DL & SL

DL needs instruction but learns how to pose quickly. I took pictures of these two cousins today to see what I could come up with. DL was pretty sporting and more adventurous. SL tends to be a little more reserved but knows that she can do more poses on the fly. I guess it kinda reflects the different personalities the two sisters have.

I'll be entering the auto sound challenge in august. Hopefully, everything on the car will work properly. I've just spent half the day in a food shoot for NUSS and the other half @ Hong Guan discussing the sponsorships and my role in the competition. Looks like I'll be going for SPL comps (man I need bigger subs..) A pair of 15's would suffice nicely along with a 2000watt power amp each.

In any case, looks like there'll be more work to do on the set of wheels...

Magazine shoot...

Indonesian food, when prepared right, is absolutely delicious. Beef rendang that "melts in your mouth" and sambal sotong that's seasoned and cooked just right. The advantages of working with food & beverage magazines is that I sometimes get to taste the food as well.

Every restaurant owner is proud of his/her own unique dish. They're also very very protective of their recipes. Well, of course right? Afterall, it's their "ricebowl". While I was photographing for "Halal Food & Beverage" magazine, I also got to taste some Indonesian food during lunch yesterday. It's a pity that I had already eaten just an hour before cause the food spread looked fantastic.

Photo is taken by me and used with the kind permission of Halal Food & Beverage quarterly magazine.

Luck rubs off...

People with 'good luck' particularly in business often have the ability of making their luck rub off onto your own. Don't ask me why. The minute I said that I'd work with EL, I've been getting in more photography jobs as well. It sure looks like it's beginning to come together.

Although I'd much prefer being able to shoot for the sake of art, due to economic reasons, I have little choice but to go commercial as well. To those who are stubbornly fixated on the fact that I'm selling out my principles, it's not happening. I'm just doing what I need to do to survive. Somehow, I will find the time for fine arts as well. But just not now.

It's easier to convince people about fine arts with hand-drawn artwork rather than with photography but it's still a form of art nonetheless. I was thinking to myself, how many photographers in Singapore are actually trained in fine arts? Of course having that piece of academic paper doesn't account for ability but there's still training involved nonetheless.

Among most of my friends and course mates, I believe that I'm the only one that's practicing photography. But then again, there aren't that many people who Majored in Media Studies and Minored in Photomedia anyways. Most of them were Australians. The people that I knew minored in other fields such as Advertising, Marketing and/or PR.

The only problem I'm facing now, is finding models for next to nothing. That's the difficult part. Well, if any of you guys and gals are out there reading this, drop me a note if you don't mind volunteering. Naturally, I'd provide you with a soft copy of the photographs as well. :)

Opinions...

Everyone has their own opinions. Be it a major social issue or something personal, it's still an opinion. Humans are diversified creatures. I can only imagine the time when we will move out of our own home planet Earth on to other worlds, opinions will only differ more.

Even in a culture, there are sub-cultures.

Will it ever end? I guess it only will when it trickles down to the individual. That's why individuality is so important. Imagine humans as a beehive society. We would all feel robotized. Even as it is, living in one country, we're already getting bored, needing to find interesting places to see, things to do etc. I suppose that's why the least sought after jobs are those that are repetitive and provide little avenues of change.

We are constantly building new things, taking photos, trying to look at things from a different angle (literally) just to get a fresh perspective. Why? Because we're bored too easily. Perhaps when the entire human race realizes that, will the time come where one human being will learn to appreciate and accept the opinion of another. Perhaps only then will wars stop and violence in society will come to an end.

That would be utopia where everyone's opinions are accepted. I decided to write on this because of the recent hub-bub on a Singaporean girl who decided to post her nude photos in her blogsite. For those of you who are in Singapore, well, she's already made the news so there's no need to elaborate on that. As it is, she' getting people into heated debates over the issue in many of our local forums and online chats.

It reminds me of the time when Annabel Cheong, the famous locally born and bred pornstar who made it big in USA. The sensation caused was amazing. People were talking about her for weeks after an article about her was published in the local newspapers. But what has happened now? Yes people still know who she is but she's no longer the talk of the town.

