changes the viewer’s perspective and gives the image space to breathe. Instead of arriving at the subject immediately, the eye travels through the photograph first, making the scene feel more immersive and a little more alive.

Texture: Finding Narrative in the Surfaces

To me, texture is the silent storyteller of a photograph. It’s the difference between showing a generic figure and capturing the fine details of the world around you.

These tactile micro-details give the narrative a physical pulse. They act as subtle visual clues that reveal layers of age, sexuality, identity, and intimacy - turning the raw surfaces of a frame into an invitation to feel the exact mood of the moment.

Close-Ups: Narrative Tension in the Details

A wide shot lets the viewer observe from a distance, but an intense close-up demands total immersion. I like pulling the lens right up to the edge of the skin, never afraid to break that personal boundary.

Stepping this close transforms a simple photograph into a charged, visceral encounter. Stripped of background context, I like how a crop of a glance or a directed expression acts like an electric shock. By leaning into that close-up proximity, the frame retains an immediate, magnetic charge - trapping raw emotion inside the shot while leaving the rest of the world burning outside the edge.

This is why I believe cinematic photography has such a strong place in the world of brands. The most memorable images rarely stop at showing a product. They create a feeling around it. They build a world, a mood, a moment that people want to enter.

Whether it’s a personal photograph or a campaign image, the intention is often the same: to make someone feel something before they even know why.

If you take one thing away from this, I hope it isn’t a checklist of techniques.

I hope the next time you’re out with your camera, you pause for a second before pressing the shutter and ask yourself:

How do I want this moment to feel?

Sometimes that question leads to a much more interesting photograph than asking how you want it to look.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

Every month as I close out the chapter, I share a collection of visual snapshots from my daily life. Today, though, I wanted to pause and expand on a few of the personal and creative highlights that made July feel so vibrant.

• My very first motherhood session unexpectedly went viral, which was such a surreal and encouraging moment for my visual work. (Issue 36)

• A fashion editorial I shot in Stuttgart was officially accepted for publication, alongside an active, fast-paced month filled with food and lifestyle photography.

• I took my first real steps into analog photography, experimenting with a few rolls of Kodak Portra 400.

• Low Battery reached 200 followers this month. Seeing this space grow piece by piece means more to me than I can say.

• Being on a freelance schedule allowed for slow, long weekday brunch mornings with friends and a quick weekend escape to Berlin.

When I stepped away from the camera to recharge, I found myself completely hooked on the Mr. & Mrs. Smith series. On set, the mood was anchored by a breezy Italian summer playlist that kept the energy light, while Qendresa’s curated date night mix became my ultimate motivation at the gym.

Before you go, tell me one good thing that happened in your world this July!
What was on your soundtrack or watchlist this month?

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

Hello to everyone tuning into Low Battery!

Lately, I’ve come to a realization: I barely use Instagram anymore. I have no will to show up there. Instead, I find myself way more excited to share my thoughts and photos here. In general, I was always an “Instagram girl,” but now I’m becoming a “Substack girl.” And it is because, on Substack, I have somehow regained my identity.

If you follow me on Instagram, you know me as a commercial photographer. My grid is a carefully curated gallery of fashion, product, and beauty. It took me years of hard work to build that portfolio, and I’m proud of it. But it represents about ten percent of who I actually am.

There was a time in my life when I was inseparable from my camera. I was the girl who carried a compact camera on every trip. Then it was a DSLR. Then a fancy, full-frame mirrorless.

As I grew as a photographer, I became utterly obsessed with perfecting the grid. The grid was my work, my superpowers, my aesthetic. I wanted people to land on my profile and gasp. But as my professional work progressed, the "aesthetic police" in my head took over. I started archiving anything that didn’t fit the vibe. I hid away personal photos, spontaneous travel shots, and the raw, experimental mistakes that actually made me the photographer I am today.

Follow me on instagram

It got to the point where updating Instagram with anything but work felt like a crime.

As my hobby fully became my job, the ultimate tragedy happened: I stopped bringing my full-frame camera on trips. I reached a point of sheer creative exhaustion where I thought:
If I’m not booking a five-person-effort production shoot, what is even the point of bringing it?

I decided I was just going to experience my holidays through my phone, maybe posting a story or two that would politely self-destruct in twenty-four hours.

Substack completely changed this dynamic for me.

Knowing there is a space where these images are allowed to permanently live and breathe has actually made me pick up my camera again. I’ve started packing up my Sony. I am actively going out into the streets, just looking for a bit of magic.

I found some the other day. I was on a casual walk in Leipzig. I’ve been living here for three years now, and if I’m being honest, the city can sometimes feel a bit unexciting and gray. But on this particular day, I went out with an open mind.

I stumbled upon a new café. From the outside, it looked uninviting, essentially like a building that was scheduled to be demolished by Tuesday. But I noticed people quietly walking in and out. Feeling explorative, I pushed the door open. Inside, I discovered a brand-new coffee place that was warm, incredibly inviting, and beautiful.

Those pictures will still never make it to my Instagram grid. They don’t fit the fashion and beauty feed, and they never will. My Instagram-caged mind still shows up, whispering: “Pick a lane. Niche down.”

But honestly? Why restrict myself all over again?

This space has become a home for all the passions I’ve had already filtered out. So for the first time, I am happily ignoring the whole niche thing. I am finally letting myself be all the things in between.

I am still very much a commercial photographer specializing in fashion and beauty (with some rising creative energy currently spilling over into food), but also a Mediterranean girl with a strong Greek accent that somehow has to navigate a freelance life in Germany and is constantly trying to tell her stories in a cinematic way. I like to dream a bit, like watching Frances Ha navigate her own life, but with slightly better lighting, and hopefully, a little less mess.

