Did this shoot for friends of mine last week. They run a blogshop selling graphic tees and leggings from Korea. Read more about their business here.

Goodbye 2009. Hello 2010! After a season of festivities, everyone’s back to work with, I hope, a fresh perspective to work, life and perhaps a zest, zeal and enthusiasm to make this year count. But take a moment to have some reflection on the past year, and use that as a guide for this.

For myself, this blog was started as a kind of social experiment and i must say I am hooked on it. I started in May 2009, after many years of deliberation and fears that I will not get pass my first post. I eventually discovered a love for writing. I can’t say I’m very good at it but at last I don’t dread it. So my first post was on packing for an overseas shoot in a reply to curious questions on what I always bring on my shoot. At that point of time I was already overseas and that was the perfect moment to talk about it. From then my blogging went on to discuss techniques, equipment, workshops, current work, book reviews and now with my new iPhone, a bit on apps and its camera. After the first post, ideas start popping up and since then, I’ve logged 140 posts! I try to go for higher value content and not just one-liners so I think I’ve done decently looking at my workload.

Continue reading 'A YEAR IN RETROSPECT'»

I’m a big fan of Yellow Octopus’ christmas gifts. So when Kevin dropped by to deliver them, I was in for a ‘wow’ moment. Yellow Octopus is this collection of very talented designers and illustrators and their talents are put to good use every Christmas.

Christmas. A time of giving. It goes beyond just giving material things. In Yolo’s gift, there is a book called ‘The Empty Box’. It’s about a box which was abandoned and later found its purpose…of giving and blessing others. It brings to mind also the biblical story of the five loaves and two fishes. Jesus wanted to feed the thousands that gathered to hear him. All there was were just 5 loaves of bread and 2 fishes. But that was enough. He multiplied them and fed the thousands and even had leftovers. All Jesus needed was for someone to offer something and a miracle was thus performed. This Christmas, let us be reminded that even though we think we have little to give, but giving it willingly is enough to bless all around us. You never know who you can touch deeply with even a gift of good works, of friendship, or even a smile.

Besides the book in the Empty Box, there were rolls of beautifully designed wrappers, all illustrated to the main theme. How apt. A book to shares a heartwarming tale of sharing and giving, and wrappers for all the gifts to bless your loved ones.

Merry Christmas everyone. May you never forget the joy of giving.

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After the first shoot of the cups, an additional shoot was required for both the cups and the coffee sachet to be more in focus. Sometimes shooting the same thing twice gives an opportunity to try and explore a new approach. The layout of props was similar to the previous one so changes were made to the lighting setup. I still used the ST-E2, Speedlite 580EX and an umbrella. This time I used a styrofoam board as a reflector. Continue reading 'Shooting products with a lifestyle twist: Reloaded'»

This article supplements the one I wrote earlier on shooting products at home. If you try shooting products on a white background, you’ll often encounter the problem of having the background not-so white afterall. Of course, you can turn up the power of your flash or lamp but you may end up overexposing your product. So how do you get the perfect white without introducing more light? Here’re the steps I use frequently for a location shoot when sometimes I don’t have the luxury of having all my studio equipment with me. The basic idea is to highlight the areas around the product and turn that to pure white using curves (you can also use level but I just prefer curves). Continue reading 'Shooting Products at Home: Getting the white background'»

I was asked to shoot a set of cups yesterday and I decided to do it with a bit of a lifestyle twist. So what is a lifestyle shoot as opposed to the the normal product shoot? It’s hard to define but I take it as shooting a product with a certain styling and props to simulate a real scene. Unlike a product shoot for a catalog Continue reading 'Shooting Products with a Lifestyle twist'»

This article is to help those who want to take pictures of food or products at home without any professional equipment. This is a simple one-lamp setup, shot with a digital compact camera. Here’re the things you need: Continue reading 'Shooting Products at Home'»