Cloud Attic turns 1!

Cloud Attic, one of 

Sri Lanka’s most sought-after photography service providers, has constantly surpassed expectations, taking the art to a whole new level. Having just turned one, Cloud Attic certainly has many 

reasons to celebrate, given its immense success and popularity. Following are excerpts of an interview with Cloud Attic Founder Aki Peiris, tracing the journey over the last year

Aki Peiris and Pavithra Jovan De Mello

By Sarah Hannan

Q: Explain the concept behind Cloud Attic – How you set up the business, who is involved, what experience you brought in when you started?

A: Cloud Attic came about with me wanting to move away from using my name for wedding photography, i.e. Aki Peiris Photography, and wanting to make a new brand instead. My love for cloud-gazing and how majestic they look during a sunset, combined with the nostalgia that comes with the association of ‘attic,’ brought out the meaning in what we do; capture moments and emotions to immortalise them on film, which you can look back on and remember in years to come. Therefore I decided on the name Cloud Attic.

Pavithra Jovan De Mello and I have been friends and were helping each other out at private weddings we got. I pitched this idea to him to build something bigger without promoting our names and he agreed and after a while of deciding on names and making the initial plan about how we were to operate, here we are, one year later, working smoothly and with good demand.

Cloud Attic is comprised of a quite a versatile team, I have been working at Odel Plc as the senior photographer for almost three-and-a-half years now and I specialise in fashion, product, event and portrait photography, combined with my previous experience as a wedding photographer for two years before joining Odel. 

Pavithra was initially a photojournalist, working for The Sunday Leader, and a food/travel photographer who has done work for many famous restaurants and hotels around Sri Lanka. Upekha Hewavithanage, our third shooter, is a wildlife, travel and portrait photographer, so the three of us combined bring three different perspectives when we shoot. 

Q: When did you start capturing images, what was your first camera and what made you continue on this journey of photography?

A: I started capturing pictures from a very early age. From the time I was maybe four or five years old I was fascinated with cameras, by the time I was 13 I used to borrow my mom’s point-and-shoot digital camera and take pictures of just about anything and everything, although I never in my wildest dreams had any idea of becoming a photographer. It was around 2009 when I finally managed to get a DSLR camera that the idea actually set in.

Q: How do you set yourselves apart from other photography services in the country? 

A: I think there are so many fantastic photographers in this country; we have our own style and how we work and we take things from a very natural and candid perspective. We let the moment happen and we capture it as we see it, so we truly believe that we are good at what we do and by our many satisfied clients I think we are doing it right. I don’t believe there are any specific rules or techniques to follow to get a good photograph, I always believe in taking a picture that would make me look at it and go ‘wow’ or tell me a story or make me feel the real emotion behind the picture. If I manage to do that, I will consider that a good picture. 

Q: Did any of you formally study the art of photography at any point? 

A: I have no training whatsoever in digital photography; if you ask me technical terms and things I probably wouldn’t know how to answer half of your questions. How I learned 99% of what I know is through trial and error, a lot of help from my photographer friends, YouTube and Google searches and a whole load of perseverance and practice. Up to today after almost six years of working as a professional photographer, I still learn so much from so many people and the internet, I don’t think I will ever know everything there is to know!

Q: What was the most challenging photo-shoot that you did recently and how did you manage to tackle the situation?

A: It is very hard to pin point just one shoot and say this is the most difficult situation we faced; we had our fair share of difficult shoots, and in tough situations we just focus on what needs to be done, which is to get the shot. There is nothing more to it really; we don’t consider our jobs very stressful, very tiring yes. But it is all in a day’s work, and we love doing it! There is nothing else in the world I would rather be doing.

Pix Courtesy Cloud Attic