At my core, I’m just a hipster soul living in this weird new era, documenting my coffee dates, my walks, my work in progress, sometimes occasionally rambling about the rise of AI slop, sharing pictures from my travels, and hopefully packing my camera wherever I can for now.

I am refusing to crop my identity to fit a square anymore.
All thanks to Substack!

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

Today I would like to introduce you to little Fil.

There she is…

Please ignore the expression. The photo may have been taken a while ago, but she still makes the exact same face every Monday morning when trying to come up with a new Substack topic.

Everything about this picture screams '90s kid. A little too loud, honestly.

If you had approached little Fil that day and said,

“Hello. I’m a ghost visiting from the future. You are going to leave a graphic design career to pursue photography & move abroad to work for luxury fashion.”,

she would have stared at you blankly for approximately two seconds before wandering off to see if someone had brought more ice cream.

Career planning was not really on her radar.

What neither of us knew at the time was that these very photographs would one day become lighting references.

We’ll get there.

Today’s version of Fil is indeed living abroad, working as a commercial photographer specialized in Fashion & Beauty. But lately, the industry feels like it’s undergoing a massive transformation.

And so am I.

Years ago, while working in a commercial studio in Greece, I briefly dipped my toes into food photography. Back then, we always had a professional food stylist on set, which took away all the stress of the shoot. It was clean, curated, and safe.

Last year, I decided I wanted to dive back into food, coffee, and drinks to actively build up my food portfolio. But something was missing. I couldn’t find the same personal connection to the work that I felt in fashion.

Until very recently.

I function notoriously well under pressure—to the point where I will literally gift myself a challenge just to force my brain to turn on. This time, my self-inflicted spark was subscribing to Herstudio (seriously, check out if you need a visual wake-up call).

What followed was an immersive exercise in tracing back my earliest memories of light and taste. Suddenly, everything clicked.

Walking through those early memories, I realized the truth was much simpler, and a lot deeper, than just “developing a food portfolio.”

I am homesick.

Being an expat means living with a constant, quiet ache for your roots. You miss the warmth, the light, the effortless ease of the place that made you. When you can’t physically go back, your brain starts looking for other ways to build a bridge.

For me, that bridge is food. I didn’t want perfectly curated, sterile studio food. I wanted to touch a part of myself that feels very far away right now.

Little Fil’s absolute best childhood memories are wrapped up in summers by the beach and camp life. The peak food memory would be endless spreads of Nutella on limitless bread during breakfast hour at summer camp, eating in a giant outdoor dining area crowded with friends. Or eating pizza with my family right after a long day at the beach - because, as a scientific fact of my childhood, pizza tasted 40% better in Chalkidiki.

Honestly, 80% of my favorite summer memories revolve around food.

Present-day Fil is now on a mission to document these unseen, forgotten stories that made her. The indie misfit living in my brain wants the aesthetic to feel effortless, accidental, accessible, and summery. A little bit "junk", because as a child, that is exactly the kind of food I was obsessed with.

For years, I kept Pinterest boards full of direct-flash references. Most of them came from high-fashion editorials or late-night party photography. I always assumed I was drawn to them simply because I liked the trendy aesthetic. It never occurred to me to ask where that preference actually came from.

But looking through my childhood albums, I realized almost every photograph I love has those exact same qualities: harsh flash, oversaturated colors, and slightly awkward, candid framing.

I want to bring that careless, nostalgic energy of little Fil’s childhood into my new setups.

One of my first exploration efforts actually features my Italian husband. Here, we caught him in a couple of highly spontaneous shots, having his morning espresso at home before work, complete with our extremely fashionable dog in the background.

Note: The dog is borrowed, the husband is not—only his Italian heritage is on loan for the aesthetic

My efforts have kept me indoors for now. For my next setup, I tried to recreate my most dominant summer taste memories: a simple table setup with pizza and Cola.
I wanted to embrace those good, lazy times—right before little Fil grows up, faces reality, and starts boycotting war-profiteering corporate giants.

But for a split second on a plate, it felt like summer all over again.

Little Fil would definitely approve.

They say we spend our adult lives trying to recreate the things that made us feel safe and happy when we were eight years old. I guess, for me, that looks like harsh direct flash, pizza grease, and trying to import some goodies from Greece to Germany just to feel a little closer to home.

To all my fellow expats, immigrants, and long-distance lovers of home: how do you keep your roots alive when you are far away?

P.S. This post is dedicated to my mum, who I know is reading this on her phone right now on her way home from work. ❤️

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work, here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

I am slowly returning to reality now that we’re into the first week of July.
So many things happened in June that will probably feed this newsletter for the next couple of posts, but today, I have to talk about something that completely caught me off guard: my very first motherhood session went viral.

Read more

Want to guess how many days I actually spent at my home base in Leipzig this month?

Three.

Yes, that is correct. Three days.

The rest of the month was a blurred montage of Greece, Stuttgart, and various Deutsche Bahn trains. But it was all for good reasons. As I briefly mentioned in my photo journal, June was a month of pure movement. To say that it kept me busy would be an understatement.

It started when I landed in Greece, filling out a complaint form to Lufthansa while trying to track down my suitcase. It finally arrived on day three of my trip, which meant Lufthansa had to buy me a brand new outfit in the meantime. You lose something, you win something.

I spent time in Greece with my family, trying to balance holidays with work. The days kept shifting from being fully present with them, then slipping away into edits, emails, and shoots. In the background, I was already preparing for a full week of e-commerce work in Stuttgart, while also organizing a portfolio shoot for the weekend I planned to stay on.

The real challenge of this month wasn’t the travel itself. It was learning how to navigate a constant influx of new situations while living in a permanent state of uncertainty.

Either my suitcase hadn’t arrived with me, or I would arrive somewhere after 5 p.m. only to discover that, instead of a modern hotel room, I had apparently booked a tavern straight out of The Lord of the Rings, specifically the one where Frodo and Pippin spend the night before the Nazgûl come looking for them.

