Thank you MC2!

Last year was a fantastic year to be able to be involved in the MC2 building project promoting and documenting the migration into MC2 through photography. It is all finished now. What a wonderful project and really want to thank two people in particular (amongst many who were involved).

First and foremost, Emma! She is great to work with because she is totally organised, switched on, reasonable and even gave me money for lunch when I forgot to bring my wallet on day. I would work for you any day. Thank you Emma and congratulations!!

Another person to thank is definitely Lachlan the videographer. Getting behind his trusty Cannon 7D is not all he does, he does event / stage / FOH management and is an experienced, senior staff at Manningham's YMCA as well. He is the one that saved my life and my cameras' lives when he gave me the raincoat at Carols by Candlelight when it was bucketing down with rain. Thank you Lach, what would I do without you?

I so much wish I have a sound blimp for shoots like this and for many other shoots I do like dance and concerts as well. But they are so very expensive.. :'( I just have to improvise for the time being.

Melbourne Spring Fashion Week (MSFW) 2010 - Summary

This year's Melbourne Spring Fashion Week (MSFW 2010) was packed with challenges, new experiences, and favors.

Challenges and New Experiences

Already named the challenge of lighting in the previous post here. Here is another one:

I had an interesting challenge to prepare the slide-show / backdrop behind one of the fashion shows. They were slides for designer labels, labels of accessories and shoes and slides of performers, etc. It was a big challenge because I didn't even know the program before that - Keynote and my mac experience can only qualify at best as beginner level.

Here is one of the simplest slides, with only the design label, no labels for shoes and accessories.


This is the macbook I used to prepare the presentation. Note the run sheet next to it on the left with yellow highlights.


I was so worried about not being able to find the logos (jpegs), mis-spelling the label where I couldn't find the pic. Getting the slides in the wrong order and whether I was putting the right content in the slides.. not all were design labels, it was the backdrop for the whole show.

Anyway, with many prayers, I made it just in time. Five pages of run sheet converted to no less that 60 slides. I checked them and checked them again and again. After, no less that 4 complete check from the beginning to the end, my first Keynote slide-pack was complete! So relieved! :)



During the MSFW 2010 week, I had my laptop with me which meant I could work through the pics as the week went on. Despite being worried about losing the laptop or damaging it, it helped me to get several sets of photos ready just as the client wants them.

Sweet! :)

Favors


Nikon was a key sponsor of MSFW 2010 this year. It was fantastic! I got to know some of the cool people from Nikon professional services. In particular, Julie M. who let me work on my pics during the day in their service centre / media room.

They also lent me a Nikon D3s for the week as well as a copy of the new 70-200mm f/2.8 VR2 lens. I also had the D3x for a while, tried out the 200-400mm as well as... yep... wait... drum roll... the 600mm f/4 VR which is a really big beast! So heavy (over 5kg), so long, I played with it for a little while backstage in the make-up area where I couldn't actually focus on anything (with the minimum focus length of 5m) but boy did I feel powerful with it.. Talk about men with their toys.. :)

I didn't keep the 600mm or even the 200-400mm, just the D3s and the new 70-200mm, yeah, just the D3s and the 700-200mm... ;) Had to reconfigure the camera from scratch which wasn't a trivial task because the camera is really customisable, but I was more than happy to pay that price!

BTW, love the shorter minimum focusing distance of the new 70-200mm and lack of light fall-off at the corners!



Another big favor is from a top notch make-up artist of Napoleon Perdis, Shev Kelly. She kindly gave me two front row reserved seats at one of the shows. Thank you so very much Shev, I owe you one!

The tickets went to a photographer friend of mine, Brett and his brand new girl-friend and did well to impress. ;)

Melbourne Weekly Eastern A Celebration of the Nation

I am going to be a copy-cat this time. Just noticed one of my pics in the local Magazine - Melbourne Weekly Eastern (Feb 3-9 aka week 5 2009 Volume 3). Below is the pic and the article. :)

"There were flags and barbecues, music and citizenship ceremonies across the nation last Monday in celebration of Australia Day. In Manningham, 63 people became Australian citizens and many more enjoyed the festivities on offer at the council offices in Doncaster. Mayor Charles Pick (second from the left) and councillor Fred Chuah (right) were on hand to announce Manningham's Citizen of the Year and Young Citizen of the Year. Heather Ambrose (left) was named Citizen of the Year for her work with Manningham U3A, and Eve Ember (second from right) was handed the Young Citizen of the Year for her outstanding achievements in tae kwon do, at school and as a teacher of martial art."

Manningham Council, thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to serve you. Looking forward to serving you again.

Congratulations Heather and Eve for your excellent achievement!

Visit here for more information about Manningham U3A or if you want to help or sign-up to a course. Heather is the Volunteer Coordinator and she teaches Psychology there.

Happy New Year

I had intended that this blog only contains photos that I took. Here are two that I did not take and are photoshopped... Well, I couldn't take them because they are pictures of me I found, in The Age newspaper web site, of the Melbourne Spring Fashion Week. I hope this has not set a precedence for the future. :)


2008 was an amazing year. I had so many photo opportunities. I still can not believe it. God was indeed very kind to me. I worship you, my Lord. He has blessed me through many people. People who gave me opportunities to photograph events - thank you Emma, thank you Paul and Caz and friends at AEMA. Thank you Clint.

At NAB, I was able to mix business with pleasure, literally. Thank you very much Jill, Amanda, Jessica, Suzanne, Belinda, Nathalie, Craig and so many others. Many encouraged me and inspired me like Brett, Christine, Magdalena, Patrik, Wayne, Gary, Matt and David, I've learnt heaps from you.

Thank you very much John, your eagerness and dedication humbles me. Thank you Catherine, Marilyn and Boby for giving me opportunities to serve you. Hopefully, I can serve you again very soon.

All, thank you so much for your friendship, I wish you every success, happiness and good health in 2009. Looking forward to rubbing shoulders with you again in 2009.

To all who were in front of my camera, I thank you too. The pics were good because of you. There have been some amazing people I've come across - Wendy, Simon and Kerrie just to mention a few. You guys inspire me.

Lou, I am going to miss you in 2009, love to do a shoot together, of Taekwondo or whatever. I am going to miss Olivia. ;_;

A big thank you to my dear wife for your love, support and encouragement throughout my photography journey in 2008. Thank you for the many opportunities to photograph food (and get to eat them too). They look great and taste even better. Now that we are both armed with dSLR camera, I hope my role has not become redundant. Guys, you should check out her work here.. makes mine look like child's play...

Last but not least, thank you all for reading my blog. I hope you have enjoyed it. All the best for the year 2009. God bless.

Melbourne Spring Fashion Week (MSFW) 2008 - Catwalk

Do I even need to say anything??

....and the photographers (and videographers)! Gary Richardson, sat at my spot in this pic.

My work in print

I don't have a printer. My monitor is a 14" CRT freebie from a good friend who heard about my Viewsonic 17" that blew up (it wasn't the fault of the monitor, it served me well for about 8 years). My 14" monitor is a reliable IBM P50 though...

Anyway, what I am trying to say is this: I haven't really printed my own work.... BUT they are actually in print! They have been published in a bank newspaper, for the second time! They are pictures I took at work functions. AND, it is not a tiny picture in a corner but it covered the front page and a significant portion throughout the rest of the paper. I can't help but to be very excited about this. It even has a little corner with my picture and a little brief about me... How embarrassing! :P