A color-blind man who devoted his life to color photography has a subtly amazing quality. Romy Ocon’s story revolves around this paradox, which may be what makes it worthwhile to share.
Ocon, a self-taught Filipino nature photographer known online and in photography circles as “Liquidstone,” spent years exploring the country’s wetlands, rainforests, mountain trails, and island coastlines in order to capture the wild birds of the Philippines. He had no formal training in the arts. Before giving it all up, he pursued a career as a concrete technologist, received training as a civil engineer, and managed a company for years. At the age of 39, he took a semi-retirement in 2004 to concentrate on wild bird imaging, a hobby of his for years.
In retrospect, the choice seems almost impulsive, but it was obviously not. Ocon was raised in a rural village in La Union, Northern Luzon, where he was taught at a young age to observe the natural world. Early observation like that doesn’t go away. It simply waits.
He has a strong personal ethic that is evident in the way he approaches bird photography. There is no use of bird calls to entice subjects. Avoid using food as bait. No fake setup. Using super-telephoto lenses that range in size from 100mm to 1,600mm, each picture is taken in the natural environment in the light that is available. The end product is genuinely in-the-moment photos that don’t feel staged or optimized for easy drama. That discipline is more difficult than it seems for wildlife photography.
In addition, Ocon founded and runs the Philippine Bird Photography Forum, which has grown to be a hub for serious bird photographers nationwide. He used it to advance technical standards and conservation awareness while also serving as its moderator and mentor. Those who attended that forum continue to talk about his impact. One former moderator pointed out that he initially became interested in bird photography because of Ocon’s images.
He was named a Brand Ambassador by Canon Philippines in 2010 and was one of about fifteen photographers from various genres that were highlighted in a nationwide print campaign. His wild bird photos were included in the Canon EOS 7D Digital SLR Handbook that same year, which was published by Reader’s Digest Asia and Canon Inc. and featured photographers from all over the region. It was the kind of institutional recognition that usually comes after years of unasked-for labor.
In 2013, Ocon publicly asserted that a photo he had taken of a Long-tailed Shrike appeared to have been used without authorization on a Malaysian postage stamp and mistakenly identified as a completely different bird, which led to a legal dispute. He claimed to have the RAW file to demonstrate copyright ownership, spoke with attorneys, and uploaded a frame-by-frame analysis online. Ocon’s directness about what he believed had occurred and the specificity of his evidence both contributed to the case’s attention. Following that, he counseled other photographers to watermark their images and only post files with lower resolutions online.
There is no definitive answer to the question of Romy Ocon’s current location. As recently as April 2023, his YouTube channel was active. After years of fieldwork, he reportedly returned to his hometown of La Union, according to people who knew him. His gradual disappearance from public view has been noted by some members of the Philippine birding community, which is typical for photographers who established their reputations prior to social media making constant visibility the norm.
He left behind a significant legacy. Over 280 species have been identified in their natural habitat. HD video footage of wildlife in the Philippines. A generation of Filipino bird photographers were trained and inspired by this forum. And somewhere in all of that is a reminder that, with the correct lens and enough patience, the Philippines’ forests and wetlands contain something remarkable that is worth preserving, worth visiting, and worth the lengthy wait in the chilly mountain air at 2,155 meters above sea level. Romy Ocon appeared to comprehend that more fully than most.
