Michael & Kimmi's Engagement Photos

Here are some pictures from Michael & Kimmi's engagement photos!








Also, here's a link to Kimmi's website. She's a event/wedding coordinator/floral designer!
http://www.diamondsandpearlsaffair.com

Escalate Live 2010 Conference

To me, this event was a life changing experience and I realized how blessed I am to be able to hear some of the best wedding photographers in the world speak these next couple days. To those of you who don't know, Escalate Live is a program put together by a group of pro wedding photographers that share the same passion and want to share what they've learned in their experiences. Some of those names include [B]ecker, Dane Sanders, David Jay, Jasmine Star, Jeremy Cowart, Jerry Ghionis, Jessica Claire, and Julieanne Kost. These people are amazing at what they do, and coming out of this event I've learned that it's not how well you take pictures. It's the experience you provide for the bride & groom. They're not only just good at what they do, they're real as can be. As soon as JD came up on stage to share those few words about his wife(jasmine star), the whole room was filled with tears and you realize how much they love each other. And that's the kind of love you need to make a relationship work. That's what I love about this industry and going to this event, it totally humbled me. Anyway, gotta watch today's episode of House which was filmed with a Canon 5d mark 2!....and then I'm off to bed to get ready for tomorrows guest speakers! good night fellow bloggers!

Mother's Day

On May 29th of 1984 my mother gave birth to her first baby boy named Manning Pham. This boy didn't realize it until later on in life that he was truly blessed to have such a wonderful mom. And today on mother's day 05/09/10, he would like to thank the lord for blessing him with such a great family. I would also like to congratulate my little sister Amy Pham for graduating Vanguard University yesterday. I'm so proud of her!!! Love you lil sis!!

http://manningpham.zenfolio.com/p64249822

Where do I begin.... I've been neglecting my blogs recently due to my schedule. I'm proud to announce that I'm Kinecta's newest Member service representative, so please let me know if you have any banking needs! I'm also behind on posting up pictures as well. So a few things to look forward to are pictures from 7 seas fish house, San Diego zoo, Michael & Kim Engagement, and more!

The person behind the camera

on April 17th I attended "The person behind the camera" photo shoot. I had the opportunity to meet several other photographers who shared the same passion in photography and introduce myself to the community. The purpose of the meet was to take turns taking pictures of each other and provide edited pictures to use as a professional head shot for our portfolio or website. This was a fun little workshop because I'm usually behind the camera and it was a little difficult for me at first because I was somewhat camera shy. I have no idea how to pose myself! lol So this is what models feel like....I guess it's time to hit the gym. lol I think I captured some nice pictures of my colleagues! It was nice to meet you guys/gals!

slideshow

Raul & Linda Engagement Photo Session

I smell love in the air! Every time I talk to Linda Quang she goes on and on about how much she is in love with her fiance Raul Marquez. Both of them have full time jobs, so it's almost impossible to book a date with these two! Linda loves her family, wine, and shopping. She works in human resources for her company, and Raul is a sheriff for LA County. He loves mixed martial arts, dogs, and weight training! When I finally got to book a date with these lovebirds some birthday dinner plans came up so I only had a small window with them. The weather was nice and bright with clear blue skies. I also had time to drive around and found a small area within mile square park that had been remodeled and the flowers that blossomed had a bright orange color to make a beautiful background for the occasion. These next few months I will be doing a series of engagement photo sessions for the couple so that I can put together a slide show of their romantic love story. LOVES IT! =)

Cypress College Photo Expo

Wow today wore me out! Today I attended a photography expo seminar at Cypress College with my best photography friend Christina Cho! I'd have to say it was one of the most inspirational seminars I've ever been to. We had the pleasure of hearing Jasmine Star & Lawrence Chan speak and boy did it change my perspective of the whole industry. Jasmine Star is truly an amazing person and Lawrence Chan is incredible at what he does. A few of my other favorite photographers were listed to speak there as well including Becker & Vincent Laforet but I didn't get to hear them speak due to conflicting times. I would listen to them all day if I could! I want to thank the whole group to take time out of their lives to share what they've learned from their experiences and to give back to the community of new photographers like myself. Anyway, gotta wake up early tomorrow to go to the San Diego Zoo for more pictures! yayyy!

The Silverado Collection

12:30 photoshoot with Marian Nantell for The Silverado Collection product line! I never new barrel racing was so popular. Happy Trails! =)

The Silverado Collection

The Counter

Last weekend Steve recommended we try out this build your own burger joint called The Counter. The location was a bit difficult to find via google maps, but we all managed to get there. It was pretty good, but kind of pricey considering I could have gone for another burger. I also got pictures of the girls messing around while we waited for a table. =)

Kaden's 3rd Birthday Party at Pretend City

On 3/16/2010 I had the pleasure of shooting Kaden's 3rd Birthday at Pretend City. The lighting was a bit of a challenge, but we managed to get a few shots in. It was low light with a high roof so nothing to bounce the flash off of. Nevertheless, I had a blast! Also we are officially a part of zenfolio galleries! So when you have time visit http://manningpham.zenfolio.com/ and order your prints! I designed a dvd label for the event as well. Anyway, that's it for now. Have a nice day! =)

updates

roar!! ever since I started working on the website I haven't been able to keep up with blogs...sigh

