Engagement Shoot – Elliot & Charlotte

In keeping with my New Year’s resolution, here is another blog post on Elliot and Charlotte’s engagement shoot.

I knew both of them through church and Elliot is a fantastic drummer and Charlotte’s a fantastic dancer. The two of them looked so sweet and they got married recently! Congratulations to both Elliot and Charlotte. I have a lot to thank Elliot by especially since he was one of the emcees for my own personal wedding, I knew I had to photograph the two of them.

Here are some of my favourite shots below icon smile Engagement Shoot   Elliot & Charlotte

ElliotCharlotte 002 Engagement Shoot   Elliot & Charlotte

The first guy I photographed who had hair longer than his wife’s. icon razz Engagement Shoot   Elliot & Charlotte

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All the best to both Elliot and Charlotte in their new journey in life!

Nicholas and Sharon’s Pre-Wedding

I have known Nick for quite some time now ever since the Lowyat photography days and when he asked me to shoot his pre-wedding, I couldn’t say “no” to him. Here are some of the photos from the session. Boy, did I really have so much fun shooting the couple. Both Nick and Sharon were very sporting and they were a really funny couple to photograph. A huge thanks to Mun Tzin as well for helping me out.

NickSharon blog 0011 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

I really love capturing the bouquet especially when they are so nicely decorated such as the one above.

NickSharon blog 002 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

The head piece was from Pretty in White! I really love birdcage veils.

NickSharon blog 003 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

We started the shoot from inside the room which was themed after a middle eastern design.

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NickSharon blog 005 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

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NickSharon blog 009 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

After shooting for a while, we decided to try and capture the sunset. I really love sunset shots and I really love the warm colour tone!

NickSharon blog 010 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

NickSharon blog 011 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

NickSharon blog 012 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

NickSharon blog 013 Nicholas and Sharons Pre Wedding

All the best Nick and Sharon. Can’t wait to shoot your wedding next month! Gosh, time really flies!

Cameron Highlands Portraiture Shoot

Cameron Highlands has been a very nice and eventful place for me. Mainly because I can only remember going there twice when I was very young and the only eventful thing that occurred to me was that I bought cheap flowers there and the weather was quite cooling and there was a roti canai that was completely covered with flies!

You can find out more about Cameron Highlands in my other posts here and here.

Whilst I was there recently with my friends, I decided to bring some of my gears up to Camerons with me to take some portaiture shots at the tea plantations. Here are some of my favourite ones.

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These shots were taken at the Boh Tea Plantation where it was quite difficult to drive in. Trust me, it is only a one way dirt road so I think this was where my car rims got bent when I was travelling through it. The view there was fantastic and I just loved the tea plantations.

On the way back from Camerons, we also passed by another tea plantation called Cameronian Valley and decided to snap more shots there as well.

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Cameron Highlands Day 2  blog139 Cameron Highlands Portraiture Shoot

And finally a group photo of us before heading down back to KL.

Cameron Highlands Day 2  blog144 Cameron Highlands Portraiture Shoot

Sorry guys, I will pass you all the full set of photos soon ok? Organize a makan event and I can pass it to you all then.

Help your friend win a free portrait shoot!

Free portrait Help your friend win a free portrait shoot!

Now the title of this post says it all, instead of finding ways to always treat ourselves and making ourselves feel good by buying that really nice new gadget (hides in shame as I have been lusting for the iPad), lets do something different for a change, lets make that difference in someone’s life.

So, do you know of someone who would love to have their photo taken? It could be an engaged friend who wants amazing wedding portraits but cannot afford it. Or it could be the family living next door that has been contributing so much to society but just never had their family photograph taken. Or it could be a friend living with a terminal illness.

It’s up to you.

Tell me their story.

Contest Details:

1. Nominate a friend and write an email to (grace.tan [at] stories.my) explaining why this person / family / couple deserves a free shoot. It is up to you to be as creative as possible with your entries! Please attach a photo of your friend. If you don’t have a photo, you can create any kind of graphic with images or text and send it to me. The photo can be a web resolution photo. Please include the contact information of your friend (eg. phone number or email).

2. Every week, selected images and stories will be uploaded onto the Facebook Stories page. Invite your friends to ‘like’ your story.

3. The contest will end by 31 May 2010.

4. Judges from Stories.my will select the top 2 stories with consideration of the public votes. However, the number of ‘likes’ may not necessarily influence the final decision of the judges, who will decide based on story idea. Your nominated friend will win a 1 hour photography session with Stories.my. He/she will get all the photos on CD (printable up to 4R size) and one 15″ x 10″ matte photo print. Shoots are to happen within the month of June or July 2010 within the Klang valley.