I guess I've made my point in that humans will be interested in something for only a short while. After that, it becomes boring. Variety is the spice of life isn't it?

One of the better days...

It's been a productive day. Although I spent most of it in the office over at Mandai, I'd consider this one of my better days. It was only marred slightly by a small disagreement with SY early in the morning but was soon settled (within 10 minutes).

In any case, KL came in today to return some equipment and I felt that we had a good chat regarding the direction our company is taking. I'd say this is one meeting that's been waiting to happen for a while now. At least some things are cleared between us and I think that it's important for us as partners to show support for one another. This way, at least the company has a direction to follow.

Naturally, there will be disagreements but at least upon hearing each other's reasons, they can be ironed out. Nobody said that going into business was easy. Anyway, later in the evening I had no choice but to replace the battery on the 6. It was really going flat and well, it beats being stuck somewhere because the car won't crank up. Worse would be if I have an engagement and the car dies on me. That's actually my ultimate nightmare.

Met NH in the evening and we saw this girl driving a really cool Mini. Apparently, she just purchased it off someone and took delivery today so she was showing it off to her friends which I guess were from SMC (Singapore Mitsubishi Club). Oh...before we met the guys, she parked the car and left without engaging the parking brakes. NH and I were standing next to my car when we suddenly realized that her car was slowly sliding further back into the lot. Good thing the ground was sloping towards the curb and not the other way round. I wouldn't want to be there to watch her reaction should the opposite happen.

Anyway, they were pretty nice people. Who said that Singaporeans weren't a friendly lot? When Singaporeans with a common passion came together, fast friends are made. Even though we didn't get the names of the guys that were viewing her car, we stood there and chit chat with each other; after all, there's no reason not to.

Well, that's about all that's happened today. My only wish is that everyday is a day like today. After all, it's been a pretty good one so far.

X&Y

Coldplay's new album X&Y...just borrowed it off NH. I'll definitely be getting one myself along with their previous two albums. The music's just so melodic! The chorus gives me goose bumps! Trying to figure out if I can link the song somehow.

Spent much of today watching a guy called Ah Ann polish my ride. I must say that he's pretty detailed and took 3 hours with my car. He has already spent 3 hours doing NH's car before that.

I guess today is a day of doing nothing. Not very productive. However, I did realize that I have to reduce the influence of people on me. It's giving me a negative effect and that can't be good.

Strangely, Coldplay and U2 have certain songs that sound similar and have a similar effect on me when I listen to it. An example would be U2's Electrical Storm. Very similar kinds of melodies.

I have to remind myself of two things that I'm supposed to do the coming week.

1) Drop by Gramophone to buy Coldplay's albums and
2) Get a new battery for the car the current one's beginning to show signs of wearing out.

Well. It's close to dinner now. Hope there's something good coming out from the kitchen.

Conversations with NH...

"There are some people that are lucky as well as ruthless; they will also make use of the luck of others for their benefit. AY and AO are such examples. Ed, Jailbird Jon and Angie are examples of people that are always down and out, are perpetually having bad luck and have a knack for either making people around them unlucky or depressed. You on the other hand, are the type that takes steps back wards until you live in the shadows of society."

Am I really that sort? Gosh, I'd never had known if he didn't mention it to me. Upon doing some self-reflection, I think he might have hit the nail right on the head. Put the pickle in the barrel. Perhaps I'd do well and go far in a strict hierarchal organization where the punishment for insubordination is severe. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. Life is full of perhapses.

To be honest, I'd tried that during National Service and I didn't enjoy it one single bit.

Surprisingly, today, being a saturday has been a relatively productive day. It started out with me heading to HG in the morning with the intention of checking if Sandy's ordered the strobes and lightning SGs. However, upon reaching HG, I completely forgot about it and went on to install the Napolex Temperature sensor and tune one of the sub-woofers in the trunk of the car.