Flash website launch

wahoo! got my flash website up n running earlier today. I've actually had the domain since last June so it'll be time to renew my contract pretty soon.

manningpham.com

Headshot Portrait

Yea yea, call me a procrastinator, but at least I get the job done. So I had 2 weeks to finish this assignment, but I've been in Big Bear on the weekends back to back so I didn't have enough time to arrange a photo shoot with a model. It didn't have to be a model, so I was going to turn in my head shots of Nancy from my other photography class but I only had 10 pictures in the contact sheet and it would be too last minute to get her to sign my model release forms. Luckily my sister happened to come home early today so i lucked out and was able to get in around 18 shots for my contact sheet and release forms. Amy was a trooper and sat through it while I shot random pictures. Not much editing to do cuz it runs in the family lol jk, wahoo! not too shabby! =) After tonight's class I'll finally be able to work on my pictures from big bear. I'm happy with the way they turned out!


before


after

Lake Arrowhead 2010

wahoo! I finally figured out how to extract videos in 1080p. anyways here's a summary of our weekend staying at the Lake Arrowhead Resort Town home. Spectacular view of Lake Arrowhead every morning made it very relaxing. It was the perfect getaway combined with snowboarding on fresh powder! =)

Chinese Lunar New Year

Asian Garden Mall

I went to the Asian garden mall yesterday to buy gifts for the Chinese New Year which happens to land on Valentine's day this year. I feel sorry for people that live remotely close to that area. Trying to find parking was madness!!! Luckily OCC trained me well to stalk people for their parking spots lol. I actually wanted to buy my mother this pot of cool looking orchids, but when she told me the price of $450 I choked and gawked at the scene. Not to mention, these flowers only bloom once a year... You gotta be kidding me!?!?!? So your telling me, I have to water this thing 365 days a year for just a month or so to stare at these mini flower things? Some people are nuts. They even had this exotic carnivorous fly eating pitcher plants. I think I'll take the $10 potted orchids. haha =) Anyway, random people were singing on stage and the dragon dance people had their little performance at the front entrance. I wonder why little kids love to feed these guys money. I bet they could make a killing on the streets of Santa Monica! I remember as a little kid, I always wanted my own dragon costume. I ended our visit with the traditional tet game of "Loc Bo Cua" which translates to "shake cow crab" or something like that? It's a board game that consists of 6 squares. the dealer has under a bowl 3 dices and each side of the dice has a picture of one of the 6 squares(deer/crab/shrimp/rooster/fish/sake bottle). The idea of the game is you make your bet and hopefully one of the 3 dice will roll your number. You can bet as much as you want to win or loose =) but you have to know when to quit. This year they legally got the city to approve of it only on the day of(feb 14th), so when the dealers see a cop they quickly fold up the boards and pretend that they're not doing anything. It's a funny scene to see because these guys are super fast. I ended up winning like 30-50 bucks. Nothing serious but just enough to have a good time and that's what Chinese New Year is all about to me! =) Chuc Mung Nam Oi!

Environmental Portrait

So for my portraiture class I got paired up with William. Our first class assignment was to take an Environmental Portrait of each other. This was a little difficult for me because William didn't play any sports so we had to think of something. He used to take karate lessons when he was a kid so he put on his gear, and I told him to hold a sword as a prop lol. Apparently his mother is japanese so the house was very oriental. We took a few snaps inside but I then took the set to the front of the house where the big bamboo trees were which gave it an asian karate kid theme hehe. All in all, it turned out pretty good. Now it's time for my turn either tonight or sometime this weekend to take a picture of me.... what to do....

Nike Zoom Kobe V Bruce Lee

Me and Bui lined up this morning in LA at the Beverly Hills Center Mall to get a pair of the new Nike Zoom Kobe V Bruce Lee's. They only sold them at 3 stores in the US so they're somewhat rare. This is probably my first pair of shoes that are more for a collection that to wear. I then had a mini photo shoot with them. I really need to finish up my studio instead of editing all of it in photoshop. lol

Tomorrow is Superbowl! I'm hoping Peyton Manning will win it for the Colts!!! woot! woot!

Poster projects

So Andy had me design him a poster for the door of his room. Being a Jersey shore fan, he wanted it to have a fist pump theme that said "Enter fist pump here." I used my roll of Epson single weight Matte paper and programed my epson stylus pro 4880 to cut it at 17"x22"
hehe its so cool!


It turned out pretty good, so I decided to make a poster for myself. Tiffany had posted a picture up on facebook of a poster she wanted to buy of a corgi, so I decided to make my own version of it with Ryder's bath picture. =)

Totally Rad Photoshop Actions

Wahoo I just bought 2 of the 3 Photoshop action packages from TR. Can't wait to shoot & edit now! =)

however, this kinda puts all my photoshop classes to waste.....
I hope I don't get too lazy in the future and rely too much on it...