Looking forward to hearing your stories!

For more information about the contest, head over to the following links below icon smile Help your friend win a free portrait shoot!

Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

I have to personally thank Nick for asking me to tag along with him during his portrait shoot with Bobby and Rennie. Nick was one of the participants of the recently held got Mojo? Camp organized by the crazy folks over at RedNinja (me included!) and I thought I could help him out and also offer to carry the reflector for him. He was also in the group that I was leading during the individual and group challenges.

The shoot was held at Pavillion, right at the heart of KL itself but it was early in the morning. Traffic heading there was pretty smooth and I was pleasantly surprised that the guards didn’t chase us away.

Here are some of the photos I took including some of the behind the scenes shots.

PortraitShootNick 003 Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

PortraitShootNick 004 Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

I managed to catch this moment when they were playing whilst Nick was packing up his stuff.

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After staying under the hot sun and making everyone walk about from end to end, we all decided to head to Starbucks for a quick drink.

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PortraitShootNick 021 Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

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Bobby seems a little intrigued with Nick’s flash. Nick told him that he was a flasher!

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Here are some of the behind the scenes photos.

PortraitShootNick 001 Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

I find Bobby’s expression priceless when Nick was trying to explain the pose.

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Nick was really trying hard to blend in together with the taxi stand.

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I was literally behind the scene for this shot. Funnily, the couple in front wasn’t Bobby and Rennie, they were just coming out of the toilet! Imagine their surprise when they saw Nick and Hsien Ming right in front of them like that. LOL.

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PortraitShootNick 015 Bobby and Rennie: A quick shoot

Actually, this was the start of my labour day last Saturday. It’s Thursday everyone, have a great weekend ahead!

JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

Warning, more images to come icon smile JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

As a continuation from my previous blog post, after a heavy buffet lunch at Shangri-La (believe me, the food there was so good that it was so difficult not to want to try everything!), we all proceeded with our own individual assignments. Individual means that we split up into various groups and each group consisted of 4 team members. Each team would have a model assigned to them and we had to split our time to photograph the model.

Both Shen and Hafiz were in my group and I was the 3rd person to have a go. Part of our assignment was that we were able to borrow any of the equipment available there. From the image below, you would know that we took an Ezybox softbox with an SB-900 and an external battery pack together with another SB-900. We also made used of our own equipment as well. Since we only had an hour, we had to decide on our location as soon as we could. We had the beautiful Melissa first.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 16 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Here was Shen attempting his shot with us helping out by carrying the C-Stand

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 17 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2This was my attempt within 10 minutes. Wished I had more time to get the lighting set up a little bit more elaborately icon wink JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

After the hour was up, we moved back into the workshop room where we were assigned another model to work with and we again had the usual 15 minutes. Our next model was Shirlyn who was a professional dancer (you can guess that Joe really likes dancers especially if you have read through both “The Moment it Clicks” and “The Hot Shoe Diaries”).

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 18 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2
My first attempt to begin with one light first before adding in additional lights. The first idea that came into my mind was to try out a multiple exposure shot but with movement but after consulting Joe, that setup would have taken me more than 15 minutes of my allotted time. I then decided that I would stick with the simple double exposure and the results are shown below.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 19 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Double exposure, courtesy of a Nikon technology icon wink JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 20 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Since I managed to set things up pretty quickly, we then experimented with a few other shots with a simple two lighting system. Again still sticking to small flashes.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 21 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2After the assignments were over, we gathered downstairs for Joe to show us a little bit more of his concept and his ideas and how he actually came up with the shot.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 22 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Joe took out the big gun for this, the 200mm f/2 lens which is a huge lens and cost a bomb!

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 23 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

After the workshop ended and Joe had to rush over to Business.FM for a radio interview, we quickly had our books signed as well as took photos with Joe.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 24 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Not forgetting Drew as well icon smile JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 25 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2Ok, I definitely need to lose lots of weight. Totally put on too much recently.

After the workshop, I had to stay back a while for a secret performance practice which was due to be showcased the day after at Joe’s Seminar. This portion was for Louis’ talk on guerrilla lighting. Whilst waiting for Joe to get back from his interview, Ian was toying around playing with his Alien Bees and while he was still setting up his lights, I took this shot of Melissa using available light.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 26 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2After a brief and expensive juice at the cafe, practice started and I somehow managed to spy this guy in the ballroom taking shots of the practice using an unmarked camera. Some say that it could be a Sony Alpha but others might say that its actually a new Canon. I don’t think it was a Nikon because of shape of it but before I start to speculate, we can’t really really tell what camera is that.

