my fav of the day. it was taken at the stanley military cemetery – one of the most popular photo location for my clients. Even after taking photos there over hundreds times, I still love this location a lot, and I was completely fascinated by the ever changing scene there. The view was different every time I went there because of the diffenence of time, weather, seasons.

locations: inspiration lake, the peak, stanley market, stanley military cemetery
our 1st location of the day: inspiration lake of disneyland

another fav of the day !!!!!

we dropped by the peak to take a few photos before we went to the stanley market

next location: stanley market

another fav photo at the military cemetery

congratulations !!!!! Look forward to seeing you two again in your dec wedding !!!!

locations: home, lily and bloom in central, stanley market, stanley military cemetery, 1881 heritage in TST

my fav of the day, and it ’s one of the most challenging.
the view here was so nice that I chose to use a wide angle lens to capture the view, at the same time, I still tried  to make sure that kristy was the focus of the photo – we could still see her beautiful smile, sexy pose and nice details of her dress.

in terms of lighting, it was quite challenging here. There ‘re three sides of windows, the middle and the right windows ‘re facing outside of the building so  it was illuminated by available light, while the left side windows ‘re facing the interior of the club with no light at all. I had put two flashes behind the left windows to give them some light. color of the flashes for kristy and for the windows ‘re carefully chosen that all windows light turned out blue in this photo and it matched the color of the dress perfectly

stop one: we started the shooting at home in the morning, all photos are taken by available light only.

I find it difficult to include pets in wedding photos, especially doggies that keep on running and running around.

a corner at house with wonderful light.

2nd stop: lily and bloom – all photos ‘re taken with flash light

another fav of the day

hahaha, one martin and three kristy

thanks canly for helping to make this great photo!!!!

third stop: stanley market and military cemetery

the military cemetery is my fav spot for sunset light photo

last stop: 1881 heritage at TST. 

congratulations

HATE: it is so hot now and it ’s really very tough shooting pre-wedding outdoor, not to mention, the humidity and mosquito … … In addition, there is less wedding (that means less business) in the summer time because of the raining and typhoon weather .. … that ’s why so many photographers organizing oversea pre-wedding tour during this period … …

LOVE: it is the perfect time for me to take pre wedding photo at the beach. shooting photos with your feet in the cool sea water is just a joy. I feel so excited and get inspired if the client loves to have photos on the beach, and I really don’t care if my camera or lens get dirty or damaged with the salty water or the sand. Of course,  I don’t need you to take off the top and get into the water like christie and raymond did in their pre-wedding session, but as least, please take off your shoes and put your feet into the water.

Let’s feel the heat and get wet !!!!

make up artist: polly of faces hk
location: the chinese university of hong kong, Shek O, central

this is the christie at shek O, one of my fav of the day !!!!

this is raymond at shek O, OMG … … Who said I don’t take good photo of the groom?

our 1st stop: chinese university of hong kong

2nd location: shek O

they looked like enjoying it a lot, but in face, it ’s really difficult to stand at this location. thank you for doing it.

let ’s get wet !!!

last stop at central !!!!

Even though I had shoot under very bad weather conditions before, but I really prefer to shoot under sunshine as there is too much pressure on the couple and it is difficult to protect the equipments when shooting under rain.

Cindy and Bennalt asked me the same question a few days before their prewedding session because the weather forecast was really bad. It turned out that it rained the whole day, and luckily, they made the decision to book a room inside the 1881 heritage and we could continue the shooting in the afternoon and at night.

makeup artist: Man Chan
locations: maryknoll convent school, 1881 heritage

1881 heritage is a very nice location, but it is also difficult to shoot over 6-7 hours just inside a hotel room. that ’s the case for cindy and bennalt. After checking in at 2:00pm, we spent the rest of the day there as it rained so bad outside that we couldn’t go out at all.  It became a challenge for me to spend such a long hours at the same location, but sometimes, this kind of limitation would inspire new ideas. Without new location, new background, it forced to you look at something different at the bride. I noticed that cindy got  beautiful and healthy hair, then, the question was how to feature and highlight her hair in a photo. thanks cindy ’s help and worked with me to get this photo, love it very much. My fav of the day

our first location: maryknoll. another fav of the day. so romantic, isn’t it?

just a plain wall, but their beautiful smiles helps a lot to create this beautiful picture

bad weather, no problem. I got a sun in my pocket (the tiny flash) that can create a sunset look anywhere and anytime.

when I took this shot, it rained very bad. thanks Man Chan, Ka Mui and shirley ’s help for holding three umbrella together to get this shot. Thank you !!!

start shooting at 1881

nice room, isn’t it ? Tried a new lighting setup in this photo, you ‘ll see this kind of photo more and more in the future.

all the following photos are taken at the night time. thanks for the sun in my pocket again.

this dress is stunning !!!!! 

