ERWIN DARMALI

The Start of Visual Storytelling

He began his visual creative career in wedding photography in 2005 under Apertura Photography in Los Angeles, California, where his strong visual compositions and his sense of moments earned him numerous prestigious awards and articles written about him, including the recognition as one of American Photo’s Top Ten Wedding Photographers in the world in 2009.  It is during this stage that he honed his skills and knowledge on photojournalism.  

The Educator’s Role

As he believes that sharing knowledge is a vital part of society, he started doing speaking engagements, seminars, workshops across three continents, including becoming a mentor at the world-renowned Foundation Workshops in the United States since 2009. 

The Search for Meaning

His evolution continues as his hunger to tell real, impactful stories through his personal projects. In one of his earlier projects he tells a story of a family with a young child who was just diagnosed within the autism spectrum.  He combined his photographs with a voice narration of the father and the result was immediate and overwhelming - The family received over 100 messages of support within 24 hours of releasing the short film. The response solidified Erwin’s desire to tell stories that matter and decided that he would leave the wedding world and pursue great stories. Stories that touch and inspire audiences on a deeper level.

A Journey Into The Arts

Following that, he was commissioned work by Pasadena-based artist Kenton Nelson, marking a point where Erwin started to dive into the art world. Erwin believes that within art lies beauty, feel, perspective, and philosophies -  that art is an exploration on humanity itself, and aside from philosophers, it could very well be that artists are the ones who thinks about the world the most.  “Why don’t I dig deeper in the process of the arts and uncover the meanings and the [why] so people can benefit from it?” And so the journey in arts continued.

Foundational Philosophy

Whether he is creating a film, photographing a subject or story, or guiding photographers through their own creative blocks, his focus remains the same: to see clearly, and to invite others see more deeply. This clarity - earned through experience, questioning, and reflection - is what he brings into every collaboration.

For Erwin, filmmaking is more than a craft—it’s a calling.
He believes that inspiring stories has the power to change the world, or at the very least, change one life at a time.