Before I begin, I would like to thank Photocritic whose tweet on my ‘PARADE’ photo gave me such a huge boost in both my confidence and view rate on my Flickr account. He is so well-known, he is that influential really! Love him! x)

(Parammmmmzzzzzz :P)

Have I mentioned anything about the Escapade 2009 held at Singapore Polytechnic last Saturday? It was a huge success seriously, though I had to work hard after being assigned by the Media Team to contribute photos from the different segments for their official website Escapade 2009.

It was a challenge really especially since I had nothing much with me except my kit lens and my trusty nifty-fifty. But like always, the latter had always been a saviour during low-light situations. Coupled with the external flash, it worked like magic seriously. Of course, there were moments when I did not include the flash and the photos were much, much better.

Like this shot of Param, definitely.

;)

I just had to help out with Jing Song and Param for the second shift because I could not bear to miss out on the night segments, especially their midnight gig. Great bands with great music, of course it was fun! My heart was busily pounding through my chest though as I leaned so close to the stage, I was sure there were sub-woofers placed just beneath the platform.

Oh yea, they had great models too!

Working from four all the way to eight the next morning was surely tiring but worth it nonetheless. You can see more great shots and even videos on their website so do visit their page!

(Susie Caldwell. She totally has one hand on the SP Most Photogenic trophy already. If you have not heard of the fantasy girl, this is her!)

And I cannot wait to shoot for the SP Most Photogenic roadshow and finals show. Totally have to grab a ticket soon!

<3

I swear this had been the longest time my blog was left abandoned ever since I posted photos of Yin San and my Lubitel which is still in good health but currently on a long hiatus together with my other film cameras, including Denise’s F75. But why so? Ever since school started, work after school hours has consigned me to stay awake during unearthly hours just so that I could finish up on my school work or my daily photo project and that left me pretty dead & unmotivated to update this site here.

You see, I always thought it to be great if I could post a not-that-short entry full of my photos perhaps every two or three days, but even if I had the spare time, I would always end up procrastinating thinking that I should wait a while more so that I could include more content to them. Of course, I never had enough content to include and the lack of spare time totally made it close to impossible.

It has been some time since I last dropped by my friend’s sites too! Gosh, I am so sorry.

:(

(Ready, Get Set…)

A few days ago there was this Waves 14 concert in SP organised by the SDZ team and we were lucky because Ika invited us over but we had to pay for the tickets of course! Benjamin got totally excited by the way because we were sitting at the front row so he could greedily feast his eyes on the unsuspecting female performers. For me though, it was a different story.

Flash photography was not allowed so I had to depend on my fast lens, the 50mm F1.8, as my 18-55mm was close to being useless in this low-light environment, and the quick movements would totally condemn me with a memory card-full of blurred shots. So thank goodness I had this nifty fifty. Without it, I would never have gotten a single decent shot of the dancers on stage!

Sitting right at the front row definitely helped.

(You can lift women instead of weights for your workouts, but just do not give them that constipated, ‘you-are-heavy-OMG’ look!)

And I never knew my Optometry mate, Juanne, was in dance. And Juanne is a pretty nice name too. Juanne eyh? I am pretty certain though there are not as many Juannes out there as compared to all the more common Joannes, so she should be flattered. Like totally. Oh, and I love my name yes yes!!

:)

(My lens is a beau, and so are the both of you. Yeah yeah, whatever! :D)

You know it feels so good to finally write something this time. This entry itself should last long enough for another two or three more days. Then I will create another one, hopefully with more photos of higher quality. Because I love photos and photos will make my time here more worthy. Uh huh.

It will be such a busy week for me. Friday there will be another appointment with the SP Optometry Centre, and on Saturday morning I will have to head down to Republic Poly for the Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon Volunteers’ Briefing before heading back to SP for SP Escapade, an event organised for graduating secondary school students. The event will last until the next morning so I hope I am able to last long enough for work later the same day.

Crap.

And I still need to study! MST is approaching faster than a speeding Usain Bolt!

Oh man, let me finish off Wan Fen’s tutorial for now. I hope I do not fall asleep later.

:(

Today was actually the first time I managed to bring my camera along for lunch and it was well worth it. Of course, the decision was met with lots of raised eyebrows from my colleagues, but I reassured them that I was in no way affiliated to any terrorist organisation, nor had I any intention of doing recce for them — this was instead made in the name of love for photography, even more than how these extremists claim love for their religion.

Like this chrysanthemum, there were lots of fantastic opportunites that laid scattered all over the airport and just dying for the shot of love from your camera. This flower was found hidden behind a gallery, so it was not really that obvious to the passing eyes unless they were photographic.