I feel glad (and lucky) that there are still so many clients that love having pre-wedding photos in Hong Kong and always bring me lot of interesting locations – and kavy and ben are definitely one of them.

they both live in Ma Wan, so we started the shooting at the Ma Wan old village. The last time I was there was already four years ago. This is such a beautiful and quiet location that I love it very much, and it was just like a hiking that we walked around to look for photo opportunities — no specific route, no specific scenic point — that ’s the way of shooting that I love very much.

location: Home, Ma Wan old village, the peak, temple street.
make up artist: cherry from Makeup Rainbow

this is one of my fav photo of the day. this was shot at the peak and here is my thinking process behind this photo.

When I arrived, I saw a patch of light passing through the branches and I immediately thought it was a photo opportunity there. After asking kavy to stand under this light, the next thing that I needed to consider is what should kavy do to blend into the environment. When I take photo of the bride, I always think how I can do the best for her and what should be highlighted in the photo, it can be her eyes, her face, hair, the dress, the shoes, the body figure, the emotion, the smile …. … you name it, the possibility is just unlimited. In this case, I found kavy ’s dress (the back) look awesome, and I was thinking putting her back as the highlight of this pic. By positing her at the right location, with the light and shadow on her back, it gave us a very three dimensional look of her back and her figure. that ’s how this photo was created, all by available light only.

before we started shooting outdoor, we took a few photos at home first

the lovely Ma Wan old village

2nd location: the peak

last location: the temple street. never thought I would take pre-wedding photo here. they brought me here because here  was where Ben first dated Kavy out. Oh … … first dating at temple street ????? Ben, you ‘re awesome !!!!!

you may not agree, but I always think that wedding is all about the bride, nothing else.

having said that, it’s surprising that, I have several clients recently that the groom really like playing an “active role” in the photos. Sometimes I really feel that the guy has more concern of his outlook and appearance than the bride does.  hahahaha…….. And Jonathan is definitely one of them.  This is a good thing for sure ….. ….. at least I can feel that he is very serious about the quality of the wedding photos, doesn’t like other guys that just help the brides pay the fee, then don’t care about anything of the wedding.    :-)

make up artist: man chan
locations: 1881 heritage, Tai Tam Reservoir, military cemetery, stanley market

wow !!!!! this is jonathan !!!!!

and this is helena.

final touch up !!!

out 1st location: 1881

2nd location: tai tam

3rd location: military cemetery
with such happy couple, we didn’t need any special lighting or location, I just needed to capture the moment !!!!

night shoot at stanley market

I am sorry to tell you that there will be an increase of my rate for engagement (pre-wedding photo) session on 1st May, 2011 The new rate card will be released on May 1st , 2011.  If you plan to hire me as your pre-wedding photographer, the old rate will be honored if you confirm the booking (with deposit arranged) before 1st May, 2011.

All bookings will be charged at the new rate afterward.

Don’t believe in me, you can see the photo below. this is a photo I got at our first meeting, hahaha, I am still keeping it in my mobile. I didn’t open my studio yet at that time, and we were still meeting in a cafe inside IFC.

Have you ever got any client like this in your meeting??? I think I am lucky to have sweet couple like this as my client.

location: HKU, Shek O, Stanley military cemetery, Stanley market, Central
makeup artist: phoebe lam

the photo session was perfect !!! We got plenty of sunlight the whole day and this is my first time to had photo taken at both Shek O and stanley military cemetery in one single day.

