June

I know that summer is on its way when days are getting longer and when my fridge is working harder. It definitely causes me some adjustment to these warm and sunny days. But hey, it isn’t a big deal because there are just less than 60 days like this in the State of Washington. I absolutely enjoy the honey sunshine, cool air, and refreshing breezes pouring into my apartment every day. Soon enough I will need change my bedding to accommodate the summer heat. Eating more vegetable and fruits also helps make the summer more pleasant.

Food Photography 101

It is no secret that I am a food lover (hey, no one hates food). I am recently inspired by some amazing pros with their amazing food photography. So, I decided to teach myself some basics of food photography 101.

Behind the scene of photographing a wedding ceremony

In the sequence of posts on how I photograph a wedding, here are some behind the scene pictures of me photographing a wedding ceremony.

I always prefer to have a second photographer to help me at a wedding because it is so crucial for my clients that I am able to capture all the important moments of the ceremony. There are often so many things happening at the same time at the wedding and I cannot photograph all of them by myself. The second photographer is a big help for me to reduce the pressure of capturing everything by myself, and I can ensure to have pictures from different angles and positions without moving too much during the ceremony.

More people, better ideas... sometime the second photographer can help me find a better angle to photograph from. And instead of running back and forth to position people for group shoots, the second photograph usually helps me do it much more effectively while I am focusing on setting and composing my camera.

In order to make sure that we would get good shots in a short amount of time, each of us usually shoots from different angles at different positions. That way, we would get variety of pictures of the same moment.

And here are the pictures from that moment.

Bonus:
For all of engagement albums that I offer to my clients, I am now switching from the regular coffee table book to a much more superior album provided by MyPublisher. And to ensure that my clients will get the best, I always go with the high-end design for my albums. They are Deluxe Hardcover with beautiful leather cover at 11.5 x 15 inches. Here is the engagement album that I designed for Phu+Hien.

All pictures are printed on premium 182-pound high-gloss paper with additional supper gloss printing to enhance clarity and color, and to provide a glistering, protective surface to each page. The supper gloss printing will provide sharper and clearer images with richer, deeper, more vibrant colors on thicker pages. All pictures are scratch and spill resistant.

I alway choose the Lay Flat Pages option because I love the way how the pages are opened completely flat with no curl. It just makes the pictures look a lot better and more pleasantly to be viewed.

World Photography Day

Happy World Photography Day... it's a day that all of us, both photographers and all photography lovers, come together to celebrate photography. It's just a coincidence for me to know about this day when coming across a tweet from Jasmine Star (my most admirable and influential wedding photographer of all time). If you are still wondering what this day actually is, here is a quick lesson for you.

My love for photography came to me very naturally. I still remember the old day when I had a lot of fun playing with my parents' film camera. I loved taking pictures from some kind of odd angles... just tried to re-create my imaginations of life around.

My family love taking pictures from our trips and events, and we adore all of the photos. In fact, my mom had a stack of 3-4 huge albums of our family photos carefully kept: they are our treasures. This habit comes from her dad as he made a beautiful album for each of his children and carefully documented their childhood from birth to highschool graduation, and much more. I still remember when I first saw the old album of my mom: it is breathtaking and touching when seeing all the vintage photos carefully mounted and noted with the old imprinted labels. It is priceless to see how my mom, her family, and even the neighborhood back in the days. So, I do believe in the power of photography to capture the still moments in life that will last for generations.

Nothing is worth more than your photos. You cannot travel back to the past, you cannot hold the people you love forever, but you can keep those unforgettable moments for life through photographs. So, keep shooting and documenting your beautiful life and make it the best gift ever for generations to come.

And a post is always better with a picture, here is a snapshot of my digital album where I keep all of my 7,000+ photos for the last 6 years.

Photograph a newborn

Photo Credit: Adele Enersen

What could be more adorable than babies?!... they are the most pureness and precious creatures on earth, yet beautiful! I am sure the worst photographer cannot take even one bad photo of a baby... like young Vietnamese folks often say babies are "Dep Tung Centimet"... um... but it doesn't mean that you can just fire the camera unintentionally and wish to get a good picture of your cutie... it requires some care and attention.