All this happening during the European heatwave. Honestly, some days it felt like I was navigating life through a customer complaint form and some days taking it step by step.

I spent an alarming amount of time stranded on train platforms with 20% phone battery, waiting for delayed trains and replacement buses. It was brutal, even for a Mediterranean girl who’s trained to shooting weddings in Greece in the middle of August. This despair can be caused only by a delayed Deutsche Bahn train in 38°C.

Most of the time, it honestly felt like survival mode: hiding in hotel rooms with the air conditioning blasting and trying to convince myself that this was all part of the adventure.

But amazing things happened, too.

I met a lot of inspiring people. I found the time to organize a personal portfolio shoot. And I’m incredibly proud of the work we created together. I honestly can’t wait to share it with you soon.

Somehow, against all odds, I came back to Leipzig feeling more grounded, more grateful, and more happy than ever to have returned back. I found answers to questions I wasn’t even consciously asking.

It turns out that sometimes you have to let your battery drain almost completely before you figure out what actually recharges you.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

I managed to combine work and fun for a little while before surrendering once again to the familiar rhythm of traveling mostly for work. Airports, train stations, packed bags, unpacked bags, repacked bags. By the end of the month, I felt like I spent more time checking departure boards than looking at my own calendar.

All this moving around has left me thinking about the idea of home.

A few years ago, I packed up my life in Greece and moved to Germany because I wanted to see what else was out there. I had this belief that a different place might offer a different version of life. And for a long time, it really did.

I found the apartment. The job. The friends. The community. The routines that slowly turn an unfamiliar place into your place.

Lately, though, things have felt a bit more up in the air.

I’m in one of those strange in-between phases where I’m organically exploring other possibilities and trying not to force any conclusions. The downside is that it becomes harder to picture exactly what comes next. The upside, if there is one, is that it makes you question things you normally take for granted.

Like home.

I first noticed this feeling years ago when my family sold our summer house by the beach. It’s a strange experience when a place that holds so much of your childhood suddenly belongs to someone else. The memories are still yours, but the physical location isn’t.

You can drive past it, but you’re no longer arriving. You’re visiting.

I get a similar feeling when I go back home and discover that a favourite café has closed or a familiar neighborhood has changed beyond recognition. The places remain on the map, but not necessarily in the form you remember them.

Maybe that’s why nostalgia can feel so disorienting. You’re not actually missing a place. You’re missing a version of it that no longer exists.

Coming back to Greece this time, that usual holiday feeling didn’t last quite as long. Partly because I knew I’d be returning to a lot of question marks waiting for me on the other side.

Which brought me back to the same thought I’d been carrying around all month:

Where exactly is home?

Is it a place? A routine? A language? A collection of memories?

I don’t have a neat answer.

But as I pack my bags again, I know there are a handful of people who feel like home to me right now. And the older I get, the more I suspect that home might be less about geography and more about that feeling of being understood.

The rest, perhaps, is just logistics.

Here are some photos of my home.

’Til next time,

Fil🔋

As someone who has probably crossed the unhealthy milestone of watching over a thousand films — and as a photographer myself — my answer would almost always be the filmography of Terrence Malick. Not just as inspiration, but as a case study as well. For me, Malick’s work captures something essential: that images are about sensation, atmosphere, and emotional rhythm. They capture the invisible vibration inside a moment.

His work feels like both a creative spark and a form of recovery. It is the visual equivalent of making tea at 1 AM because the day moved too fast and your brain forgot how to land. His films don’t just look beautiful; they recalibrate your nervous system and remind you that light moving across a wall can be enough. I find his movies extremely visually rich—at certain points even overwhelming—because the camera follows the characters with such a variety of shots that you can feel the physical space and the motion, whether indoors or outdoors.

Some of his films, like The Thin Red Line, The Tree of Life, To the Wonder, Knight of Cups, or Song to Song, share a similar directing skeleton; they could almost be viewed as one long, immersive music video. Malick is a director who knows how to document pretty much anything, having even transitioned into documentary filmmaking with projects like Voyage of Time. His collaborations with some of the most acclaimed cinematographers in history prove that motion, emotion, and variety are the languages he speaks best.

For anyone looking to expand their visual vocabulary, these films offer a great creative read—a way to study how a story can be told through texture and light rather than just dialogue.

Days of Heaven (1978)

Watching Days of Heaven feels less like watching a movie and more like leafing through a collection of 19th-century landscape paintings. Malick used the works of Andrew Wyeth and Edward Hopper as visual anchors, aiming for a look that felt grounded in American history and still-life art. To capture this, the production famously pushed boundaries by shooting almost exclusively during “magic hour.” Cinematographer Néstor Almendros noted in interviews that they would spend the entire day simply waiting, only to roll the cameras for a frantic twenty-minute window when the sun had dipped below the horizon but the sky remained a luminous, shadowless light source. By stripping away artificial lighting, they achieved a painterly, soft-contrast look that defied the high-gloss standards of Hollywood. The frame is saturated with deep ambers, burnt oranges, and golden ochres. It’s a tactile warmth that feels like a fading memory, where the only interruption is the ink-black silhouette of a farmhouse against a dying sun.

The Tree of Life (2011)

If his earlier work was a painting, The Tree of Life is a sensory overload of childhood memory—the smell of cut grass, the way water feels on skin, and the overwhelming scale of the world when you are small. By the time Malick collaborated with Emmanuel Lubezki on this project, the philosophy had evolved into a “dogma” of naturalism. The behind-the-scenes reality was a set where traditional movie lights were banned, and the camera was constantly in motion to chase the sun as it moved through windows. Lubezki spoke about their “non-linear” way of working, where they would abandon a scripted scene if the light suddenly looked better in a different room. They used extremely wide lenses—often 14mm or 18mm—to capture the vastness of the world while remaining inches away from the actors’ faces. This created a paradoxical sense of intimacy, bathed in a palette of vibrant, cool greens and piercing cerulean. It feels “wet” and alive, capturing the saturated hues of a childhood that hasn’t yet faded.