1st location: HKU
one of my fav of the day — there was a very strong sunlight coming from the window. the difficulty of this photo is that I need to position fiona under the sunlight very very precisely so that we can see her face and figure as well as the details of the veil under the sunlight. Of course, this photo could never work without fiona ’s beautiful face, do you agree?

time for a coffee

2nd location: Shek O.
I usually don’t go to the Beach  earlier than 3:00pm because the sunlight is too harsh for photo. However, as we needed to go the stanley military cemetery later, we didn’t have a choice. It was quite challenging for photo unde this light condition!!!

we got two little friends on the beach

It was really a miracle being able to take a shot like this at the beach in the early afternoon !!!!!

3rd location: stanley military cemetery

last location: Central and stanley market
here came the two little friend again

location: old central police station, Sheung Wan, Stanley military cemetery, star ferry and Central
make up artist: polly of faces makeup studio

my fav of the day

1st location: old Central Police Station

2nd location: Sheung Wan

3rd location: stanley military cemetery

So you can imagine it  was really a joy taking photo of them!

locations: university of hong kong, Tai Tam, Shek O, Central
make up artist: polly of faces

1st location: HKU
a lot of people asked me if I feel bored always shooting at the same location. Let me tell you something first. Before I became a wedding photographer, I spent lots of time taking landscape photos. that ’s the period I learned the basic of photography and learned seeing light. One thing that I remembered from other masters was, in order to take good landscape photo, you have to understand the place, spend time to observe it, love it.

I think it is the same for location shooting in Hong Kong … …  if you start  to say that there is nothing to take good photo in Hong Kong, you better ask yourself if you ‘ve spent enough  time to understand the place,  to observe it. Even though I ‘ve been to HKU lots of time, the more I go there, the more new photo opportunities I find. Take the following photo as an example, this is my first time to see this natural light on this wooden door, it ’s so beautiful, but at the same time,  I could see that the light and shadow kept moving very fast, so I quickly get alison to get this shot. Within 15 min, the light moved out of the door. A lesson learned, isn’t it?
BTW, don’t miss seeing the mobile phone version of this photos by clicking here

we get beautiful sun light everywhere, all photos below (before sunset) are taken by available light only, no flash is used.

Oh … … beautiful bride !!!

2nd location: Tai Tam

third location: Shek O

too heavy ??????

Canly and Polly !!!!

last stop: central

thank you so much and look forward to your wedding day !!!!

together with the white dress, this set of photos is “white on white” in color.
in terms of lighting, other than the last three photos, most of the other  photos were done with available light only, only four of them, flash ‘re used. which four  do you guess?

one of my fav of the day.
this one was shot at the bathtub inside the bathroom

three night photos 

first, when I  arrived at the inspiration lake in the morning (phoebe and julian ‘re still on their way to the park),it was so surprising that the place was already packed with lots of students. Looked like the day was a picnic day for lots of schools and the park was very  popular for school picnic. Within two seconds I uploaded the  photos below to my facebook page, phoebe already left message to me and asked if we need to switch location. you can imagine how difficult to find a quiet place that day … … But I always tell my client that location is not important for me, and I am always looking for color, abstract pattern instead of wide angle landscape in my photos, then, let ’s give it a try

second, when they arrive, the 1st thing that julian told me was “No need to take photo of him”. don’t get me wrong, Julian was a very nice person, but he just really not enjoying any wedding photos at all. hahaha, it may be a big challenge for lots of photographers, but not a big problem for me, as I am always a woman/bride photographer, LOL … …

the day went very well finally, as the park ’s very big, we could still manage to find places for photo shooting, and it’s not bad, it forced me to look for alternatives and explore new photo spots.

Julian is much better than what he told me, and phoebe has a very cheerful personality that it’s really a joy taking photo of them. anyway, I will be shooting their wedding at bali later this year, so looking forward to it !!!!!!

location: inspiration lake at disneyland, wetland park, kam tin, central
make up artist: lesley ho from texure workshop

1st locaton: inspiration lake
photos from my mobile … … OMG … …

found a quiet spot for this photo. not too bad, isn’t it?

in fact, we had very beautiful sun light through out the whole day.

our 2nd location: wetland park, photos from my mobile and lots of students again  @_@

our 3rd location: kam tin, it is my 2nd time taking photo there, really love this location.

there is a very interesting tree house

one of my fav.
love the way all the branches lead your eyes to phoebe and a very unique way to show the dress.
also special thank to phoebe for doing this as she has height phobia @_@

last location: central
Julian saw this photo on my blog before and he really likes it.  this is his only request of  taking  a similar one for him.

thank you and see you two later

also can’t believe that this post is going to be my last one  in 2010. As I am going to have four weddings,  starting tomorrow, crossing the year 2010 / 2011, seems that I am not going to have time updating this blog until some time next week.  This is my 3rd year having wedding shoot on new year eve and I really love celebrating the new year in a wedding. I ‘ll try to upload some photos onto my facebook page from my mobile, stay tuned.

