Hi people! Yes, it’s been a long time since I last updated my blog. Part of the reason being my busy schedule with work. It seems that my busy schedule would not end anytime soon. Recently, I have been busy preparing for my MPA qualification.

I have been accredited with an Associateship (AMPA) in the wedding category from the Master Photographers Association, UK. An associateship is awarded to photographers who demonstrate a great understanding of technique, light, composition, creativity and finesse in the art of professional photography. For more information, visit http://www.thempa.com.

This has been the most grueling experience for me from start to finish. It was a very last minute decision but it was all worthwhile.

It was a great experience and I am truly blessed with the people that I’ve met along the way during my preparation. I’d like to thank Ryan Wong for his invaluable advice and for spending countless hours (occasionally up to wee hours in the morning) coaching me on my final panel. I would not have done it without him. My esteemed judges for your critical and constructive feedback on my panel. I would definitely take it all in and start improving on those areas. My lovely couples because without you, I would not have any images to submit! Thanks for your confidence in choosing me as your preferred photographer.

I would also like to thank all my friends and colleagues who supported me throughout my grading process, Alicia Koh for running around town with me to get my panels completed, Stephen Loh (thanks for the coffee that helped me calm my nerves), Michael Chan (for waking up early and being there for my judging ), Chris Woon, Chris Lim, Agnes Tjan, Jonathan Ho, Jonathan Chan, Gerald Goh and the rest who gave physical support on that day. It was indeed a nerve wrecking experience! Not forgetting Edwin Tan, Jon Low, Andy Chin and the rest on twitter for your morale support. To my wonderful wife for her patience and support, I love you! To my Lord and Saviour, Jesus for His unending favour. All I am, is attributed to Him.

Here are a few images that made it to the panel submission.

Dear friends,

eeyern photography will be away for the Charge Up! Conference 2010 in Malaysia from 14-17 January 2010. We will be flanked by notable photographers like Louis Pang, Jenny Sun, Ke Wynn, Ian Salang, Grace Tan and many more during this conference. Feel free to contact us, as we will be checking our emails as often as we can.

Charge Up! Conference is a media conference by LiveWire! Media, a non-profit organisation aimed at imparting and training people in the media ministry. It is a cross-denominational, inter-church media ministry network. With a hope in linking up God’s media artists in Malaysia and to encourage and equip them to a greater experience and encounter with Him in their service, ministry and lives.

Hi people!

I know how late this is, but late is better than never! Looking back at 2009, there are things that I am thankful for and things that I wished I could have done differently. Here are some of my Boos and Yays for 2009.

Boos

• I lost a lens at a wedding
• I drop a lens at a wedding
• I drop a camera at a wedding (now you know why I love to gaffer my camera gears!)
• Spending too little time with my family. This is something that I plan to change this year!

Yays

• I like to thank my Maker, my one and only Jesus, without Him, nothing would fall into place and nothing have be possible. Indeed I am highly favoured, greatly blessed and deeply loved. Double Yays for that!
• My beautiful, lovely, gracious, wise, understanding, patient and adorable wife and personal assistant, Lai Yeen. Thanks for being my constant pillar of support and my sounding board whenever I need advice. God has given you wisdom beyond understanding and it would be foolish of me not to listen to you. You’ve been a true blessing to me each and every day. Thanks for sharing this journey with me. *muaks*
• I went International! Shooting in Bangladesh & Melbourne was an awesome experience. Thanks to my lovely clients and partners for allowing me this opportunity. Getting paid to travel and to do what you love is beyond comprehension.
• To my clients who have trusted me in covering their actual day wedding or pre-wedding. Thanks again for without you, none of these would be possible. Occasionally, I would look at the photos that I’ve taken and wished that I could re-live those moments again where I see the joy of two people madly in love united as one. The laughter, the happiness and the mood that a wedding brings is truly magical.
• I met lots of new photographers and friends in the wedding industry. Without you, I would not know where I would be today. Thanks for your constant support and encouragement. Together we laugh, we cry and we grow. Thanks for investing your time and energy in me, you guys are awesome!
• To the readers of this blog, thanks for subscribing to my musings and although I’m a man of few words (when it comes to writing!), I’m glad that this blog has been interesting enough for you to come back again and again!

Let’s pray and hope for a better 2010 this year as we reach for greater heights and greater goals. Change is the only constant and I am to improve and be a better husband, photographer, friend as the year progresses.

It has always been my life goal to be constantly learning, constantly improving and constantly growing. There’s a saying, “when you are green you grow, when you are ripe you rot”. I value that phrase very dearly and keep it close to my heart as the day that I stop learning, would be the day I die. I read books, listen to audiobooks  and sermons on my iPod, spending hours on Wikipedia (yes, Wiki can be a great source of learning) and occasionally meeting up with like-minded people in the industry that I am in. I strongly believe that spending time with a group of counselors would increase your knowledge and experience by many folds.