Knight of Cups (2015)

With Knight of Cups, the observation shifts toward the fractured, high-contrast energy of modern-day Los Angeles. The experience of this film is built on a jarring, beautiful tension: the camera constantly shifts between the artificial heat of neon-lit nightclubs and those sudden, quiet escapes into the natural world. In the club scenes, the energy is frantic—captured on digital sensors and even GoPros, feeling like a sensory overload of neon magentas and electric blues. Following Christian Bale through these spaces is a visceral experience; Malick and Lubezki use an incredibly agile wide-angle lens that stays glued to him as he wanders through high-rise balconies and glittering parties. You aren’t just watching him; you are drifting with him through a fever dream of a soul searching for a real connection in a “full charge” city.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work,

here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

The photos ended up carrying fragments of conversations shared with loved ones over coffee or little treats.

Most of my observations revolved around things I own, and things I don’t or won’t. Like a golden ass for example.

It all felt a bit like that line from Télépopmusik — another day, just believe, just breathe.

All captured with my new obsession: the Sigma 105 mm f/2.8.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work,

here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

INVESTIGATOR: A Fashion Photographer with a broken BS detector.

SUBJECT: Playing Hide and Seek with AI in Fashion

The Briefing

Let’s skip the corporate PR flack and get straight to the raw truth from the ground floor. If you talk to anyone in the commercial photography community right now, the mood isn’t just bleak, it’s an existential cr…

Read more

Approximately 1,400 kilometers of basalt, ice, and black sand.

This trip was the dream of a lifetime finally coming true.

For quite some time, my reality had been defined by my dog’s battle with cancer. Planning this trip became an escape. The logistics, the schedules, the maps — they gave my mind somewhere else to go. And knowing I’d be sharing the road with close friends made everything feel softer.

But the feeling of rejuvenation you’re “supposed” to have after a trip like this didn’t really arrive.

The moment I stepped back through my door, I had to face the loss of my dog. Grief moved in immediately and swallowed whatever the trip had given me. For a long time, I couldn’t even look at the photos. When I finally edited them, it happened in a haze — never fully realizing what we had seen or where we had been.

A year has passed now, and I can finally look at these archives with clear eyes.

This is both a visual diary and a practical route guide — for anyone trying to build a similar Iceland itinerary but unsure where to begin.

Photographer’s note:

Sony is an absolute beast when it comes to battery life.

I arrived in Iceland with my Sony Alpha III R, a basic 24 - 70mm lens, and the confidence of someone who suddenly believed they were a travel photographer despite only packing two batteries for a 9-day road trip.

Somehow, it worked.

Iceland constantly reminded me that composition matters more than equipment. Some of my favorite images from the trip came from the simplest setup imaginable: one camera, one lens, terrible weather, and patience.

The Strategy

Circling Iceland in May is a conscious decision to move with uncertainty.

You accept early that not all roads will be open. Summer is just beginning, and winter still holds parts of the island. Our strategy was simple:

Avoid the F-roads entirely.

We wanted snow, glaciers, raw landscapes — but with minimum risk.

The route was circular, but never rigid. In Iceland, planning is always temporary. Weather interrupts everything, so we adapted daily — letting the island decide the pace.

We also avoided volcanic zones during a period of increased activity. There was a real sense of caution there, so we chose distance over curiosity.

That decision quietly shaped one of the most memorable parts of the trip: the northern coast. It was a revelation.

I have never been further north in my entire life on planet earth. In the tiniest, northernmost village I’ve ever stepped foot in, I experienced a moment that felt like a dream: I was served cold Greek coffee (frappe) by a girl who spoke my own language. In a place that felt so alien and remote, that sudden connection was fascinating.

A reminder of how small everything actually is.

The short version of the trip looks like this, before I proceed with all the details.

The Rhythm: Cooking and Connection

When you have thousands of kilometers ahead of you, rhythm becomes something you create.

For us, cooking became that structure.

We balanced experiencing Icelandic cuisine in the larger towns with quiet nights in our apartments while cooking together and sharing meals against a backdrop of endless sunsets.

It’s the kind of environment that invites deep conversations that only happen when you’re 1,000km from home.

Surprisingly, the further North we drove, the friendlier the weather became.
It felt like the island was rewarding us for pushing through the fog.

The Arrival: Meeting in Reykjavik

Everyone arrived at different times, so the first day was deliberately soft.

Pick-ups from the airport, a quiet drive into Reykjavik, no pressure to start anything immediately.

We already knew we’d end the trip here, so Reykjavik at this stage was just a landing point.

That first night was about arrival in the most basic sense:
reuniting, catching up, adjusting.

The road started the next morning.

Day 2: The Golden Circle Highlights

We officially began with Iceland’s most iconic route.

Thingvellir was the first stop — where you can literally walk between tectonic plates. It’s one of those places that sounds symbolic until you’re standing inside it, realizing the earth is physically pulling apart beneath you.

You need time here. It’s not a stop, it’s a landscape that expands as you walk.

After a few hours, we stopped at Friðheimar for tomato soup and bread — a warm pause in the middle of volcanic scale.

Then came the heavy hitters.

Gullfoss felt less like a waterfall and more like force.

Kerið Crater closed the loop — red volcanic rock wrapping around aquamarine water in almost unnatural contrast.

We ended the day in the area of Selfoss, preparing for the coastline ahead.

Day 3: The South Coast

We started in rain and ended completely soaked.

Before even reaching Skógafoss, we passed Gljúfrabúi, Seljalandsfoss, and Sauðafoss. The landscape there is so lush and emerald it felt like we had stepped into a “Hobbit Land.”

