A couple of weeks ago, on August 7th, countless couples decided to get married.  It just so happened that it rained the first time in months on this day.  But rain doesn’t stop a couple from getting married. 

Andrea and Steven were one of those couples.

They’re a young couple, but very much in love and definitely excited to be married.  They got married in the temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Langley.  Then we moved on to New Westminster for some pictures.  I didn’t get the opportunity to attend their reception because I had to attend another lucky rainy day wedding, but I heard it was perfect.  Like I said in an earlier post:  Latinos are vivacious.  They know how to throw a party.

Congratulations Andrea and Steven!  I’m really happy for the two of you and thanks for letting me a part of such a momentous occasion in your life together!

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This is the first time I’ve ever done a headshot and I’m happy with who my first headshot was.  Devon is a very outspoken person.  He’s not shy to voice his opinions.  These headshots were used for entertainment auditions.  I remember that during this shoot I spent a lot of time laughing as Devon was trying to get me to be more comfortable around him.  That’s something that I really appreciate.  It’s rare for me to come across a person who’s so relaxed in front of the camera that they’re thinking about my comfort than their own.

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I LOVE THIS BAND!!!

Behind Sapphire is officially my favourite band in the whole world!!  I may show favouritism towards them because they’re my friends but they’re spectacular musicians!  They’re so passionate about what they do that it shows in their stage presence and in everything else that they do.

This year, Behind Sapphire is one of the top 20 finalists for The Peak Performance Project hosted by 100.5 The Peak FM.  (For more information visit: www.thepeakperformance.com).  I’m so proud of them.  Like you can’t believe.  I’ve seen them progress so much in the past year that I feel like they do deserve recognition for all of the hard work they’ve put into their music.

Below is a little bit of promo that I’ve done for them.  I think that from these photos you can get a bit of a sense of the type of characters these boys are.  It’s never dull with Behind Sapphire around.  Girls, seriously, it’s easy to crush on them because they’re so sweet and adorable.

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Latinos have a certain vivaciousness that I lack.  No matter how hard I try, I just don’t have that flare that comes out naturally for them.  Maybe it’s because I’m Chinese and am a lot more traditional than I’d like to think I am.  I’m eccentric, but not vivacious.  That makes me appreciate other’s a whole lot more.  They hold qualities that I don’t have and that makes life and friendships more interesting.

The Turcios are a Latino family that I have gotten to know better and better over the years.  This year, they’ve asked me to shoot some photos for their Mothers’ Day gift.  Being the people that they are, it’s always fun being with them and taking their pictures.  A week afterwards, I got to shoot Andrea’s engagement photos!  Andrea and Steven got married recently.  (Post to come shortly).  It’s always a priviledge to be asked to play a part in important events in others’ lives, especially those of my friends.

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This was a really nice wedding.  The wedding and reception was held at The Hart House Restaurant located by Deer Lake in Burnaby.  It was a nice little location because you have have the greenery and the lake in the background.  The Hart House itself was an interesting restaurant because it looked like an old lodge, but cleaner and whiter.  The wedding was really small with approximate 40 guests.  Everything took place in only a few hours. Heidi and Mike are a really nice couple.  Heidi’s sister attended another wedding that I shot for a friend over a year ago, so she recommended me to Heidi.  I find it interesting to see all the varying displays of love between different families.  At my friend Viviana’s wedding, a good portion of the families were crying because it was an overflow of love.  At Heidi’s wedding, I don’t know if I saw a tear, but there was still a strong atmosphere of deep love among Heidi, Mike, and their family and friends.  Kaleb, Heidi’s son, was an adorable attention stealer.  It wasn’t just a union between a man and a woman, but also a union with a little boy.

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Sorry for the late post!  This wedding occured in late January this year and I had for some reason thought that I had posted it.  I wrote up the draft but never published it.  If you’ve read my previous post with my Olympic photos sadness, it doesn’t make me look very good.  BUT!  I assure you that I’m just not as avid of a blogger as I should be.  Everything else is good.

Anyways, this wedding was fun!  Despite the fact that I spent half the evening cold and wet from the waist down, it was a really good night!

Everything happened pretty fast for this wedding of 2 couples from Brazil.  Actually, one of the grooms is from from a small island off of Spain and one of the brides married the brother of the other bride.  All this was communicated to me in several languages.  I understood the English but there was also Spanish and Portugese that was flying around the entire night.  I managed to understand a TINY bit of Spanish, but not enough to really get the jist of the conversation.

