post drumming: hangovers, reality, and finding that groove

Gong Xi Fa Chai! A new year in the Chinese calendar, and I haven’t done much since I started the new year – no shoots, no projects, no concepts but plans, plans and more plans. I am not quite, sure but lately I have become lazy or maybe I have become choosy over what I want to work on but as one of my daughter goes – Meh! But anyway I will be writing on my updates.

What’s new and what’s happening to the Asylum?

•          Aside from acquiring a new staff, a new direction is to go bolder, with my shoots, meaning more risqué. I like to work on pieces that show glamour, sex, and a lot of skin, that of voyeur point of view – and a lot of more storytelling now than just my typical point, direct and shoot. I want to push myself as photographer, and with this new direction, it would really flex my portfolio to push my confidence in interaction as a photographer and my model without stretching the perv-photographer.
•          I would be working on being part of the Asia Pop Comic Con 2016 as a media partner, and I hope I get the bit.
•         Events less, private shoots more – meaning I would no longer be going to BOA, Otaku Expo, Toycon more on NEXCON, APCC, Fantasy Quest and other selected events but focusing on clientele to do shoots that I want to take my time and work on. I would redo my Lolita, and do another City of Pines Tour this year.
•        Different style of editing – yes with my new staff, I will be turning it over to a graphics artist in which I can trust in doing the dirty work. Fixing what I can’t do or manipulate.
•         I would be traveling more, and shooting more on volunteering models – Yes I have chosen this route ever since I got inspired meeting people I met from Baguio, and surely there are other provinces who has cosplayers that are warm and accommodating as them.
•         Lastly, I will be back soon on my Social Networks. Ever since my phone killed itself, I would be acquiring a new unit to interact with the people of the world again.

This may be the shortest entry I may have written, but I want to thank JC ZALA Travel and Tours, for helping me in my travel to Kalibo – of all the trips, I am thankful that I have a travel advisor helping get to my father’s homeland. Without their patience and understanding – I am grateful for their help. Based in Zamboanga, I was acquire what I need with a few hitches then and there on my part, but I want to plug them – should you need to travel around the country, they will gladly arrange it for you.

That’s it for now, I may write more food and movie reviews soon. Stay tuned.

three conventions and a delayed photoshoot

It has been pretty a long time since I wrote something in my blog, and I still feel the falling out from a colleague who helped me get to where I am at. A lot has happened over the course of the month itself, tragic or joy – thankful that I got through. May, was a busy month, where I was able to attend three cosplay conventions from Saturday to Sunday to the end of the month, and tried to pull off a photo shoot in the same but got delayed due to unforeseen things.

 I never realized how much the month of may drained me, that to this very day I still felt never so tired – never again will I do something like this but down the line I had fun.

April, O-Kun Fiesto

Nica, Nexcon

Shion Goddess, Animax

On the 16^th of May I attended the O-Kun Fiesta which was held in the SMX of SM Mall of Asia, sad to say the event pretty much disappointed me, in which I felt the event proper felt flat – I got bored right away where I took a few shots and left home early. Maybe it was the crowd that got to me or maybe it was the lack of sleep, which I think I had only 3 hours of – I came in to see two of my daughters, April and Yuriko, and did a small shoot with some friends that I knew who were present in the area. I was pretty much convinced that I will not go the event the day after which was Nex Con, but sure enough with a few tugs from Vincent aka No-face and Nica, I surprised myself by boarding the cab heading out to the function rooms of SM Aura. With all the cosplay events I have attended, I have never gone to something that felt organized and clean with Nex Con. Though the cosplayers wore western influenced characters such as the likes of TV series the Game of Thrones to Lord of the Rings to DC Comics characters – it was fun. More so that Vincent and I helped opened the 2^nd day to the event with  a game called Face Palm the Music, in which we had to guess the theme or song by face palming a human buzzer. I lost by one, because we had to spin around before buzzing… I lost to “Mortal Kombat”.  And my friends, this is how I humiliated myself with loads of people, but I can't stop smiling from then on.  I had a number of shots, from shooting a gang load of Daenarys attacking a Tyrell, to seeing the New 52 Joker harassing a Batman mannequin, to bumping in person the famous Jin and Tadashi cosplayers, and scream my lungs out on a Lip Synch battle in support of people who I just met. I went home late with a smile as oppose to O-kun.

The very next week I had to go to BGC for a photo shoot I organized with inked friends, unfortunately I had to postpone due to having one of my models not feeling so well that day. I was pretty much tired, I didn’t want to go to any other events until my officemate the cosplayer, Shion Goddess pushed me to attending Animax which was on the 31^st of May. To be honest, I never wanted to go and support Alodia events because I felt cheated on overpriced tickets and felt it was not worth m time – but it was Shion Goddess’ return, I had to pay my respects and help get her career going – thinking nothing could top the experience and fun I had with Nex Con, the event of Animax was rather almost as par, same chaos though, but meeting colleagues like my idol Sir Christian Mack, seeing my old model Ysa, meeting up with Cjaze and others I had a decent amount of fun. From the cheesy lanyard I got from the ticket to laughing my ass off seeing Shion Goddess try to grab a soda, and ended up almost half an hour or so because the fanatics just can’t stop admiring and take a shoot of her, to having mysef just chilling and having a good time without stressing myself too much.

Maybe I should keep on having this mentality of not stressing myself too much on the next cosplay events – and just really feel and rock the vibe of people and meet new friends. I am ever grateful to all of the time I have had – it helped me overcome the depression I had along the way, especially dealing with my Mom’s cancer and work performance blues… I hope the momentum keeps on going.