After that, NH called and asked if I was available for a meeting regarding photography for yet another magazine that he was handling. The meeting turned out pretty good and things that were mentioned were as expected. In any case, I had a late lunch with NH @ Holland V before the meeting and I must say, that place is populated by more and more sweet and relatively attractive looking ladies (although for some of them, I'd refer to as girls instead). I also noticed that the hemline of skirts are going higher and higher again. Much like the 60s when micro-miniskirts were the fad of the day.

It's either that minis are making a comeback, or I'm beginning to hallucinate more leg than usual. Who knows. Whatever the reason, it's eye candy for me so I definitely don't mind. NH also managed to convince PD to attend a shoot conducted by me on the coming Sunday @ the studio. How he did it, I have no idea. What I do know is that PD is a little out of proportion. She's kinda lengthy and perhaps a little gangly and her face is on the rather round side. I guess it'll be up to me to figure out her best angles.

I read about a blog written by a Singaporean girl in the Straits Times today. I went to check it out but noticed that the site gets all the hits because it's got saucy details of her a) sex life and b) supposedly nude pictures of her which she removed after her parents objected to it. I still think that Asian society is a little closed to accept that sex is not necessarily a taboo subject and that an object of beauty is to be admired. After all, don't we spend much of our time looking for things that look good in the first place? The human body is an object of beauty and the best part is that no two bodies are the same. It's not to say that I will gawk at pornography but if the photos are well taken in a non-vulgar yet erotic way, I definitely will enjoy it and so will a majority of the people out there.

Anyway, towards the end of the day, I took the Jag out for a spin and ended up meeting Joey, Eric & gang @ Yishun Dam. I must say that the recent fad in automotive under-body lighting has caught me by surprise. A consolation is that none of the numerous vehicles with under-body lights that I saw today have the colour that's on my car. Unfortunately, I did see one at MacDonald's on Marc's birthday though.

Well, I think this is one of the longer entries that I've written. Thanks for taking the time to read it. It'd be great if some people comment on it but honestly, I don't think I get as many hits as the girls do anyway.

That Nostalgic Feeling...

How many guys out there know how to give in? It's rather strange but as a person gets older and perhaps more mature, giving in becomes almost second nature. Not always though cause I think it all depends on who you're giving in to. I could be considered pretty spoilt I suppose. Having a childhood where I got many things that I wanted; particularly toys and destroyed them almost immediately.

I remember the times when I used to enjoy building model kits. Glueing all the little pieces together to form a ship, plane, tank or car. Once completed, one could play with them too. The details on these models were really fine and that could be one of the reasons I enjoyed them so much.

I realised that as I grew older, my toys became more and more expensive to the stage where I start to consider cars as toys. I suppose there's some things that don't change.

It's amazing to what end credit card companies will go to keep your account. After calling one of the banks to terminate my card, they offered me all sorts of bells and whistles just to get me to keep the card. Not that I intend to use it anyway. I finally convinced them that termination was what I wanted. The lady on the other end sounded so sad...almost like she was about to break into tears.

If there's anything that I can't stand is a girl breaking down sobbing to me. I will simply just melt into a puddle of goo and usually give in to whatever demands they have. I guess I'm just not ruthless enough (unlike some other people).

Oh well...just a recap...I dropped by Balaclava for a short while on Wednesday night. The band was as good as always especially when the girl was singing. The bald dude that plays the bass, however, well that's another story altogether. He tried singing U2's One and to me, it was the ultimate disaster. He totally lacks the emotion in the voice to sound convincing. Almost like he was mumbling instead. Oh well, at least the girl sang most of the songs...and the beer was 1 for 1 so it's not all that bad. Hahaha!

Somethings work and some just don't...

Have you ever had an experience where something works, then you fix something else completely unrelated and the original thing stops working?

Well, the old saying, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" sure does make sense now...dammit. What can I say...now, it's going to be one hassle after another. The Streetglow transformer has a habit of burning up...similar to what used to happen to the ballasts of my HID lights. Gawd...if it ain't one electrical item, it's another.