As part of my constant desire to learn, I’ve just signed up for my third photography workshop for 2010. Photography workshops don’t come cheap and like any other good, professional, note-worthy workshops out there, it would cost most people an arm and a leg. I’ve long decided that in order for me to improve on my photography skills, I will have to invest in my education. Without a doubt, next year would be a year of learning, improving and reinventing myself.

The end result, would eventually translates to the photos you’ll see here and ultimately being passed down to my lovely clients. There would be changes to the services and products that I offer for next year. The only reason for that is because I believe that my clients deserves the best and that quality & service should always be at the top of our list in eeyern photography. I’ve set some goals for next year and hopefully I’ll be able to share them with you in time to come.

Like one of my favourite authors would say, “People only think to the level of what they are exposed to. If you want to think big expose yourself to bigger things”.

Continue to stretch. Continue to grow. Think big. Never stop learning.

Thanks to my friends from Wedding Story, my wife and I were invited to an all-expense paid retreat in Langkawi together with the Wedding Story team. Haha, well, it was not entirely “all-expense” but I it sounded nice when I typed it .  That said, Wedding Story chipped in on the accommodation for us and that was truly awesome! It is my first time to Langkawi, so thanks guys for being such a great sport and for inviting me and making it a reality. Now I can say, “Hey, I’ve been to Langkawi you know!”.

I can’t say enough but the people at Wedding Story and Integricity are a bunch of awesome people. They are professional, friendly, fun and most importantly, they are fantabulously crazy and fun, just like me! I always believe in teamwork, and as a professional photographer, I can’t work alone and it helps to have close friends in the industry that can support you and be a constant encouragement to you. It pays to have strong relationships with the people you work with and I got to say, we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves there.

From the moment we landed, we basically had a fun time hanging out around the hotel, went shopping, played some water sports, took “professional” photos for each other for FREE (yes, it pays to have photographer friends!), went for a full body massage together. It was a time of relaxation and at the same time, we got to catch up with everyone. Since I’m based in Singapore, I hardly have time to meet up with anyone whenever I am in Malaysia.

If you have colleagues, partners or just buddies that are like-minded, do spend time together, I highly recommend that you either go on a road trip or a short vacation together.

Oh, one very important thing that happened in Langkawi that I have to share… I got a brand new spanking camera! Thanks to Joseph Siew and Grace for helping me out. I was so excited, because I finally got my hands on a compact camera, the Canon G10. Well, it’s not soooo compact but hey, it’s a great camera that produces great images!

All the shots taken in this post were from my new compact camera, the Canon G10. I’ll blog more about it later.

One of the many famous Sawah Padi fields in Langkawi during sunset.

The beautiful sunset by the beach, right outside our hotel.

Lastly, enjoy the clip below by Kee Sitt from Wedding Story. He did a great job compiling our activities in it. Best of all, he did not use a professional video camera, but a consumer camera, the Panasonic TZ7. After watching the video, I feel like giving up my Canon G10 and go out and buy myself one of them Panasonics.

Disclaimer: OK, after being “ratted out” by Mark Leo, I have to say that the Canon G10 is not mine! It belongs to my wife. Yes, my wife had a long discussion about it, as she wanted something small that could fit into her bag. But I reasoned with her that the Canon G10 is a GREAT camera! Yada yada… anyways, long story short, after much persuasion (and pestering) from me, she caved, and gave in to my request. Hehe… so, the Canon G10 belongs to my wife since she paid for it… (which will be in my ThinkTank Airport AirStream bag most of the time.. hehehehe).

Thanks to Jon Low who RT’ed this from someone else wee early in the morning. I was still dreaming about it when I woke up this morning. I guess it’s all over the twittersphere now but I thought I’d just add it here. This has got to be the coolest wedding couple ever! I went to the link from the tweet and it says, “Watch it. You might cry. You may get up and dance. You may break into instantaneous giggle fits. You may even be slightly horrified.” What about you, would you laugh, dance or cry? Watch the video.

I teared a little at the end. This has got to be the coolest wedding video I’ve seen for a long long time. How I wished all weddings are like this, but I know everyone has their own preference and being the wacky me, I love the unexpected. That’s my code. My motto. My life. I love it! Well, if you have ideas that is out of this world, some dying fantasy (wedding related only, puh-lease!), or an unrealised dream that you would want to on your wedding day, feel free to contact me and we can cook up something unexpected. It’ll be fun, it’ll be exciting and most importantly memorable.

Would you laugh, dance or cry?

That’s entirely up to you.