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 27 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2An unknown person with a Sony Alpha 5D Mk2

JoeMcNallyWorkshop blog 28 JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2And of course Johan was assisting out the whole day that after almost 16 hours of carrying light stands and small flashes, it seems that he has really gone bonkers icon wink JoeMcnally’s Hot Shoe Diaries Workshop – Part 2

This was how I spent my birthday this year with those crazy photographers as well as the honour and pleasure of meeting Joe and Drew as well as learning from him. I must practice what I learned so do drop me an email if you are interested in having your personal portraiture done.

Behind the scenes at Heritage Hotel

Here are some of the behind the scenes shots which Mun Tzin took when I photographed Poh Seong and Chiu Yen’s portraiture session at Heritage hotel last year. Last year sounds like a long time but then again, its only January icon smile Behind the scenes at Heritage Hotel

D305098 Behind the scenes at Heritage Hotel

D305137 Behind the scenes at Heritage Hotel

She was playing with my other camera whilst I was shooting the couple. She was also quite intrigued with the bath tubs that were located on the roof of Heritage hotel that she was bugging me to take a picture of her in the tub. Of course I obliged but I took a very quick shot of her.

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Mun Tzin in a tub

Thanks again @munz for helping me out that day icon smile Behind the scenes at Heritage Hotel

Poh Seong & Chiu Yen’s Portrait Session

When Chiu Yen contacted me via email about a portrait shoot, I’ve always been communication with her. The moment when I arrived at the shoot location, I was so surprised that Poh Seong was there as well. What a small world! Poh Seong is my neighbour and I used to go to the same high school as his younger brother.

After a couple of weeks of planning the shoot and finally the location, we met in KL at the Heritage Hotel for our portrait session.

I was really looking forward to this shoot and here are some of the images that I took during the shoot.

PohSeongChiuYen Blog 001 Poh Seong & Chiu Yens Portrait Session

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It was one of the fun shoots that I had and it was great to have been able to shoot both Chiu Yen and Poh Seong. I also have to thank @munz for helping me out throughout the day. She took some behind the scenes shots as well but I haven’t gotten around to posting them up yet.

Weng Jou & Yvonne’s Portrait Session

Sometimes the weather in Malaysia has always been rather predictable especially now during the monsoon season but there are times where I would be praying very hard for nice weather and bright sunlight. Unfortunately, the sun wasn’t up that day but although the sky was rather gloomy in some ways, we still managed to have some fun and enjoy ourselves in the park.

Yvonne contacted me via email after hearing about my promotion which I posted on my blog and after a couple of email exchanges, we agreed on the date and time where we will meet for me to photograph both her and Weng Jou.

Here are some of the photos I liked from Yvonne & Weng Jou’s portraiture shoot.

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I took this shot below as we were walking to our next location icon smile Weng Jou & Yvonnes Portrait Session

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Having a little bit of fun during the shoot.

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Thanks a lot to Yvonne and Weng Jou for being such a wonderful couple and being such great models during the shoot.

By the way, there is going to be a big announcement on the 1st of January. Stay tuned for it.

1stjan Weng Jou & Yvonnes Portrait Session

Aaron & Susan’s Portraiture Session

Aaron works in the same company as I do and he previously helped me organize the photography workshop I thought at my firm a couple of months back. This time when he emailed me again, it was for something totally different. He was going to be in front of the camera together with Susan instead of behind it.

Frankly, I believe that Cyberjaya is a little hidden gem when it comes to photo taking. I believe there is plenty of potential here in terms of the photos you can get. I just need to experiment more and recce the place out a little bit more and I am sure I can find more unique locations.

So when Aaron asked me to shoot his portraiture session, I jumped at the chance to suggest Cyberjaya.

Here are some of my favourite shots from that day.

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The weather wasn’t really what I had hoped for, instead of the sunny and dramatic skies I know Cyberjaya has, it turned out to be dark and gloomy. To make it worse, it started to drizzle as well during the shoot.

Despite the weather, we powered through with more shots!

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AaronSusan Blog 011 Aaron & Susans Portraiture Session

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The sun did eventually set earlier than expected or it probably hid behind some clouds, so we headed towards Putrajaya for a couple of shots there as well.

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As a confession, we took these photos right after work so I had all of my lighting equipment and no one to help me hold them. Hence I had to employ the street lamp to assist me with my lighting.

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I can’t wait for my next assignment to be in Cyberjaya or Putrajaya, I definitely want to try other locations other than just using the usual bridge shots there.

pixel Aaron & Susans Portraiture Session