Nov '25 • General discussion
Founder's Story 12 - Focus: My Way Out
When the world shut down in 2020, I lost everything I had just begun to build.
Tourism vanished overnight. All my bookings were canceled.
My dream of becoming a full-time guide dissolved as the borders closed.
But I still had one thing:
A camera.
Before the pandemic, I had bought an entry-level camera.
I thought that if I wanted to thrive as a guide, being able to take good photos for my guests would be a nice bonus.
Then the emergency declaration hit.
Restaurants sat empty.
Owners were panicked.
But food delivery apps like Uber Eats were booming.
And I saw something.
The restaurants needed culinary photos to upload online for the food delivery.
So I focused.
I dove into YouTube tutorials and taught myself how to shoot food.
I learned how to set up artificial lighting in my tiny apartment.
I practiced every day.
I focused harder than I ever had before.
Slowly, my photos started to look like the ones in magazines.
And then, I started getting calls— From ramen shops, sushi counters, curry houses.
I became the guy who made food look irresistible online.
Over the next three years, I photographed dishes from over 300 restaurants.
In the middle of a pandemic that broke the tourism industry, I reinvented myself as a food photographer—not because I had a business plan, but because I noticed a gap and focused everything I had into it.
What started as a backup skill… Became the very thing that saved me.
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Founder's Story 12 - Focus: My Way Out
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