Once again, I have the opportunity to photograph a bunch of talented youths. I’m so excited about this that I can’t help but to finish editing them as soon as I can. My friends from Vertical Care Services (VCS) invited me to help photograph some of the band shots for Zero2Hero Season 6. If you have read my blog entry back in February, I posted some photos from Season 5. This time round, I was in charge of taking some individual shots for each of the band members.

Joseph

Joel

Jerrer

Vonnes

Fiona

Thanks Fiona for being a sport, I know you only know how to smile when you are photographed by the way. Love the head banging shots!

Qi Guang

Amanda

Brandon

Zhi Ming

Sean

I didn’t know that shooting by the beach can be such hard work. Look at my Crocs slippers! I think I have to get a new pair after this.

Thanks to James and Gerald for inviting me. Here is a photo of James from 14-85. (Sorry Gerald, didn’t get to take a photo of you earlier!)

Thanks to my lovely assistant, Eunice, for helping out. She’s a star and I can’t say enough to thank her for helping me hold the light throughout the shoot. Thanks for enduring my many requests and not complaining a single bit!

Here is a photo of Eunice hard at work.

Here are some group shots from James’ camera.

Coming soon….

Wow! I’m speechless! My work is being published by UK’s Worship Central on their blog! No, not just an article but as a permanent fixture on their blog template. *jumps up in the air with hands raised to the heavens* Woohoo!

Last year, I volunteered my services to assist Alpha Singapore to take some shots for the Planetshakers and Tim Hughes Concert, a collaboration with Worship Central. It was for charity and I think it’s a way for me to give back to the Christian community for the number of times I’ve skipped church over the weekends! Hah! To be honest, one of the reasons is because I believe that my photography talent is attributed to one person and that is my lovely Jesus. Without Him, I’m nothing. Thus, I always believe that it is important to give back wherever and whenever you can. I seized the opportunity when I saw the ad in the local Singapore newspaper about the upcoming event and called up the organising sponsors. Met up with them and showed them some of my work. They were happy and I was given an “OFFICIAL PHOTOGRAPHER” tag. The rest of it was history. Not just any history because it was history in the making.

I’ve decided to show you some of the photos I took of that great night of worship with over 5,000 people in a jam-packed hall. Planetshakers and Tim Hughes are probably one of the biggest names in the Christian Music industry. To have the opportunity to cover the event was truly awesome.

Planetshakers started the concert with a bang! If you’ve never heard of Planetshakers, they are one of Australia’s fastest growing churches with awesome praise & worship music.

The atmosphere at the event was just mind-blowing. Hands were raised and people were jumping. Who said Christian concerts were boring?

One of my favourite shots that night.

Tim Hughes took the stage and gave us his all. Technically, he gave his all to the One most High.

Things started to quiet down with some worship songs from Tim.

There are times where the songs picks up and you can see the drummer just whacking away on the drums. I took this shot in between a person’s underarms and the stage railing to get the drummer in the frame.

The worship leader was awesome.

…and ahletic! I think he was like spidey jumping up and down.

Even the bassist joined in the fun.

Nothing beats Henry Seeley rocking on his Telecaster guitar.

Another awesome moment. I love stage lights.

Photo of the bassist rocking away.

Not forgetting the guitarist as well.

The worship atmosphere was spectacular to say the least. Everyone was worshipping with their hands raised.

I even caught this photo of a little boy, mesmerised in the presense of God.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the photos as much as I did. These are moments where I feel that my dream has come true. That living my dreams is to be where I’m most happy. Even when the work hours are long and there’s no pay involved. My heart is contented and yet my passion continues to grow. It’s a strange feeling. Sometimes, I look back at these photos and find some of my best work here. I was just a 5-month old photographer back then but yet these pictures are prove that there’s something greater at work when you give back to a greater cause.

Shooting season starts this weekend! Can’t wait to get my lazy bum off the couch and off to shoot some amazing photos! You have a good weekend! Stay blessed!

I thought I’d post up some links to some great photos I saw this week. These pictures inspired me and I am definitely looking at bringing my photography skills to the next level.

• NYT Damon Winter’s “A Vision of Photography” which won him the Pulitzer Price 2009 for Feature Photography.
• It was Earth Day a few days ago and here are some inspiring pictures of our lil’ planet. It really makes you feel so small and how awesome God’s creation is.
• Wow, all these happened when I was in Bangladesh during Easter Week. And not forgetting Good Friday.
• Scenes from a zoo. I love #6, reminds me of Po from Kungfu Panda.
• MSNBC’s Year in Picture 2008. This is slightly older than the rest but it serves as a constant reminder of what goes around in our world.
• Lastly, what I want for Christmas. No, not those biceps.

Do you have any inspiring photos to share?