Anyways, as I was saying, this all happened pretty fast.  I was hired 2 weeks before the wedding and the couples were engaged before Christmas.  But despite the short amount of time that was used to organize the wedding, it went by really well.  The couples were married on a boat off the pier on Denman Street.  After the ceremony, we went on a small cruise around the inlet.  That’s how I got wet.  I was at the bow of the boat which had holes at the bottom.  The boat hit a wave and water splashed through the holes where I was standing, soaking my pants from the waist down.  I don’t mind being wet……I’m just glad my camera didn’t fly out of my hands……

The rest of the reception on the boat reminded me of a New Year’s party.  Lots of dancing for the small group of guests.  Everyone had a great time and I got a lot of great pictures.  Brazilians really know how to party.

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This photo makes me want to cry.  Not because I don’t like it, but becuse there are hundreds others like it that are missing from my harddrives.  I don’t know what happened to my photos during my first few days of gallavanting around the Lower Mainland during the Olympics.  This photo of Hawksley Workman’s concert at The Ozone was the only that survived whatever it was that happened to my photos.  I’ve got to say though, this concert showed me what real showmanship was about.  Hawksley can work the crowd.

One day in the future, I’ll post up more images….  If I manage to find them.  I’ve heard rumours that others have them…..

In 2008 at the Rio Tinto Dragon Boat Festival, The Trews played a free outdoor concert by Science World.  It was the first concert I had ever been to.  It was pretty amazing for a first concert.  I went out there by myself but I took my camera with me and took as many photos as possible.  Through this experience I realized how much I love concert photography.  There’s so much raw passion on stage that draws people in.  I wanted to be able to capture that on my camera.  So I associate The Trews with the beginnings of my love of concert photography.  Plus I like the band.

So to be able to see them again a year and a half later was something else.  I was on cloud 9 when I found out I was allowed to take some media shots for them.  They played at the Rio Theatre on November 27th, 2009.  It was an accoustic concert, something very different from what I heard at the dragon boat festival, but they were just as energetic and solid.  I loved every moment of it.  It was almost like my experiences with photography and music was coming full circle.  I had gained more knowledge on photography by then and I had definitely gone to a lot more concerts since my first Trews concert.

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Here are a few that I took November 25, 2009 at St. James Hall.  The opening musician is Hannah Georgas, I believe, from the Island.  It’s been awhile since I heard her music so I don’t remember what it was like.  I just remember I liked it.  Then Said The Whale, with frontmen Tyler Bancroft and Ben Worcester, took the stage after Hannah Georgas’s set.  I wasn’t disappointed.  Their live performance was solid and, being among a crowd of buzzed fans, revved us all up for more upbeat, happy rhythems and rifts strongly influenced by the sights and sounds of beautiful Canada.

Check out Said the Whale.  I wouldn’t be surprised if they became the next Trews of the westcoast.

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Mainstream music has its benefits. It’s more pleasing to listen to and taps into the right emotions to keep you listening. It’s like mass production for the ears. It is meant only to please the listeners and about the hit songs that make money. Mainstream is so manufactured and formulated that performance barriers are formed, causing a musician’s inability to perform music in its purest form. Music in its purest is meant to be felt, not heard. Indie music does just that. It’s the complete opposite of mainstream. It’s all about the musicians and their passion for music. You don’t listen to indie bands because of their one song that sounds good. You listen to these bands for the musicians themselves. There’s something sublime about a person when they skillfully show a range of emotions, baring their souls as often as possible and to as many people as possible. It’s a form of expression, of conveying an emotion or an experience that words alone have no way of expressing.

The past year I have been discovering real musicians from the local community. These are musicians who are “undiscovered”. They play real music that one can feel, not just hear.

For me, the first of these bands is Behind Sapphire. I was astonished to see 2 young men skillfully perform such soulful melodies. I was first mesmerized from the moment Grant sang, and as the months went by, that mesmerization was held strong by Matt’s increasingly complex guitar. So when Matt asked me to take pictures for Behind Sapphire, the word ‘no’ instantly evaporated from my vocabulary. If I’d try to search for it, it would have been as if the word never existed.

About a month later with shooting and post finished, we have the picture you see above. This is picture 1 from a series I took for them. I’m excited for the release of the rest of the photos because I’ve never been so satisfied with a picture. When something’s perfect, there’s a tingling of excitement that’s generated from your heart and spreads out through to your extremeties that you just want to share this excitement with everyone.

I’m excited for Behind Sapphire’s future. The release of their first full album is coming up soon so you have to check them out and buy their album!

To check out Behind Sapphire’s music and their shows, visit: http://www.myspace.com/behindsapphire