OK, who is the couple to be featured in my last post of the year ???

wendy and princeton. I still remembered the 1st time I met them in a coffee shop early this year. Instead of going through my portfolio, princeton showed me some of the new photography books he just bought and asked me opinions of them. He ’s such a passionate photo lover that asked me lots of questions about photography during the meeting. From my experience, most of the grooms are really not very keen on wedding photos, but princeton is an excepton. you can imagine that it ’s really a joy for me to take photos of wendy and princeton.

locations: home, tai tam, stanley market and  military cemetery, central

1st location: home
one of my fav of the day. Really have to say thanks to canly and princeton for helping me set up the light (it ’s not an easy task for holding the big light in the air for a long long time, not to mention having to control the direction of the light very precisely) like the direction, feathering and quality of the light a lot.
I love the feeling of mystery in this photo and wendy looks so pretty that make me think of the title of this post.

on our way to Tai Tam, we took some photos with princeton ’s Ferrai, cool !!!!

2nd location: Tai Tam, we just stayed there for 15-20 min only

sure, princeton brought along his camera and long lens

will you marry me ??? 

3rd location: stanley market

stanley military cemetery, just enough time to catch the last minute of sunset light !!!!

another fav of the day. 

last location: central
three photos, three different aperture setting, yet maintaining the same look and feel in light quality

awesome pose, princeton!!!!

really thanks wendy for doing this and lay down on the street in central  !!!! look at the picture, it ’s worth !!!!!

thank you !!!!!

Happy new year !!!!!!!

When I first meet Faye and Matthew, I said to myself “OMG, this is such a beautiful lady, lucky me again…..” But faye kept saying to me that she ’s very very nervous as she feel that she ’s not a photogenic person and all her photos don’t look good before. in fact, she ’s so nervous that she couldn’t sleep the night before the photo session.

So, is faye photogenic or not, let the photo tell you

and look forward to their wedding in 2011 !!!!

location: Kam Tin, soho, the peak, central
make up artist: Man Chan of Miracle (tel:27391988)

have you imagined that we can even take good picture inside a 7-seaters van? Faye is changing into the evening gown inside the van, when she finished and I opened the door, oh no, this is the scene what I saw!!!! this is so natural and beautiful !!!!

1st location: Kam Tin
thank you matthew ’s father for arranging such a nice photo location for us in Kam Tin. we had very beautiful available light the whole day that all day time photos below are taken with available light only, no flash is used.

thank Man Chan for providing this beautiful umbrella for us

2nd location: central, soho

3rd location: the peak

as both of them are not located in Hong Kong, I shouldn’t miss taking the night scene of the HK island for them

faye suddenly asked me “can I kiss matthew?” … … it ’s so cute of her !!!!

final location: central.
by now, can you tell if faye is photogenic or not???

locations: soho central, the peak, belair, stanley military cemetery
makeup artist: polly of faces hk

here are my two fav  of the day.

thanks polly for becoming another lighting assistant for me !!!!

by reading my blog, they love the photos at wetland park a lot. it is almost one year since I took photo there last time. I love this place a lot, but it can be tough for clients as it takes almost 20 min walk going to the wooden bridge and it can get very very hot during the summer times.

this photo session was done in sept when the weather was still very hot. I can still remember rene got completed exhausted after taking photos at the bridge. who says it is easy to get good photo ???

anyway, thanks for coming, and hope you did enjoy the photo session and the shopping in Hong Kong

locations: wetland park, inspiration lake, university of hong kong, central, tsim sha tsui
make up artist: polly of faces hk

we found lots of new shooting locations at wetland park this time. 

finally, we arrived at the bridge !!!!

