Photoventions 2009-2010

Zwillings (Yin & Yang) : Farhannah and Farhannie

The Goddess Gala Shoot : With my cousins Kathleen and Phoebe

My sister for her birthday shoot

My mom on our post makeup session

Timer photography and first attempt with GIMP

Cover Photo for my 2010 Project

The Story Behind my Photography 2005 & Beyond

2005 and beyond-

The very same Karl Zeiss Sony Cybershot 5.1 MP returned to the Philippines with my name on the box. I had my first digital camera. Although second hand, a hand-me-down, it was a camera nevertheless. A digital camera. It had great features and even as I couldn't adjust the settings as a DSLR - I couldn't complain. I finally could waste the memory card on inanimate objects. I took on my first trip to Wao, Lanao del Norte and took pictures of the road, the hills, people, and everything that I could frame in. So it began.

Here are some early photos in 2005 stored in my Multiply account.

Eventually as the needs went further to editing, my handy dandy DSC and I were constant companions alongside a USB wire or card reader as I learned Picasa - my thanks to Charissa Akut, a great emotional photographer herself, then Photoscape, GIMP - and finally Photoshop.

My best attempts were with family members; my twin nieces Farhannah and Farhannie, my sister, until I ventured in a 2010 Calendar of Birth Flowers with my make up artistry, styling, and photography skills with a non-SLR camera.

I would say I am not a photographer by profession but by passion, I am. And that I don't need an expensive Nikon D90 - well, soon but not now - (or mind someone giving me that, so says my witty conscience aka sister) to exhibit, to show off, to emphasize this very love of this aspect in Art. This Photography. I think it merely takes the patience, the practice and for the lack of anymore p-starting words - PASSION.

The Story Behind my Photography 2004

2004 -

My photography slowly showed promise and Auntie Chinga saw this when she came to visit Philippines. She let me handle her Carl Zeiss Sony Cybershot digital camera. Heavy. Made in Japan. Black. A bit bulky for today's taste but this was 2004, where in Cagayan de Oro, you were either rich or privileged to afford something like it. I jumped from borrowing from my friend, Johnny Macanas - a talented theater actor, model and photographer himself and then to my cousin's Olympus when either was available. I needed them. Not only to feed my own vanity, posing as my own model and lab rat but my present occupation required it. My jewelry business. As an artist, I often found myself sidetracked by colorful skills and manual work - jewelry making was one of them. This was the height of do-it-yourself jewelry and I had access to good beads, wires, pliers and whatnots. I sold them here in the locality to friends and soon, I was already exporting to New Jersey. As a businesswoman of the artsy fartsy, it was important for me to make an impression with my brand "Natural Vices." I decided, that maybe it was time for image models. So I gathered beautiful family members and lovely friends to pose in headshots with my handcrafted earrings. With the simple makeup I did on them, their photos gave even more life to my designs - and together, they traveled abroad.

(Inset: An example from the Natural Vices collection sent to USA with same set of earrings the model is wearing and more. The model is my cousin. )

The Story Behind my Photography 2000

2000 -

I was college in the School of Architecture. By then the world was weaving in the consciousness of the digital era, the new millennium. At the same time, third world countries were just weaving out of the awareness that despite analog, it still had its uses. So I was proud enough to be carrying around independently my mother's Ricoh analog camera. I took it with me in my study travels to Camiguin where we toured the island to document Spanish houses. But of course unlike the digital camera nowadays, I didn't have the luxury to take random photos of inanimate objects. Those were the days when a 36-film camera roll cost Php300 pesos to develop, plus developing charge. A self-supporting working student like me couldn't indulge in what may pay a month's tuition fee. So

my photos always if not often contained faces of my friends in front a backdrop of antique churches and houses. Or else, just faces of my friends - posing to what we prefer to call today as "wacky". The camera lasted me in my study travels to Bohol and Cebu and even in our family visit to Manila. It stayed until it could not serve anymore.

(Inset: An example of my photos in Cebu Taoist Temple. A perfect example of shoot, print, compile and scan)

The Story Behind my Photography

I've always loved photography. Except that I never had a real camera I can call mine.

My first encounter with this - now well-loved apparatus was way back when Kodak had this purse camera. It was slim and yellow and very 1980's. I was well past the era of Polaroid insta-photos but hey, it's back alright. But even as the Polaroid was elusive to me, so was that Kodak fad cam. Only my older cousin could hold it - coz she was "older", naturally. Until I was high school and cameras then were though analog, became even more advanced with the automatic system it had inside. I was 14 years old when my Uncle trusted me with their office issue. Dear Uncle Joe taught me how to frame correctly and balance. He too had an eye for perspectives and art, he is a Mechanical Engineer. But even better than he was in photography is my godmother and my mother's sister, Auntie Chinga. She is an artist and has never ceased to be even as her eyes have failed her. Well, once an artist, always an artist. This is proven through her choices in clothes, colors, designs, and more importantly - cameras. She always had what seemed to be best of what the digital times could offer. Working in the United States, it was easier to do this. While here I was in the Philippines, drooling at her takes and those - cameras.

Moving on...

Finally, after two years promising that the next succeeding posts will be well worth the reading, here I am - working on that promise.

I have easily shunned my collective love for art - of ultimately almost every passion of mine; photography, travel, writing, fashion, and then back to writing - with the alibi of being busy. In 2009, I was just fresh-out-of-the-OB's watch as a new mom to my first baby.That's when I started this. Here I am, it's 2011 and I am pregnant with our second child and I still haven't lifted a finger to do anything. But I guess, lying there with a copy of Anne Rice's "Feast of All Saints", insomniac as I am, I realized I better moved on with it what with a pile of photos ready for the taking. That as well as the challenge of seeing a friend's travel blog finally in the making in Wordpress, which fed the urgency. Thank you Jenifer Maagad. She is a brilliant amateur travel photographer - but then brilliant nonetheless. Perhaps what she is purely good at is that she has an eye for everything beautiful. Check out the new blog on her Guide to Inexpensive Trips around Mindanao.

Just started...

WHAT happened?

I was starting on Twitter and then I was redirected here.... Facebook was going crazy on me and I was like...what the heck let's tweet even if I really don't know what I'm doing in twitter!tsk! I can't even follow AJ Mclean coz I can't find him, I can't even fin dmy friend CJ Akut...

Look! I'm so bored, I'm even taking pictures of my unshaved legs! But you gotta admit my toe paints match the text!

This is a senseless blog, don't worry, the next couple ones will be well worth reading and besides...I just started...