We, as the Designer Interviews ("DI") had the distinct pleasure and opportunity to interview award-winning, most creative and innovative YU KUN ("YK").
He is a professional photographer and photography teacher with many years of experience in shooting and teaching. And seriously insist on paying for them. In his many years of shooting career, he was good at summarizing experience and having the ability to express himself in simple and concise language, which laid the foundation for later becoming a photography teacher and university professor of photography, and won many international awards. Some of the works after 2020 have a variety of conceptual photography tones, reflecting some current social phenomena and his inner thoughts, and creatively expressed in the language of photography, bringing some thinking to many readers. This expression is the social responsibility and commitment that artists should have.
YU KUN Designs
We are pleased to share with you original and innovative design work by YU KUN.
YU KUN Design - Limited Space Photos
Designer Interview of YU KUN:
DI: Could you please tell us more about your art and design background? What made you become an artist/designer? Have you always wanted to be a designer?
YK : I had a rock band in college, from then on contact with a lot of art-related people, ideas are very much collision, which is very interesting, because these people are very interesting will bring a lot of thinking, and then will also selectively read some books, movies, music style, perhaps these are quietly influenced by me
DI: Can you tell us more about your company / design studio?
YK : I think you're asking about my work in photography; I've been a self-employed photographer for most of the time since I started doing commercial photography, but of course I've also opened a studio and been employed by a professional photography school in the middle of the process.
DI: What is "design" for you?
YK : It must be an idea first and then have some purposeful use, and then it was constructed.
DI: What kinds of works do you like designing most?
YK : In recent years more like the concept of photography
DI: What is your most favorite design, could you please tell more about it?
YK : I think there are two characteristics of good design: the first is pleasant to use, and the second: when you don't have it around, you will miss it very much.
DI: What was the first thing you designed for a company?
YK : I don't remember my first shoot, but my first commercial shoot must have been portrait photography
DI: What is your favorite material / platform / technology?
YK : Most like to talk about different ideas for each period, talk about the lens, there is a period of time I really like to use 35mm lens to shoot commercial portraits.
DI: When do you feel the most creative?
YK : After dusk, when it's quiet and when listening to songs. I've been thinking lately that maybe dusk is the beginning of the day for me, and I feel good at dusk especially when the sky is beautiful.
DI: Which aspects of a design do you focus more during designing?
YK : The expression of the work, whether to meet the requirements of their own inner thoughts, such as: composition, color, light, dark, mood, scene...
DI: What kind of emotions do you feel when you design?
YK : The preliminary design is very time-consuming, and may have to go through the process of overturning the last time many times to come up with a rough framework, and then fill in the content to make the work more executable, and after the final draft to determine the personnel, materials and venues.
DI: What kind of emotions do you feel when your designs are realized?
YK : Excitement
DI: What makes a design successful?
YK : Ideas and then execute them
DI: When judging a design as good or bad, which aspects do you consider first?
YK : Whether it can touch me, followed by the professional details of the aspect
DI: From your point of view, what are the responsibilities of a designer for society and environment?
YK : Have some social responsibility, reduce unnecessary purchases, and dare to present your inner truth with your works.
DI: How do you think the "design field" is evolving? What is the future of design?
YK : I talk about photography, after nearly two hundred years of photographic development history, photography from a pure technology gradually evolved into an art, from a niche professional development to the public popularity of a professional, almost everyone will "take photos", the future of photography equipment will become more and more convenient and compact, intelligent algorithms will replace some mechanical manual operation.
DI: When was your last exhibition and where was it? And when do you want to hold your next exhibition?
YK : The last small exhibition would have been in 2016, and hopefully this time my work will be in Italy this year
DI: Where does the design inspiration for your works come from? How do you feed your creativity? What are your sources of inspirations?
YK : Inspiration comes from life, such as some social events, some tangled and contradictory thoughts, etc. I will intentionally keep time alone, intentionally selective to watch something, listen to something, read something, which is very important.
DI: How would you describe your design style? What made you explore more this style and what are the main characteristics of your style? What's your approach to design?
YK : Concept Photography，Some inner thoughts，Behavior and overall picture construction ，It's about expressing what you want to say in your heart through photography.
DI: Where do you live? Do you feel the cultural heritage of your country affects your designs? What are the pros and cons during designing as a result of living in your country?
YK : I live in Chengdu, China, and will more or less receive the impact; there are many benefits such as good prices and will be very convenient...
DI: How do you work with companies?
YK : From the recommendation of some friends
DI: What are your suggestions to companies for working with a designer? How can companies select a good designer?
YK : Photographers can communicate more details, from supplies, content, time costs, many companies actually do not know what they want, but also do not have a rough prototype, we need to help them establish the prototype through communication details. Companies choose the photographer, you can ask more people around whether there is a recommendation, if the cooperation is pleasant, you can establish a long-term cooperation mechanism, tacit understanding and efficiency will be greatly improved.
DI: Can you talk a little about your design process?
YK : Inspiration accumulation, determine the direction of the theme, refine the content, pre-preparation, execution of the program, post-keying, adjusting the details, production.
DI: What are 5 of your favorite design items at home?
YK : Iphone6，Fender-Tele，Light Bell，The Imperial Palace，Stokke Steps
DI: Can you describe a day in your life?
YK : If the rest may not speak for several days in a row, hahah
DI: Could you please share some pearls of wisdom for young designers? What are your suggestions to young, up and coming designers?
YK : Be sure to lay a solid foundation, master the basic theory and skills, and think more about the nature of the problem; stay curious.
DI: From your perspective, what would you say are some positives and negatives of being a designer?
YK : The positive factor is that photography is often in constant contact with new people and things, can always have a sense of freshness；the negative factor is that people are very different for the aesthetic, sometimes it will bring trouble to my work
DI: What is your "golden rule" in design?
YK : Expressing true emotions，Follow the laws of nature.
DI: What skills are most important for a designer?
YK : Hands-on skills
DI: Which tools do you use during design? What is inside your toolbox? Such as software, application, hardware, books, sources of inspiration etc.?
YK : Photoshop，Bridge,Capture-one.Set a Light 3D Studio.
DI: Designing can sometimes be a really time consuming task, how do you manage your time?
YK : Set a long-term goal for each year and then break it down into implementation goals.finally dedicate a period of time to focus on preparing the work
DI: How long does it take to design an object from beginning to end?
YK : Uncertainty, often an existing good idea, and then note down, may not continue to refine the idea at the time, will be put on hold for a long time; generally have a pre-existing idea, from the beginning of the development of content to shoot in a month can be achieved.
DI: What is the most frequently asked question to you, as a designer?
YK : You always shoot beautiful grils, you must know a lot of the opposite sex, right?
DI: What was your most important job experience?
YK : Having served dozens of companies cumulatively.
DI: Who are some of your clients?
YK : Many companies
DI: What type of design work do you enjoy the most and why?
YK : Now I like the concept of photography and enjoy my current job in the university teaching photography, usually have time off to shoot their favorite
DI: What are your future plans? What is next for you?
YK : Want to go to a different culture to travel，Don't think too much，like the biblical phrase: "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
DI: Do you work as a team, or do you develop your designs yourself?
YK : I usually make my own shooting plans, and when I need people in different positions to work together, we divide the work.
DI: Do you have any works-in-progress being designed that you would like to talk about?
YK : There will be, but they are still in the idea stage
DI: How can people contact you?
YK : By this “1323932835@qq.com " You can find me at this email address or Search my instagram “kohen_yu”。