2nd location: inspiration lake

3rd location: university of hong kong. 

night shoot: central pier

tsim sha tsui

star ferry 

Having said that, shooting at new location can be fun, especially in a pre-wedding session. It can be very  challenging as I have to explore the new location and lighting condition in a very limited time.

a very special set of pre-wedding photos for me , thanks kalam and nelson for bring me to some very interesting locations !!!

locations: central, tai tam, dragon i, tazmania ballroom

one of my fav bridal shot for kalam, shooting inside dragon i

before we started, we took a few photo at home

1st location: central. we walked around explored a lot of new places

cool !!!!

shooting inside a chinese herb tea shop

like the dress and the glowing light !!!!

2nd location: Tai Tam

dragon i

tazmania ballroom

another fav of the day !!!

night shot in central

So a lot of my clients arranged interesting  indoor locations for pre-wedding shoot recently. Places such as bar, cafe, hotel, club house, school or chapel are not uncommon. It was both fun and challenging to me as all these locations are very new to me and some of them ‘re even my 1st time to be there.

This time, phoebe and ricky, brought me to a hotel called Luxe Manor in TST – a very nice and modern hotel. As they are going to have their wedding ceremony there later this year, it has  extra meaning for them having per-wedding photos session there.

locations: Dada Bar + Lounge of Luxe Manor, Central, HKU, ifc

our 1st location: Dada Bar + Lounge of Luxe Manor
one of my fav. of bridal shot for phoebe. just a simple curtain inside the bar, but I like the color and the lighting a lot.

2nd location: Central

3rd location: HKU, the main building was still under renovation, so I tried to explore some other interesting spots

final location: ifc

after 3 weeks’  holiday, I resumed shooting last week. (in fact, just no shooting, but still lots of post processing works).

It was a wonderful holiday – shulin started her two-years old  class two weeks ago, and I could stay in the classroom on the first few days and this was really  a wonderful and joyful experience.  Shulin now have to stay in class on her own, and she gets used to it very soon, just cried on the 1st two days. It is very amazing that children can learn things so fast and she really brings lots of happiness to us.

Apart from the several pre-wedding shoots these two weeks, it is so busy this week – we are going to leave our home in new territories and move to kowloon by end of this week. We have been living in Tai Po for over 10 years, this was such a good place to live,  with lots of good memories and  beautiful scenes (sun rise, the tolo harbour and all the trees and birds outside). Having said that, we decided to move so that it spends less time for shulin travelling to and from the school. So you can imagine my home is full of boxes already … … busy packing.

I wish I  can still manage to squeeze some time updating the blog next few days … …. Here is the pre-wedding session of tushiyyah and benny, one of fav session I did before the holiday. hope you enjoy all the photos below.

BTW, we  just exceeded the mark of seven hundred thousand (700,000 ) visitors here, thanks for all your support !!!!

location: St. Stephen College, Shek O, Pottinger Street (Stone Slab Street)

this is my fav shot of tushiyyah. it was taken at a corner at Pottinger Street. It was very very dark, and I challenged myself using several lights in this shot. 3 lights ‘re used with a mix of flashes and LED light, all with different color gel and light modifier (softbox, grid, barn door … …). like this shot a lot, looks so beautiful and all the lightings give a very 3 dimenional look to it.

our first stop: St. Stephen College

we took lots of great shots inside the library !!!!

second stop: Shek O. Got a lot of new ideas to shoot this time

Oh Canly, how could you do that????

another fav of the day, so beautiful and peaceful !!! This was a new angle for shooting I found in shek O

thanks for lying on the sand for this shot !!!!!

last stop: Pottinger Street

It ’s a hot sunny day pre-wedding for charlotte and kelvin. walking on the main stanley market street, we ‘re all attracted by the mini bus selling ice-cream. Without much thought, I asked them if they like to have ice-cream for the photos.  That ’s how I got the photos below …. ….

“Dont’ limit yourself by the location, the limit is only your imagination”

locations: inspiration lake, stanley market, central

don’t miss this behind the scene video. BTW, I started using a new video player that enable html5 video playing on mobile devices. You can try watching using your iphone or iPad, let me know if you have any problem playing it.


1st locaton: inspiration lake

love this shot. this is a big challenge  as it was a sunny day and the sun is very high creating harsh shadow. This can be a nightmare shooting outdoor at this time of the day.  Thanks everyone helping me to prepare the shade, the reflector to modify the light to get this beautiful shot

so pretty !!!!

2nd location: stanley market

the white

and the black

the sleeping beauties

last location: central

thanks everyone !!!