These waterfalls don’t exist at a distance. You walk through them, into them. Mist becomes part of everything.

There was no way I was risking my Sony Alpha there — and honestly, I’m glad I didn’t.

Even with waterproof clothing, I was soaked within minutes.

(note: always keep dry clothes in the car — you will need them later)

From there, we headed toward Dyrhólaey and the black beach of Reynisfara, but this is where the fog really took over. We couldn’t really see Dyrhólaey.

We pivoted to the Fjaðrárgljúfur canyon, where the mist actually made the prehistoric greens look even more surreal.

The day ended with us driving into what felt like a void.
Our apartment in Orustustaðir was the most isolated place I have ever been.
There were moments where it felt like we were driving to nowhere, just cutting through an endless, empty landscape.
It ended up being one of the best nights of the trip.

Day 4: Höfn, Icebergs & Vestrahorn

If I had to pick a favorite day, this was the one!

We made a deliberate choice to book a glacier tour on the smaller lake, Fjallsárlón, instead of the famous Jökulsárlón.

We wanted something less touristy and not so crowded, and it paid off. I don’t think you can go wrong with either, but what we saw there was on another level.

The ice literally moves while you watch; you enter one lake and leave a different one. It’s an experience I’ll never forget.

After a quick coffee at the lake facilities, we moved on to the big glacier, Jökulsárlón

and Diamond Beach. Breathtaking is the only word.

There was mist everywhere, and the ice sculptures washed up on the black sand made everything look DRAMATIC. We even spotted some seals bobbing between the bergs.

For lunch, we hit Kaffi Hornið for their lobster sandwiches and burgers — I honestly cannot recommend them enough.

Before heading to the majestic Vestrahorn, we fueled up one last time with coffee and cake at the Viking Café. Just a heads up: it’s a long walk out to the dunes, and it’s stunning every step of the way, but you definitely need to budget extra time if you want to explore the abandoned Viking movie set too.

We ended the day back at our base in Hornafjordur.

Day 5: The Eastfjords

Day five was the day we truly felt the scale of the island.

Leaving the glaciers behind, we began the long, cinematic crawl through the Eastfjords, winding through Fauskasandur & Lækjavik where the road clings to the edge of towering mountains that drop straight into the North Atlantic.

It’s a meditative drive, punctuated by tiny fishing villages and endless coastal curves. We made a deliberate push all the way to the harbor at Borgarfjarðarhöfn specifically to find the puffins.

We eventually landed in Egilsstaðir for the night, settling into our routine of cooking a shared meal and decompressing as the light stayed stubbornly bright outside our windows.

Day 6: North Iceland

Leaving the East behind, the landscape transformed into something prehistoric as we approached Stuðlagil Canyon. This was where the “Viewpoint vs. Hike” debate happened — we were feeling the weight of the kilometers, so we chose the viewpoint.

As a photographer, I have to be honest: I felt pretty restricted at the viewpoint. It’s a stunning place, but I couldn't get the angles I really wanted.
Unfortunately, I didn't walk away with any truly satisfactory photos of the canyon—it’s one of those spots where you really need to put in the footwork to find the right frame.

From there, we pushed into the Mývatn area, where the earth feels raw and unfinished. We stopped at Hverir, a geothermal landscape of bubbling mud pools and steaming vents that smelled of sulfur and looked exactly like the surface of Mars.

Just a few minutes away, we found Grjótagjá, the hidden lava cave with its crystal-clear thermal pool tucked into a deep fissure in the earth. And for anyone who watched Game of Thrones, this is also the cave connected to Jon Snow and Ygritte’s iconic scene beyond the Wall — which somehow makes the atmosphere feel even more surreal when you’re standing there in person.

Before finally heading toward our base in Hjalteyri, we made one last stop at Goðafoss.

This is the one place no Sony camera can truly capture. It’s impossible to frame how majestic it is or how small you feel standing there.

I felt like a tiny ant in the face of this massive engine of power. The wind was relentless, "killing" everything in its path, and I left that spot feeling completely humbled.

To recover from it all, we headed to the Forest Lagoon.

We chose the spa experience here instead of the famous Sky Lagoon because it fit our route better and felt more intimate.

And if you go, you have to eat at the canteen outside. The place is called Bessa biti, and it makes the best burger we’ve ever had.

It was the ultimate reset, we left feeling “like butter” and ready for a perfect night’s sleep in our apartment in Hjalteyri.

Day 7 : The Northern Coast

Leaving Hjalteyri, we followed the coastline toward Siglufjörður.

To get there, you pass through a series of mountain tunnels that cut straight through the rock. It’s a unique experience that sets the tone for the day as you emerge into the town.

Siglufjörður is actually the northernmost point I have ever been, and ironically, it was right there that I was served a cold Greek coffee —a strange, familiar taste in such a remote place.

Even more surreal was the fact that the girl who served us; she was from my hometown, loved Iceland, and treated us like old friends.

The perks of being from Thessaloniki always pay off, literally.

Shoutout to the bakery Aðalbakarí <3

But as a photographer, this stretch is vital. We traced the high coast where the road clings to the cliffs, and I found myself pulling over constantly.

From there, we started approaching the Snæfellsnes Peninsula Often called “Iceland in Miniature,” it packs nearly every landscape of the country into one area.

The rest of the day was long driving, Icelandic horses along the road, and Grafarkirkja — the oldest turf church in Iceland.

By Hvammstangi, a hailstorm hit.

We ran into a supermarket.

By the time we came out, it was gone.

Day 8 : Snæfellsnes

Day eight was a relentless pursuit of light.

We moved through the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, starting with the sharp arrowhead of Kirkjufell.

Even after a week of incredible sights, that peak framed by its waterfalls feels like a mandatory masterclass in composition.

