Neon nights
Take one look at Liam Wong’s night-time images of the city of Tokyo and you’re transported to a Blade Runner-like world, a nocturnal sci-fi playground that dazzles the eye and imprints itself on your brain. The obvious cinematic reference is no surprise as Wong cites key influences such as director Wong Kar-Wai and cinematographer Roger Deakins.
He reveals, ‘My favourite photographer is Fan Ho – his 1950s and 1960s [work in] Hong Kong is just incredible stuff. A main inspiration is Syd Mead, the Blade Runner and Tron visual artist. The colours, the composition, the content… everything about it… he had a graphic design background and you can see it inside his work. Those people were huge inspirations for me.’
Wong was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, but his journey into photography has only truly developed since 2015, when he bought a Canon EOS 5D Mark II. Prior to that he was an art director at the major game development company Ubisoft, in Canada, which developed blockbuster games like Assassin’s Creed, but an increasing need to travel for both business and pleasure saw his visual horizons expanding further.
He explains, ‘Coming from an artistic background I save a