I do suspect, however that the powerjet used @ snow-wash is the guilty one...but then again, it's supposed to be waterproofed! Damn damn damn! There was a huge meetup tonight @ Turf City. Unfortunately, I was there only for a short while...had to head back to the studio to get the gear for tomorrow's shoot in JB prepped. Gawd...if only we could just afford another set for M'sia...that'll save me so much hassle of lugging the gear in. I wonder what can I say should the customs dude stop me. That's been bugging me all day today.

I'm smoking a ridiculous number of cigarettes as well. It comes with living alone. Somehow or other, just to stay awake, I smoke...gawd...Philip Morris is a happy man...I've finally managed to upgrade my laptop harddrive to 80 gigs...at least I don't have to worry about it running out of space in the middle of a porta anymore...for the time being that is.

I haven't heard from Germaine in quite a while...I wonder what she's up to. She still owes me a bumch of DVDs of which X-Men 2 I want back real bad to watch the opening scene again. It's really well done and mighty impressive. Oh well, Germs, if you're reading this, lemme know when I can get it back from you! You don't return my calls anymore!!! :P Hahaha...now it's gone public. Oh well. C'est La Vie as the song goes...

What the fuck is going on...

The steady rhythmic rattling of rain drop hitting the terracotta roofs woke me up this morning. I was in a semi dazed state as I got up and closed the shutters to prevent the rain from coming in. It is 6.45am. A little too early for me to start my day. Unfortunately, once I wake up I can't seem to sleep anymore.

It's a fine rainy morning. The balcony's door's open letting some spray from the rain damp my face. It feels good. I'm still semi-laying in bed while writing this and it's already 10am. I've been surfing the web and checking my emails for the past 3 hours. God...sometimes I wonder where does the time go.

I guess I'll be taking half the day off. I still have to head down to EL to get Andrea's PC online. It should be as simple as plugging in the network cable but then again, I should be there cause she doesn't know what a network port looks like.

I've been going nostalgic again, hence this song on my blog page. Nothing much has happened to me lately to write about. Last night we did a shoot @ Hyatt though. For a wine producer. To bad I can't remember the name of the company. The lady in charge of marketing kept asking us if we wanted a drink but drinking on the job with an empty stomach ain't such a good idea.

Anyway, yesterday's porta must've been one of the least printed portas I've ever done. We'll just have to see how it goes when I head in to JB on saturday...

Work, Play, Sleep, Eat...and of course

This has been a weekend of events I must say...

First thing you might notice is the upbeat, up tempo, cheerful music that's accompanying this site. Well, you can put the blame of that to my cousin Shi-Ian who's in town for the weekend.

Anyway, it started as a normal Saturday morning except that while most people were in bed enjoying their slumbers, I was lugging about 40kilos of photographic/computer equipment up the blasted escalators over at Shaw Centre...

Anyway, it was a pretty uneventful "porta" corner which actually may not really be worth doing (the amount of trouble far outweighed the rewards - monetarily speaking of course). Anyway, after slogging with 3-35 year olds getting them to pose right, smile etc etc...I packed up and lugged the damn equipment back to the car.

After dropping off the equipment @ Mandai, I popped by TransEurokars & Stuttgart Auto to see if any buddies were there. Unfortunately, there was some road trip going on and Bernard was busy as a bee so I decided to head on home.

Later found out that dearest cousin Shi-Ian was in town and decided to pop in to mom's to see what she's up to. I must say that she's bloomed beautifully. Anyway, went to catch Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy @ WestMall and it was a blast of a movie...laffed quite a few times too!

After that just headed home & to BED~~~!!! GLORIOUS BED!!!

Today...well...lunch was at Turf City (dim sum) and as usual, having dim sum means overeating on my part. Anyway, headed over to sis' house @ Chancery and watched Lara "check out my boobs" Croft in the latest Tomb Raider DVD on the plasma tv.

Dinner was great and consisted of authentic home-made creamy mushroom soup (yeap...none of that canned soup crap). Finished up by yakking with Alec for a while, checked out this song which according to Shi-Ian is THE song of the moment due to some dude lip-sync-ing to it on his webcam over the internet. It's called Numa Numa (or something like that) and it's quite funny to watch too.