What I liked about this photo, was the fact that a simple spotlight aimed from the bottom of the chrysanthemum could create such a fiery, magnificent faux-burning effect that I would never have thought I could achieve just by mere observing. That moment was magic hard to notice initially, but only made obvious once you compose through the viewfinder and hit the shutter release.

Seriously, it felt good to have captured a simple object that was actually a wonder by itself.

Oh, it was called love!

:)

(Always the fourth one missing. Guess who!)

And guess who turned a year older?

THE GIRL WHO TOTALLY HATES CATS!

I requested an AM shift for this day, only because she is part of the FEOPLE. So this meant that, it was just as important as my own birthday. But sadly, Yin San could not make it — cannot wrong her though, not everyone was free even if others wanted her to be there.

It was nice to have celebrated Joon’s birthday at Marina Barrage since not many went there before and it was night time, so the scenery there was indeed spectacular. But not without problems though..

(Joon, your Korean boyfriend. Take it! Haa.)

Evon and I really had problems lighting up the candles, initially because we had no lighter and the crazy winds made it near impossible later on. And the drizzle, Evon had to shelter the both of us, and the cake and also had to shield the wind. Hahaha. We persevered though, and that perseverance and never-say-die attitude overheated the borrowed lighter and rendered that poor thing unusable after that.

Of course, I had some answering to do later on to the owner! :(

(Said Joon: “Which of these three are the biggest? The bundle, the bag or my head?” LOL. YOUR HEAD!)

I saw a huge kite which Justin bought but they never played with! And Qi Rui was there, and Jacky and the fashion boy Zeng Siong too! Wan Ting, Evon and the birthday girl were looking so gorgeous that night, I thought they were their best yesterday! Ah, but I was from work and I had to be there in my work attire though fortunately I bore no Watsons logo on the shirt. Haa.

We got for Joon a Korean book, and the enthusiasm caught her as she profusely tried to thank us in Korean and some other new phrases found in the book. The way that gift was wrapped was classic though, thanks to Jacky. If you have no idea which one, it was actually the bundle of newspapers. LOL!

We went back soon after to catch the last shuttle but I really had to return that damaged lighter to its owner. Thankfully, she was not that abusive (Haaaa..) and declined my money for that lighter. Ahh, nice people!

And the best FEOPLE!

SAENGIL CHUKHA HAMNIDA JOON!

You are so old now wakakakaka!

(But this was the best! Chocolate Cheki Instax Mini 7S (Japan only) for the GF, and 30 mini instax films included! :D)

While I was at work, my mother told me there were two parcels waiting for me at home from Taiwan and Japan. I was already expecting their arrivals actually, but I never thought the both of them would arrive at the same time! Good thing I informed my mother to keep a lookout for the postman — she would never have noticed the postman’s calls!

Oh, I just got back from my Watsons’ day job, but I will moving out pretty soon for my night one. I am dead beat now.

But I am glad I work hard and earn my own money to spend on the beloved and myself. Life can never be sweeter and more meaningful than this.

And I love my Sakina so much!

I just wish to share with all of you my joy, my joy, oh my joy! If you did not realise, I actually turned PRO on Flickr just yesterday after much contemplating on whether I should fork out a portion of my income just for this premium account. It did not cost me much heartache to part with the sum but it really meant alot to me — afterall, I am serious about photography. Flickr has already been a useful platform for me to share my photos to the public, and coupled with Twitter, I have actually gained an exponential growth in the number of followers to my photography. I am happy to say that I have thus been greatly satisfied with the progress I achieved so far.

(Got this book from the Lomography section in Kinokuniya. Great buy, really.)

All of a sudden, my love for analog is reignited! Film cameras have once again become the objects of my desire and my desperate wish to own another one is actually bugging me so much. I tried asking Denise for her Dad’s Nikon SLR but I have yet to get to play with it; I asked Justin if he owned one, and he mentioned his family had this Fujifilm SLR which were no longer in use. Looking at the current situation, I highly doubt I will get either one of them anytime soon — and that is sad.

The GF excited me though when she showed me photos of her late Papa’s Canon and Minolta film SLRs!

And my advice for her was to clean and maintain them, and to hold on to them until I finally get to lay my hands on those two beauties — not sure when that will be but at least we have one more thing to look forward to.