In the mean time, it is pretty fun to play with hehe.

this is actually one of the demo effects for the tr2 package.

one of the effects called rusty cage.


For this picture, I tested out the dirty picture actions along with some ez burn & contrast.

1/31/2010

So I guess I didn't get the job at stampington but oh well(no reply by the end of the day).... life goes on right? I really wanted that job too..sigh.... On the bright side I did get into my portraiture class that only comes around once every 2 years but it's like a 6-10:20pm class eeks. Also, my new order of 220ml ink cartridges for my epson stylus pro 4880 comes in thursday so I'm pretty excited about that. Should be here sometime on thursday(2/4/2010) from B&H in nyc. Spent around $900 on inks and fine art paper. These rolls of photo/fine art paper don't come cheap. Same with the ink cartridges. It's around $112 per color and the printer has 9 different colors to support the new k3 ultrachrome printer head. So hopefully I'll start selling some portraits soon to get some money back. Also I need to look into a website & business cards for the quinceanera in august and the wedding in September!

As for the picture of the day, I haven't really been keeping up so my picture of the day is actually from yesterday evening. Me & the usuals ate at a new japanese restaurant called Taiko. It's a sushi spot that has a nice authentic homey feel to it right next to yogurtland(not A&J). The portions are generous, and the service is great. You start off with a bowl of rich miso soup and hot green tea. I ordered combo #7 which had sashimi fried chicken and tuna steak. After tax & tip, it came out to around $20 per person so it was very fairly priced. The night was topped off with Yogurtland and we parted ways. Good way to end the night! =)

1/28/2010

Presents from the UPS man

yayy got my tripod & pocketwizards in the mail today. Can't wait to try them out! =)

I've decided that my new years resolution this year is to take at least one picture a day. Right now I'm trying to get myself to drive out to the beach. The sunset looks amazing with the sun peeping through the rain clouds.

So starting Jan 13 me and some friend decided to compete against each other to see who could loose the most weight(biggest looser style). To make it it fair you take whatever you lost divided by your original weight. We're now approaching week 2 of the weight loss competition and so far so good! My goal is to loose around 5lbs per week. Last week I went to the gym 5 days and rested for 2. So if i keep this up along with watching my diet, I should be able to pull it off by March 14th(spring break). Wish me luck!


Also, wish me luck on my interview on Friday! I'm applying for an assistant photographer position at Stampinton & Co. It'll be a great opportunity to learn and expand my knowledge in the photography industry. please oh please oh pleaseee!!! lol

Dinner @ Thuy & Topher's

Today, I spent my evening eating dinner at Thuy & Topher's apartment. Thuy had prepared for us a Vietnamese dish called Bo Tom Muc Nuong Vi. In the Vietnamese culture, pretty much everybody sits around the grill cooking their own beef, shrimp, and squid. Then you roll them into spring rolls and dip into either this fish sauce or squid sauce? Anyways, thanks for having us over! I don't think me and my friends would ever do something like that because we don't know how to cook as well as Thuy does! =) It took her well over 2 hours to prepare, and we had some trouble with the electricity. hehe But nevertheless, we had a wonderful time, and after everyone had their fill of champagne & Final Touch(mixed berries) cake, we gathered around the tv and watched Hangover like fat asses. Never a dull moment! =) Until next time my friends.

Printer Dilemma

I'm at the point in my photography career where I want to step up my game a little bit further. The time has finally come to choose which printer will be representing my artwork. I'm currently using an HP Photosmart C4780 that I got for free when I purchased my Macbook Pro. It's a cute little printer that gets the job done & helped me pass my photography class. Don't get me wrong, in my opinion, it prints out amazing quality 8.5x11 pictures. But then again, what do I know? =P (retail: 150.00)

A smaller step up would be the Epson Artisan 810 All-In-One. It has a 38 ppm max, but the only thing that's disappointing is, it still limits me up to 8.5x11 photo paper. But, I've also heard amazing reviews on the printer, so I would def want to add this printer to my collection someday. (retail: 299.99)


The other printer I was looking into, and seriously considering was the Epson Stylus Pro 4880.
This would be more of an entree level professional imaging photo printer. Amazing quality and can even get in the 16x20 sized photo paper I've been wanting to try out. It has a 17' tray, so the maximum sized paper is 17x22 and can support paper 1.5mm thick. hmmmm maybe canvas printing in the near future? =) (retail: $2,195)


And last but not least, my dream photo printer is the Epson Stylus pro 9900. I mean, what more can you ask for? for a 44" wide printer, there's almost nothing you cant print. The only thing is, the smallest 8.27" x 11"which means no more 4x6's but who cares! Epson does carry 64" printers but I think this is an excellent sized printer. Prints at a resolution of 2880 x 1440 dpi and uses UltraChrome HDR ink jet technology. (retail: $5,995) <---fml =( one day