Photographing a newborn is the most easy thing to do also the most difficult one. It is easy because you can literally photograph a baby from any directions at any time while he/she is playing, eating, sleeping, bathing, crying, or even just staring straight to you with big open eyes... cute! Babies are beautiful in every angle and you do not have to work hard to find the best one.

However, it is difficult to capture the right moment to make your picture extra special. Remember, babies do not pose... they don't even know what you are trying to do with the little box (camera) that you are pointing to them... they are just "whatever"... so, don't expect to make them say "cheese" or counting from 1 to 3... babies don't get that.. Instead of that, you have to work on your own for your pictures. Photographing babies is not like a typical photo shoot where you have models ready and you can photograph continuously within a certain time and then call it done. In stead, you have to be very patient and play along with his/her mood.... you better have your camera ready on hand all the time, and then sit and watch... and when you find the right moment, quickly capture that... it is really a type of candid photography... yet telling so much story to viewers.

When looking at a baby photo, we do not look much at details or color, but we look at the shape, emotions, expression of the baby... so, pay attention and try to convey these things to viewers... Here are some tips for you, try to get enough light (you are sure not want to get a dull and dark picture of your baby), place the baby on something warm and fuzzy (will sure add some cuteness), set your camera focus on the eyes (this will make sure his/her eyes really pop), and be creative!

Here are some photos of Nhi when she was one month old. Her mom and I were working for 2 hours to get these shots... She is definitely a cute one!

How to take good party pictures

We are human and we like fun... we love party... yes, so do I! If you are like me, you will love taking pictures of the fun time, yet priceless moments to share with friends and family. Here are some of my tips to make your awesome snapshots even better.

Blurry Photos: I'm sure this is the most common problems when taking photos at parties. It can be caused by slow shutter-speed of your camera or your shaky hands. Most point-and-shoot cameras (compact camera) are designed to automatically adjust the shutter-speed to compensate the available light. To get enough light, the camera will automatically slower the shutter-speed, which is often not fast enough to freeze the actions of moving objects. To prevent this, you should add more light to increase the shutter-speed by using flash or take pictures at a bright place. To prevent your hand from shaking, keep your arms and camera close to your body to increase the steadiness.

Red Eyes: You sure want people to look nice on your photos, and not want them to look like monster with scary red-eyes. To prevent this, just simply turn on the red-eyes reduction on your camera if it is available or avoid using flash. 

Noisy Photos: A point-and-shoot camera has a very small lens and image censor compare to a DSLR camera. So, in order to get enough light to create a picture, the point-and-shoot camera must slower the shutter-speed and bump the ISO to very high. However, the small censor does not handle high ISO very well and creates a lot of digital noise, which makes your pictures look grainy and not as smooth as the ones taken with a  DSLR camera. To prevent this, adjust your ISO to below 1000. If your picture is too dark with a low ISO, try to add some light to the scene. This will definitely help.

Add some creativeness: Last but not least, your pictures will be attractive to viewers if they can tell a story and convey atmosphere of the event. Viewers may not mind the blurriness and noise of a picture if its content is interesting enough to keep their eyes on. Viewers often want to know what the event was about, who were there, what people were doing at the event, what made the event interesting or different from others, etc...So, be a storyteller by showing a lot of details and emotions from the event... focus on the whole environment, people, actions, emotion, details, decorations, etc...look for different angles... take a lot of candid photos... link the shoots to each other to create a story line... 

I am sure you can do all of these and hope that people will be soon amazed by your photos... remember "camera does not take the photos, photographer does"

Here are photos from my friend's birthday for your inspiration...

Workflow 2011

I love art and creativity, and I am a very formulating person. I like to lay everything out in order because it is just how my brain works. A well planned workflow is extremely important to me more than anything else because it helps me to ensure the quality of my work.

Since I started to focus more on my photography business, I have been experimenting different ways to operate which can help define my style and to build my own branch. I still continue to learn along the way to refine my workflow and to make it fit with different stage of the business. 

Here is my workflow version 2011...