Oh, and a photographer’s GF should own a camera too right? But of course! I definitely cannot wait to purchase and send that sweet thing over to the GF. Chocolate, chocolate! :P

“They stood before the altar and supplied
The fire themselves in which their fat was fried.
In vain the sacrifice! — no god will claim
An offering burnt with an unholy flame.”
— M.P. Nopput

I just hit the 200th mark on Flickr yesterday and after today’s ‘Burnt‘ post, Flickr automatically cancelled out my very first photo I ever had there — all because I am not subscribed to their pro account. But the good thing is that they did not delete my photos rather just had them hidden to allow only two hundred viewable images available to the public.

I have mixed thoughts about going pro there though and I am still considering.

But having reached the posting limit, that did not mean I will stop my daily photo posts altogether. Thanks to Twitter, I was introduced to a new host for my photoblog and managed to set up ‘Mostly 3X2, Mostly F/2.8‘. There, I will be starting my first ever 365 photoset! Sounds interesting right? Well I am excited to see as to how this will turn out knowing the number of failed attempts before but for this one, I will surely dedicate my heart and soul.

Also, I had set up a Tumblr account for my photo inspirations that were gathered from all the other great photographers out there.

Do check them out. Hopefully by doing this, I will be able to learn more on the art that is photography.

If nothing had happened back then — if he was still beautifully gracing this Earth — it will be his birthday tomorrow.
Been a year already.
You are truly missed my friend, hope all is well there..

Love you Tapa..

Someone sent me a package!
There were two really, really lovely gifts inside that came all the way from that special someone in Australia;
these could not have arrived at a better timing than now. Love it!

I headed down to Canon Service Centre earlier to have my 50mm F.1.8 serviced as I spotted a foreign
particle trapped in between the two lenses — how it got there, I had no idea. It did not look like any type
of fungus, rather it had this cute, bubbly gelly-like look that reminded me of the Amoeba Boys of The
Powerpuff Girls. No kidding!

They cleaned it on the spot and returned me my prime lens at no extra charge at all. How convenient eh?
I asked them if they could spare me some advice on preventing this from reoccuring but they had none.
It was said that I just got unlucky. How slipshod!

Well, at least my lens is clean now.

Oh, I got a super low-end phone for myself to replace the retarded one. Like, really low-end. Heh.
Back to the army days, eh?

I love you Sakina, so much!

It was a day of mixed feelings for me on Sunday as it started pleasingly between me and my beloved
until a series of other events unrelated to her made me a little disheartened about certain things and
it involved a bit of self-actualisation too. But I will not touch on it here because the futility makes the
mention of it quite dumb just like the subject to this topic. I swear there are things that need to be
sorted out right now but even if I try hard, I doubt the same will happen with the other party.

Trust is a heavy word, really.

(The three-headed sexy beast with the fierce Jacky-head, happy Justin-head, and confused Rusydi-head.)

When I was younger, my dearest mother always demanded that I trust no other people except those from
my household. Did ‘demand’ seem too strong of a word here? No I do not think so, especially after considering
the validity of its usage and its importance. But why only my direct relatives, and not even my cousins?

(Someone seems to be missing from this photo right Zeng Siong?)

It took me quite some time to understand that no one can ever love a person more than his own family does.
Sometimes it can be utterly puzzling to accept this statement straight but if sufficient time for thought is given,
that person will eventually be able to fathom this simple yet somehow misunderstood fact.

I guess experience plays a part, and not to forget maturity too because I reckon no young punk out there
believes that not even a word of your best friend should be dissolved in you. Controversial? No. Eat this
opinion whole unless you have spent enough time with your family to refute this claim which I think
can never be achieved even until you have spent half a century of your life wondering if your own family
loves you.

(Look at Justin! He is asking to be punched, really.)

Your own family definitely loves you; they only seem not to (you claimed) because you have not given your
whole heart to try to perceive them by becoming less selfish and forcing yourself to get out of your narrowed
mentality.

How can anyone even have the audacity to judge that there is a lack of love reserved for him or herself in the
family?

How could you blame your parents for what you are now?

Do you know why these people are called childish? Simply because, they have not grown up enough. If they
are, they will definitely know whom to trust more.

Amongst friends, you should definitely trust the one who values you more than anything; the one who cares
for you, at least.

Three years back, I did not really quite make it to becoming a Medical Technician. Now that I have my
second chance, I better end up graduating as a qualified Optometrist.

With whatever I have right now, — my love, my friends, my family, my hobby — I do not see a reason why
I will never make it through.

Back then, it was a distraction having someone; she was definitely not like you, dearest. She could never be.

I better make it happen now; if I really want it, I need to work hard and earn it.

Thank you fate for the second chance, oh God..