Everything Under The Tropical Sun

Teach introduced me to Chase Jarvis. He’s one heck of a photographer. I follow him on twitter and just found his “iPhone pictures portfolio”… one would wonder why would he post photos he took with his iPhone? And why in the world would a photographer of his calibre use a 2MP phone cam?

Here’s the answer: Chase Jarvis’ iPhone photos (click for the link)

(sigh with me, Teach)

Chase Jarvis is the photographer’s version of the singer who can sing a phone book and make it sound sooo good. Some people just have so much talent. How I wish it was transferable. I’d go to his house and lick his spoon if that was the case (yuck, right? desperate much?).

Anyway, just wanted to share how amazing that album was. Goodnight.

I’m doing a quick, quick post. So forgive me. One of our beloved colleagues is getting married today. It’s such a happy day and we’re going to shoot her wedding. Everyone’s in on it: Bible Guy will be covering Strawberry Cow, Mamykills and I will be covering Herbie and Trickster will be assisting us. So I’m expecting a FUN, FUN, FUN day!!!

For now, I bid adieu and ask for forgiveness for this half hearted post. Hehehehe…

Three gorgeous boys walked into my life two Saturdays ago… *sigh*… Gorgeous! Gorgeous! Gorgeous! Their mom is a good friend of ours and requested for a shoot. So we scheduled it… did it for free… (because I needed the practice) PLUS triplets are ultra rare. It was such a treat to photograph Kai, Ryo and Gin.

It was my first time to use the company studio and to be honest… I SUCKED. Hahahahaha! I was totally clueless as how to position the lights and worse… I should’ve experimented with the white balance but didn’t. I got what I aimed to achieve: LEARN. It was still such a fun experience for me and made me realize that this month has been a great month for photography so far… I’ve picked up my cam so often and learned so much.

Maybe I will take up that 365 challenge. That challenge is taking a self portrait once a day. I don’t know. I still haven’t figured how I’m going to do that and I’m still waiting for the tripod I ordered. Kinda hard to do a self portrait without one. If I asked my husband to press the shutter then technically he took the photo right? So we’ll see.

Anyway, back to the triplets… they’re so cute! And my photographs didn’t turn out half as bad as I thought. Though that camera shake was a pain. Gotta keep making mistakes… gotta keep making new mistakes… gotta keep learning. A triple treat. Thank you little ones… you’ve made my month! I’ll be posting some photos of them in the future but for now, here’s one just to show you how completely adorable they are…

Happy Birthday, Teach! I know you’re on a plane from Thailand right now so let me be the first to greet you ONLINE. And as a tribute, I’m going to go on a “Teacher bashing time…”

A few weeks ago, Teach and I were chatting and he had me check out some photography equipment sold at a local photography store (The Photoshop) near our office. Since he was in Dubai, I was thinking that these things he asked me to check out were most likely cheaper here.

The great friend as I was, I called the shop right away to check on the availability of: 1) UH-200 Bracket; 2) 36″ Shoot-through umbrella; 3) 6.2′ Stand. Only the UH-200 wasn’t available. Instead, there was a UH-400. Told him about what I found out and he said that the UH-400 will do and he said to go ahead and have the items reserved. So I did.

He was trying to work out the payment so I gave The Photoshop another call if they would accept international credit cards wirelessly. They said that they had to physically see the credit card and that it couldn’t be done over the phone. So I offered to pay for the items first. I mean, he really sounded like he was interested in them and they weren’t really expensive so I really intended to get them for him.

He was really bummed to find out that I would have to pay for it from here and will end up owing me money. So I told him that I had a paypal account and that maybe he would like to send his payment to me there. He agreed. Gave him my email address and then he went ahead and wired the money.

After working the transaction out… I was feeling quite proud about being able to help a friend out… he went and said: “Advanced Happy Birthday, TEACH! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!” Stupid guy made me buy all those things for myself! ARGH! I really hated that he tricked me! I don’t mind getting gifts but it’s not the place or the time to give me any (it’s our secret why).

I got the equipment about 2 days later and true enough, his instinct to give me those things triggered me into playing around with lighting. Though I still prefer natural lighting, my fears in delving into the unknown has subsided. I’m still trying to figure out how to use it and I can’t pretend to know that I’ve learned enough to feel confident but at least I’m trying. Photos of my test subject (a.k.a. my husband) will be posted after this entry and the con turned out to be another lesson from my teacher and best friend.

P.S. Isn’t it funny that Teach was born on Friday the 13th and it’s another Friday the 13th… and he just turned 33 years old? Well… it’s just an odd coincidence if you ask me.

I am a POSER. I’ll say that now so that everything’s clear and you won’t hold me liable for any misguided information you may or may not pick up from this blog post. I’m simply telling a story about one part of my life: photography. Don’t worry, I won’t take offense if you do call me a POSER… I believe the great ones had to start out as one before they became… well, great.

So here I am, finally comfortable with the tweaking of my camera (which by the way… I LOOOVE so much! I can’t say that enough) and I know there’s still so much to play around with but I’ve finally made up my mind to buy some inexpensive stuff to experiment with. Not to mention, Teach CONNED me into buying some other equipment. I’ll tell you all about that later.

So the next images I’ll be posting would either be lit by using a softbox or the equipment I was conned into getting. If the photo is of still images, most likely that was taken with a softbox. If it’s of my husband (my model via emotional blackmail), then it was taken with the tainted equipment from Teach.

You’ll see below two images of my lighting experiment. One is with the regular white cloth and the other with a white acrylic bottom… but both were placed over our bed (for my own comfort). I bought a regular desktop lamp for the overhead lighting and used my husband’s flash as a slave.

I hope you learn something, but again, I’m a POSER… so don’t hold me liable for any misinformation in this entry.

The AF-S DX Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 will be released this month. I don’t know how long it’s going to take before it’ll land on the Philippine Islands but I’m sure it will be before the year’s out.

I’m not particularly interested in this focal length but the reason why I’m so excited is that I’m 100% sure that my husband will love it. He’s so old school and believes that he’ll trip out on this glass. When I told him about this he said that I can have all the lenses he’s using now and this baby will never leave his camera.

Something about him getting excited over anything is such a wonderful thing to see. Shows that he has emotions other than being composed and calm. I’m sure he’d like to think of himself as “Mr. Cool” but I’d like to think more like he’s “ICE”. Okay, I’ll stop it there because he’ll accuse me of bashing him again.

So I’m excited because he’s excited over this little 35mm. According to Ken Rockwell, this nifty little thing will cost about $200 which means it’ll cost somewhere about $400 here. He’s got a review up already and he hasn’t even had the chance to get one yet. I mean, I’m not saying the guy’s not a great photographer, I just feel like he’s been paid to advertise Nikon and Nikkor products. I’m not one to complain but I like reading reviews from impartial and unbiased bloggers.

So anyway, again, it’s here. I think I’ll ask Teach to get me one instead of waiting for it to land on our shores. Dubai gets new releases at the same time as the U.S. and Europe. Nikkor said that they’ll be releasing it this month. But if it’s going to cost $400… I think I can wait.

To view the specs of these lens… click here or the picture above, or the 35mm sample picture below. Whatever floats your boat.