Last September, I had the good fortune of photographing Mr. Forte Gerardo for the cover of The Canadian Immigrant, Toronto Edition, October issue. For those that don’t know him, Mr. Forte Gerardo is a master ‘Trade Maker’, having been the former trade commissioner and head of post for the Philippines to Toronto and Central Canada, and entrepreneur running an established trading company. The full issue can be read here.

As for my trade, I create images. Having done primarily fashion and celebrity portraiture for most of my professional life, I’m used to having a full crew – complete with make-up and hair artists, wardrobe stylists, and models and am extremely proficient with all the editing, retouching, and post-processing that goes hand-in-hand with what’s considered a ‘modern photographic production’ (including some of the most intricate Adobe Photoshop techniques that involve layer masking, creative use of blending modes, warps and transformations, up to full 3D reconstruction and CG replacement – I’m also a 3D and Visual Effects artist, and teach Photoshop techniques). Sometimes though, I just love to do it old-school – just classical and honest portraiture, completely focusing on, and capturing the character of the person in front of the lens with no distractions. I find working this way extremely satisfying. These are some of the most honest photographs I have made – it’s all the-subject-as-they-are, light, and lens – nothing’s contrived. With the exception of the cover tear sheet above, the images you see below in this blog post, are literally straight out of my camera. Post processing zero – this is as honest as it gets.

Not that Mr. Forte Gerardo and his lovely wife, Salvacion, need any image editing help. They are genuinely wonderful people with characters that just exude positivity and an appreciation for knowledge and life. It was such an honor to be able to photograph them.