1. Client request
2. Consultation: discuss on event details (time, location, and schedule of the event), explain my style and workflow to clients, discuss on outfits, decorations and details, agree on packet of services (delivery time line and method, number of images, and price).
3. Planning: team meeting to plan for the shoot (angles, positions, what gears that each person is going to use, type of shoots or objects that each person will primarily focus on, etc)
4. Confirmation: I usually contact my clients one or two days before the shoot to make sure everything still as planned or if anything has been changed since our last conversation.
5. The big day: arrive at event location at least 30 minutes early to get familiar with the location, scout for good spots, find light sources, and sometime do some  clean up to make sure the background is not clustered.
6. Post-production: transfer all images to computer, back them up, load them into Lightroom for processing, sort and cull all images, edit images, export them into different formats for blog, online gallery, and export to DVD for clients.
7. Album and Prints: select the images and design album or further retouch the images for printing per request from clients.

Surely the process can be different a bit based upon size of the event and type of the shoot. But this is my ideal workflow or at least what I am trying to accomplish. Of course, there are a lot more things to talk about for behind-the-scene works, and I will share more in the next post...

My Mac is one of the essential tools for my business.

I found a new love...Canon 50mm L f/1.2

Yes, I do... I have been having very strong feeling for her, I was searching for her, I was thinking of her days and nights, I couldn't wait to see her... and finally we met each other for the first time when I came home from work... The packet arrived. After digging through layers of stuffing, I saw her sitting neatly in the soft grey pouch... yes, she is the Canon 50mm 1.2 L lens.

I rent this lens out for a weekend wedding and engagement photo shoot... This was my first time playing with it, and I wanted to clear out all the myths around this lens, but it turned out that I fall in love with it right at the first shoot.

I love the buttery background from the 1.2 aperture; it turns everything from ordinary to extraordinary. You can hardly take bad pictures with this lens - of course, you do need to know how to work with it. I definitely love this lens since it really fits with and enhances my photography style and focus. One down size is that it is quite slow to focus compare to other Canon L lens. I hope that while I am saving for it, Canon will update with a new version for better focusing system. In the mean time, I stay with my love for this lens.

Here are some pictures from the first test shoot.

 

iPhone camera

I decided to write this post while going out with my family in the 4^th of July weekend.  As my hobby + habit, I brought my DSRL camera with me on the trip… but then I decided to give it a break and use the camera of my iPhone in stead… it was for a couple of reasons:

• Wide-angle lens of the iPhone can do much better in taking landscape photos than my 50mm lens. It can capture a wider view of the scene.
• When going on vacation, I do not want to deal with a bunch of technical stuffs but rather a simple point-and-shoot camera. And the iPhone or any compact-camera can do that job better than a bulky and heavy DSLR.
• In additional to the simplicity, the iPhone camera is really versatile when it comes to sharing photos. I can send the photos on the iPhone straight to Facebook, Twitter, or Flickr, and even post them on my blog…even cooler that I can make some adjustments and apply special effects to the photos without dealing with the computer ever.

There is 2 apps that I use almost all the time when taking photos with my iPhone: Pro HDR and Tripod.

I love Pro HDR so much…It is perfect for taking landscape photos with your iPhone (or probably any photos which do not include moving objects). The app can smartly detect the brightest and darkest areas in the photos and continuously take 2 photos at 2 different exposure levels. It then automatically merges 2 photos into one by taking the best parts of each photo… So, I will never have a photo that is too dark or too bright. Can any expensive cameras do that? … NO WAY… at least not for now…

The Tripod is also an awesome app… especially for someone who does not have a steady hand… when you hit the shutter button, the iPhone will not take a picture right away… but it will start to measure the movement of your hands using the built-in gyroscope of the iPhone… and then the camera will automatically take the photo when it feels your hands are steady enough… how cool that is!

The best part is that both of these apps are FREE and you can download them from the iTunes.

So my point is that you can take good picture with whatever camera (of course, the working ones)… you can produce a horrible photo with a $10,000plus camera, but you can produce an amazing photo with just a cheap toy camera… it is all about your imagination, creativeness, and your own view to the world… you don’t TAKE the picture… you MAKE the picture…

To end this post, here are some photos coming straight from my iPhone without any editing on computer.