Yesterday afternoon, during my Sunday Session at McMurphy’s — the ritual that marks my weekly shift from discipline into ease — I made a photograph that stopped me mid-sip. Nothing dramatic. Nothing staged. Just my half-drunk pint of Guinness on a worn pub bar, the foam tracing the story of the first few swallows, the glass catching soft ambient light.
I looked at the frame on my camera and had a thought that landed with surprising clarity:
“When I think about having a pint, this is what I am thinking about.”
And in that moment, I realized I wasn’t just looking at a photograph. I was looking at the beginning of a social media campaign — one that felt authentic, consistent with my black-and-white visual language, and perfectly aligned with how I see not just the city, but the world.
Because the truth is, great campaigns don’t start with strategies, calendars, or KPIs. They begin with a feeling.
The Power of a Simple Visual Truth
Most successful social campaigns, according to every guide from Hootsuite to Sprout Social to Adobe’s marketing playbooks, share one core element: a clear, relatable idea expressed in the simplest possible terms.
Not “How do I sell something?”
Not “How do I get likes?”
But “What is the truth behind this image?”
And the truth behind my Guinness photograph was unmistakable:
A pint isn’t just a drink.
It’s an atmosphere.
A moment.
A rhythm.
A pause in the city.
When I looked at the foam line on the glass, I didn’t see beer.
I saw relaxation settling into the shoulders.
I saw a conversation warming up.
I saw the exhale after a long week — the same exhale I see all over Toronto on a Sunday afternoon.
This is what social media strategy frameworks often call a human-centred insight. It’s the emotional spark that makes a piece of content shareable, memorable, and capable of carrying a campaign.
And for once, I felt like I had one — not borrowed from trends, not reverse-engineered from analytics, but born from experience.
The Poetry of the Half-Finished
A full pint is an invitation.
A half-drunk pint is a story.
Marketers often talk about “story hooks” — visual cues that suggest something has happened or is about to happen. The in medias res of everyday life. The moment mid-conversation where presence feels strongest.
My Guinness photo carried that energy.
It had texture.
It had rhythm.
It had Toronto in it, but didn’t show the city at all.
And in black-and-white — with the Monochrome L tonal language I’ve recently adopted — it became even more distilled. The image wasn’t about the pint’s colour anymore. It was about contrast. About shape. About mood. It read almost like a film still.
Which made it not just a photograph, but a visual motif.
Campaigns thrive on motifs.
All the social media reference guides agree on this: The best campaigns are repeatable, adaptable, and emotionally consistent.
This single pint image?
It can be replicated across moments, locations, seasons, and contexts.
It can grow into a series.
It can become a signature.
The Seed of a Campaign: “When I Think About…”
The phrase that hit me in McMurphy’s — “When I think about having a pint, this is what I am thinking about” — keeps circling back in my mind. It feels like the beginning of a copy structure. A caption formula. A through-line for a social storytelling project.
When I think about the city…
When I think about a Sunday…
When I think about slowing down…
Each phrase could anchor an image.
Each image could anchor a narrative.
Each narrative could reinforce my visual identity.
And isn’t that the point?
To build a social media presence that doesn’t chase trends, but expresses a consistent voice?
This is where campaign strategy and personal artistic evolution finally meet. The reference materials talk endlessly about content pillars, consistent branding, audience alignment, and value-driven storytelling. But those things only work when they emerge from an authentic perspective.
This Guinness photo is that perspective.
Making the Mundane Meaningful
My work has always circled the ordinary moments that make a city feel alive. A street corner. A reflection. A face. A gesture. A texture. A walk. A ritual.
A pint is part of that fabric.
To photograph it honestly — with the same intentionality I bring to architectural lines or street portraits — is to admit that my city photography isn’t really about buildings or sidewalks. It’s about the lived experience layered within them.
Social media thrives on authenticity, yes, but also on specificity.
People respond to the familiar made beautiful.
The ordinary made intentional.
The personal made shareable.
A half-drunk pint of Guinness is all three.
A New Series Begins
I’m not declaring a full campaign yet. That’s not how my process works. But I am acknowledging that something sparked yesterday — a thread worth pulling. A visual idea that could evolve into a series built on:
• Monochrome tonality
• City-rooted storytelling
• Moments of pause
• Rituals of presence
• The intersection of documentary instinct and personal reflection
If city photography is about documenting the life of a place, then documenting its rituals — including the quiet religion of the Sunday Session — is part of that mandate.
When I think about having a pint, I think about that photograph.
And maybe other people will, too.
Because sometimes the most effective social media strategy is the simplest one:
To start with a true moment.
Make a photograph.
Say the thing you actually mean.
Everything else — the campaign, the engagement, the audience connection — grows from there.