We followed the coast to Arnarstapi, where the jagged cliffs and stone arches offered one last look at Iceland’s raw, chaotic edge.

But the true aesthetic bookend was Búðakirkja. The solitary black church stands in sharp, geometric defiance against the sprawling lava fields and distant mountains.

Because it’s May, the sun stayed high and bright, giving us a crisp, eternal afternoon to work the angles of the dark wood against the vibrant landscape.

We made the long push back to Reykjavik while it was still broad daylight. We ended the day the only way you should in the capital: grabbing some iconic hot dogs before finally crashing.

Day 9: The Reykjavik Re-Entry

After seven days of relentless driving and chasing the light, Day 9 was about slowing down in Reykjavik. We started our morning at Brauð & Co (Hölt), fueling up with coffee and their legendary breakfast pastries before diving into the streets.

The day became a loop:
walk — coffee — walk — food — drink — repeat.

Just the city, and the slow realization that the trip was ending.

Room with a view

One thing Iceland completely ruined for me: normal views.

Some of the best landscapes I’ve ever seen happened while making coffee, brushing my teeth, or staring out of an apartment window half asleep.

At some point, we realized even Icelandic public toilets somehow come with cinematic panoramic views. It became a running joke for the rest of the trip.

The stays themselves became part of the experience — especially after long days of driving through fog, glaciers, and black sand. Arriving somewhere warm, isolated, and completely silent felt like its own reward.

Places to visit

Reykjavík’s Perfect Morning Bakery - Sandholt
Greek Comfort in a Reykjavik Bite - Loo.koo.mas
The Everyday Reykjavik Ritual - Te & Kaffi Laugavegi
Reykjavik’s Food & Drink Court - Hlemmur Mathöll
Coffee by the River, Inside Reykjavik’s Oldest Cultural House - Iðnó
The Legendary Reykjavik Hot Dog Stand - Bæjarins Beztu Pylsur

For anyone who wants a piece of framed Iceland in their home, the prints are available below in my darkroom

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

Anyway, to sum up: I went through a period where I lost my creative instincts. I was walking around like a ghost with this heavy feeling and 1,000 thoughts running wild, contributing to a pretty much established exhaustion phase. I found out these things helped me to go through this period and regain my creativity day by day.

Starting with a schedule

When you lose the motivation to do things in general, it’s incredibly easy to get lost. And then there’s shame that starts living in your head during those periods; you feel bad for not being productive, which makes you feel worse, which ensures you stay uninspired. You find yourself stuck in this abstract period of time where things need to be done, but you choose not to take action. It stays that way until you finally decide to move.

I decided to sat down to force a monthly schedule. At first, I just put in the non-negotiables. But once those were in, I found myself actually wanting to fill the gaps with things I wanted to do. I started finding space for them, and before I knew it, I had the next three months mapped out. There is something profoundly grounding about seeing a digital block of color that says you have one week to plan this, and by the end of this week, there’s another one coming with more. It turns a rushing thought into something tangible and takes the power away from that internal shame.

Reaching out for new shoots

I started reaching out to people for portfolio updates. Did I feel it 100%? No. But one thing I know about me, and maybe I’m too afraid to say it out, is that I actually function quite well under pressure, so I gave myself a push. The worst that could happen is people saying no. Instead, they said yes. This forced me back into active creative brain mode. What are we shooting? Where? What style? All of a sudden I found myself occupied with all this unseen work: creating mood boards, location scouting, and trying to figure out each model’s strengths to find a concept that would portray them in their best light. We coordinated on styling and organized the movement from one location to the next.

I went from being an antisocial ghost to directing people on the street with a flash. Being busy and collaborative really contributed to get rid of the “stuckness.”

Taking on photography gigs I wouldn’t usually do

I started saying yes to things outside my usual base. These weren’t my usual expertise, but being stuck in an exhaustion phase meant I needed to use different skills and sides of my brain. Taking on different photography genres forced me to think differently, and the traveling required helped break the stagnation of my home base.

In Cologne, I was surprisingly amused by testing protein bars and watching people test their strength in specially designed areas at FIBO (if you are quite ripped, you already know the place). Then I went to Athens for a wedding party. Since the wedding belonged to my friends, it came with the very joyful responsibility of giving them a great gift in the form of awesome photos. As a still life photographer, I’m always drawn to the details, and I’d forgotten how much I love the preparation phase. Capturing the location, the decorations, and the stillness before the dance floor catches fire brought me a specific kind of peace. It’s also a great boot camp for photography in terms of speed; if you’re slow at a wedding, the moment is gone.

Finding focus in the edit

None of these projects would have happened if I hadn’t started that schedule in the first place. Putting my thoughts in order on a calendar was the catalyst that brought me home with four new galleries sitting on my hard drive. My days filled up with narrowing down hundreds of moments into a coherent story, followed by color grading, the deeply satisfying retouching process that I love and backing up files.

Suddenly, I had content for social media, new ideas for the blog, and a page that didn’t look like a digital graveyard. Sharing the work actually brought attention and possible next paid collaborations. It wasn’t about waiting for a lightning bolt of inspiration; it was just about having a pile of things that needed to be finished.

Investing in new gear and a studio setup

I looked at my gear and realized it doesn’t fit anymore who I ‘m becoming professionally. I’ve always “made it work” on portable surfaces, but I was tired of the constant packing and unpacking. It felt like my career was living out of a suitcase in my own living room.

I made some new orders, expanding my home studio and giving it the room it deserves. I rearranged the space to fit my actual needs; I moved some furniture around and now it’s a dedicated space. It’s spacious and organized and the backgrounds stay on the tripods. When I walk in there, it actually feels like a place of work and creation rather than a library of perfectly packed equipment.

