An impressive line-up of artistes is set to entertain Klang Valley folk when the month-long Sunrise Jazz & Rhythm Fest 2006 trumpets to its much-awaited start on July 28th at the Plaza Mont’Kiara fountain courtyard here in Kuala Lumpur.

Date & Time: Fri 28 Jul – Sat 12 Aug (Fri & Sat nights ONLY)
Tickets: Free Admission
Synopsis: The annual jazz event is back yet again, promising three weekends of a fusion of premier contemporary and classic jazz performances. Expect to see some jazz veterans along with some new blood industry, in this event organised by Sunrise Berhad.

Fri 28 Jul
8.30pm – 9pm: Fashion Jazz
9pm – 10.45pm: Rachel Guerzo Quartet
11pm – 12.30am: Lewis Pragasam & AsiaBeat

Sat 29 Jul
8.30pm – 9pm: Hip Hop by DanceStyle
9pm – 10.45pm: GruvAvenue
11pm – 12.30am: Amir Yussof & Friends

Fri 4 Aug
8.30pm – 9pm: Belly Dancing
9pm – 10.45pm: Cosmic Funk Express
11pm – 12.30am: Jupiter@7

Sat 5 Aug
8.30pm – 9pm: Sharizan Borhan & Swing Inc
9pm – 10.45pm: Shelley Leong & Jazz Odyssey
11pm – 12.30am: Funk Mob [John Thomas, Eric Li & Fly]

Fri 11 Aug
8.30pm – 9pm: Rentak K.a.my
9pm – 10.45pm: Mr. Gambus
11pm – 12.30am – Tinderbox

Sat 12 Aug
8.30 pm – 9pm: Jazzing With Style
9pm till 10.45pm: Noryn Aziz
11pm – 12.30am – Aseana Percussion Unit

Pretty cool event to practise your event photography for free.

Date/Time: 25th August 2006, time of attendance most probably follows as the 2nd TT

Venue: Nasi Kandar Sedap@Aman Suria (next to Dataran Prima), Petaling Jaya

There could be representatives from Canon, Nikon and Sony to join us for the DCM 3rd TT Gathering; hopefully they can demo to us their EOS 30D, D80 and Alpha A100 DSLR cameras.

Directions:

If you come from Motorola, use the LDP highway and turn left after the St Ignatius Church into Jln SS25/23.
Drive straight turning left at the mini round-about.
Drive straight on coming to a sharp right turn on what will be named “Jln Bt Mayang Emas” now.
Continue driving straight on up the hill, taking a sharp right corner.
Turn right at Jln SS1/45.
Nasi Kandar Sedap will be on your left hand side.

Latest info here.

Personally I’d say when it comes to photographing landscapes and still life I’m already pretty good, I naturally understand the composition for buildings, scenery and things that don’t have facial expressions.

When it come to people, I’m a beginner, I rarely pointed my Canon A70 at people, shooting people was never very interesting for me, only during parties, then I seemed to have a talent for the candid shot, capturing the moment rather than cheesy smiles and pre-posed stances.

From this I branched into street photography, which is candid for me, to bring out the true feeling, eye contact is good but not in a posed way as demonstrated by Lanatir below, you can have a eye contact portrait without it looked manufactured.

I like to try and capture some kind of emotion, capture a peice of the moment, not just some people facing the camera and smiling over and over.

I like to feel something when I look at the picture, not just go next..next..next..

For me this the essence of capturing an event, the same goes for weddings, nowdays this style has a label it’s called photojournalism style..for me, I just call it real.

I like to use a narrow depth of focus to give a real pop to the subject.

You can capture many emotions in this manner, when people don’t expect it, boredom, frustration, happiness, laughter, waiting etc..

This is my first effort of event style photography with my new SLR camera, so I have a lot to learn still, these are just my few tips from past experience.

It’s good to use SLOW flash setting to make people stand out, and any motion in the background will be blurred.

I also like to frame the subject with other people, or some objects like a glass to bring them out and add interest.

These were all taken with a very cheap prime Nikon Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D AF.

They aren’t the best pictures in the world, but I’m just starting out..

I hope my learning journey can help you too.

All were processed from RAW last night, my RAW workflow is still a bit hit and miss, I need to work on that.

That’s all for now

You can view the whole set here.