Dog sitting as my new hobby

Perhaps the most unexpected and unrelated helpful thing has been hosting dogs. While their humans are on vacation, I’ve became their dog sitter. My phone is full of dog photos because I’m constantly documenting them or sending updates to their humans, which opened up a creative skill I didn’t know I possessed.

To be completely honest, having a dog for 15 years leads to this. As a dog parent, you play a version of your dog’s voice out loud, and this version of my dog, Ernesto, existed in my life for so long. It wasn’t though present the last year as Ernesto passed away and having around these new friends, this voice somehow found its way back through new channels.

I’m filming them like they’re talking to an audience, and honestly? I’m having a blast. It’s the first time in a long time I’ve felt rejuvenated. There’s no pressure. There’s no “is this high art?” It’s just me, my phone, and a dachshund who thinks he’s an influencer. It surprisingly led to dog portraits, which is such a stress-free, joyful side of the job. It reminds me why I picked up a camera in the first place.

Plus, my camera roll looks like this now:

If you’re in that dark place where you feel like your instincts have died, hear me out: Your brain just needs new leads.

Once you start figuring out next steps, even the smallest ones, your brain actually gets into it again. One thing brings the other. The schedule brings the shoot; the shoot brings the edit; the edit brings the post. You don’t have to feel “ready” to start. You just have to be willing to be a little bit busy until you realize you aren’t a ghost anymore.

’Til next time,

Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work,

here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

I’m back.

After a whole month of shutting down.

That’s how much I needed to get my light back.

March… was quite something. There were a few things happening in the background that entirely wore me down.

I felt completely disconnected from my creative instincts.

I even stopped watching movies.

Which, if you know me, is… concerning.

Instead, movies got replaced…

Read more

March is my birthday month, and this year I noticed myself feeling more focused on yearning than on getting older. As a woman, I still haven’t quite made my peace with aging year after year, but this birthday felt slightly different. Being in sunny Florence was a gift I gave myself, and the images below are small moments from those days that stayed with me for reasons that are probably more personal than they appear.

On the positive side of things, something exciting happened this month as well: one of my photographs has been selected to be part of the Athens Women’s Photo Festival exhibition Postcards: Images and Whispers, which will take place at the Melina Mercouri Cultural Center from April 1–5. I’m very happy to be part of it.

Hopefully, when it’s time for Closing April, there will be a few more stories to share along with some more personal photographs.

’Til next time,
Fil🔋

If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work,
here are a few simple ways you can help:

• Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

• Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

• Purchase a print from my darkroom.

• Buy me a cup of coffee here.

Thank you for being part of this journey!

From the outside, it looks like a dream.
You work with inspiring people. Your work inspires people. There are no grey office walls, no rigid routines, no clocking in and out. People tilt their heads when you describe what you do and say, “That sounds amazing.”
And you smile, because in many ways, it is.

My aunt is always there to support my mental breakdo…

Read more

Before going to Florence, I watched The Comfort of Strangers.

Which is set in Venice and therefore not Florence at all. But if you’re going to arrive in an Italian city slightly over-sensitised to mood, shadows and the idea that strangers might be quietly dangerous, it’s not the worst preparation.

The film has this dark, sensual atmosphere where everyone seems to know something you don’t. People glide through beautiful streets with the faint suggestion that something unsettling could happen at any moment. It makes you look at passersby differently. Less like background characters and more like people who might have complicated inner lives, secrets, questionable taste in lovers.

That sort of thing.

And for some reason, the mood followed me to Florence.

Which was inconvenient, because Florence is full of tourists holding gelato, and it’s difficult to project erotic psychological suspense onto someone with pistachio melting down their wrist.

Still, the idea stuck: everyone around me was carrying a story.

Normally this is not where my photography goes.

Street photography, despite its romantic reputation, is not really my territory. Which is slightly ironic because I photograph people professionally. But there is a crucial difference.

When I photograph people for work, there is a whole civilised structure in place. A conversation about posture, hands, where to stand, where to look. We collaborate toward a final photograph.

Street photography removes all of that.

Suddenly you are pointing a lens at someone who did not wake up that morning expecting to become part of a stranger’s visual experiment. And I’m not entirely comfortable with that.

Partly because I’m shy on pointing the lens to complete strangers, but mostly because my brain is catastrophically analytical.

The moment I consider photographing someone, I also imagine the reverse situation: somewhere on the internet exists a photograph of me mid-blink, with a double chin I didn’t know I possessed, standing in a posture that could only be described as structurally unfortunate.

Honestly, the thought alone is enough to discourage artistic bravery.

So yes, street photography requires a kind of confidence I don’t naturally carry around.

And yet in Florence I somehow went for it.

Maybe it was the lingering mood of the film, but the people around me started to feel less like random pedestrians and more like passengers moving through a story I had briefly stepped into.

They had somewhere to go.
Something had brought them here.
Something was waiting for them after.

At some point I realised I was observing them the way a museum security guard observes visitors.

This is a very particular way of looking at people.

A security guard is no longer interested in the artwork itself because they’ve already seen the paintings a thousand times. What they notice instead is the behaviour around them. The quiet choreography of strangers sharing a room.

Who stands close together.
Who keeps a telling distance.
Who walks through the gallery with intention and who drifts through it like they accidentally entered while looking for the exit.

You begin to notice things.

Couples orbiting each other without touching.
Someone staring at a painting as if waiting for it to reveal a secret.
Someone else clearly waiting for their friend to finish appreciating culture so they can go get coffee.

Florence began to feel like a moving gallery of stories I would never fully understand.

And for once, instead of photographing objects or carefully directed scenes, I turned the camera toward the passengers.

The photographs themselves are not particularly remarkable. In fact, they might be the least technically impressive images I’ve taken in quite some time.

But the idea behind them appealed to me enormously.

Every person carrying a story I will never know.
A reason for being exactly there, at exactly that moment.

All of us briefly sharing the same street before continuing somewhere else.

Which, when you think about it, is a fairly accurate description of travelling.

And also of life, to romanticize it!

So it feels appropriate to end this post with myself as well.

Because to everyone in these photographs, I was simply another stranger walking around Florence with a camera.

’Til next time,
another stranger (Fil)🔋

Substack photo galleries worth visiting

• Paper traces by

• Film Photo Diary: Cinque Terre by

• Monthly field report: feb’26 by

• Grainy Days #1 by

  ---

  If you’ve been reading along and feel like supporting my work,
  here are a few simple ways you can help:

  • Like, share, or comment - every little bit of support means a lot to me.

  • Subscribe to the blog to stay in the loop & receive my love letter and a few playful outtakes.

  • Purchase a print from my darkroom.

  • Buy me a cup of coffee here.

  
  Thank you for being part of this journey!

  ---

  
  

Late February light spills through the window of the café tucked inside the bookshop, the dome visible just beyond the glass. We’ve claimed the table right by the window, pretending we’re productive adults when really we’re just here to debrief life.

We used to work together. Now we’re friends, which is what happens when you survive E-commerce side by side. We see each other once a week, which feels like a perfectly calibrated amount of adulthood, considering we used to see each other every single day.

I stir my coffee, disappointed in myself, a little sick to my stomach.

“I finally got asked what music I listen to… you won’t believe what I said.”

She doesn’t glance up, clearly bracing herself for the disaster she already knows is coming.
“Everything?”

“Yeah.”

She rolls her eyes “Nooooo. Why? You lost the chance to shine.”

“I don’t even want to talk about it… I was multitasking in my brain, so the safest thing was to say the most horrifying word ever.”

Everything.

Everything is not an answer.
It’s the personality witness protection program.
It’s beige. It’s elevator music.
It’s what you say when you blue-screen.

I could have answered differently. If I were focused, I would have gone full Christian Bale as Patrick Bateman in American Psycho. Calm and precise, maybe slightly unsettling.

“I was heavily into post-punk for years. The rawness, the restraint, the existential guitars. But lately I’ve shifted. I’m in a groovier R&B and soul phase now. It’s all about the vibe.”

Measured. Layered. Attractive.
Instead, I said “everything.”
Which is how reputations die.

The studio had asked me to curate a playlist. Just a playlist. Background music for photoshoots. Simple, right?

For a few hours afterward, I felt… competent. Confident. The soft warmth of maybe I actually got this right. Endorphins kicked in, and I actually felt good about my choices. I even had a little dancing moment, ten seconds of moving like a DJ while shifting to the next track, before reality set back in.

Then my brain started building evidence against me.
Which, naturally, triggered my full-blown creative-FBI mode. I was analyzing every tiny choice like an FBI agent would analyze the Epstein files…

Exhibit A: Is Vogue by Madonna too predictable for studio music?
Exhibit B: How many Doja Cat songs are allowed before it becomes a personality statement?
Exhibit C: How do we transition from millennial classics to Gen Z bangers without anyone noticing the awkward shift?

She sips her coffee, listening to my spiral like she always does. “Of course you doubt yourself. You’re a woman born with imposter syndrome. A man would have walked in, said ‘rare Icelandic techno,’ and left thinking he invented it.”

She said it, and immediately everything came back to me… the guy who would put on every band’s most obvious, overplayed song. The ones everyone knows by heart. Sweet Child O’ Mine, every single time. You’re sitting there, willing someone to pay him to stop, because one more listen and you’re pretty sure you might actually blow your brains out.

And then, of course, my brain started digging through past experiences. Someone once loved Taylor Swift, and everyone couldn’t stop commenting. Someone else hated Dua Lipa, which triggered an entire spiral wave among the team. I personally cannot stand reggae, but I’m flexible; headphones exist for a reason. Another person hated Iggy Pop, still don’t know what that was about. And let’s not even talk about that German song about Griechische wine that somehow turned my stomach upside down during one of these “team bonding” music sessions.

Wish I was this person. To play the same songs every single day that everyone secretly hates, without a care in the world. But instead I’m the one who tries to be inclusive, wondering if the playlist needs to be upbeat, just to set the pace, or should there be some neutral lows in between so no one feels overwhelmed? It backfires either way.
Maybe also trying to be everyone’s cup of tea is a project called DELULU.

I read a blog about authenticity in writing recently and really liked it. It had this little exercise to practice on your own, triggered by very mundane activities. I’m not a writer myself, but what I do have are these absurd thoughts that, when I step out of my body and watch them from the outside, I find funny. Then I feel the need to exaggerate them even more, turn them into totally absurd scenarios, and see where they go. That’s what keeps me hooked.

Lately, I’ve been thinking about how to translate these little scripts into my photography blog. Sometimes I don’t feel the need to show the work itself as much as my own thoughts, to let them exist outside my head in a way that feels like they belong to this world. I’ve been really into that lately, even if it means losing a few followers who were waiting for the next photography technique or zine, which if I’m being honest I still want to make someday. I’m also itching to change my gear, dive into film, stick to a style, and experiment with work that actually means something to me.

But right now, what draws me most is talking about the things I love, the things I notice, the things I obsess over, letting this space be what I’m also really interested in beyond photography work. It’s always meant a lot to me NO ONE SEES WHAT YOU SEE and I think that’s what keeps me going. Especially when I combine it with this deep belief I carry around since a very young age: we are what we watch, eat, and listen to. And the answer to that? It’s obviously not everything. On the contrary, it’s very selective.

’Til next time,
Fil 🔋

Substack reads I would recommend with my eyes closed

• The Great Severing by

• Protection spell - a poem by

• Sunday Morning Gallery #13 by

• Dream Weaver by

• Why Some Portfolios Feel Senior Even Without Big Clients by