artisan wedding videos by studio msv

Gabrielle's Atelier and Nicole Lisanne Weddings and Events by Design

 My friends, Gabrielle and Nicole have teamed up; joined forces; shared the burden; and supported each other through the grand opening of their new storefronts in downtown Campbell. They hosted an amazing, two-day launch at their new location and I was priveleged to have been invited to the event.

I first worked with Nicole and Gabby on the inaugural episode of Vendor Chic, my "blow-off-steam" side project that is both fun and beneficial for those who participate. (Did you know that the first three epidodes all got picked up by magazines?)

I've never seen such generosity from a gown vendor and meticulous dedication from a coordinator before. Vendor Chic was a strictly pro-bono project so no one was getting paid to do anything. In fact, many people had to actually spend money to make it come together. Maybe it's because it was my first one ever, but Vendor Chic: Vintage Cowboy still is really special to me. I think a lot of its success has to do with Nicole and Gabby.

Thanks ladies! And congratulations on the start of a new chapter of your lives!

Here are some photos that I took. (You can see more on my Facebook album here.)

Behind the Scenes, Bently Reserve Wedding

Here's a photo of me working with my peeps this past Saturday. Pictured are my friends, photographer Augie Chang, hair/makeup expert Maria Chang (no relation!) and my clients, Mai-Anh and David. (Plus, Augie's second shooter and assistant, Jason and Veronica.)

Original photo can be found HERE.

Not pictured, MB Wedding Designs, Enhanced Lighting, Cards De Luxe, The Bently Reserve, Cake Coquette, and others :-)

See Augie's original (uncropped) photo and the rest of his post HERE

San Francisco is Like My Second Home

One of the cool things about working for yourself is that you can set your own hours and it's likely you can cut down your commute to almost nothing. I work from my home studio so my commute consists of walking down a flight of stairs.

But lately, I've been spending so much time in San Francisco, it feels like my second home!

Check it out:

Tuesday: Dinner with Evonne Wong of www.awaysoiree.com - direct from Maui! I shot with Evonne last March for my special edition of Vendor Chic. (The teaser trailer for that movie can be found here.) Here are some pics from that dinner - from Evonne's blog.

^ Clockwise from top left: Darrin and Evonne, me, Augie Chang, Nancy Liu Chin, Kevin Chin, Chung Li, and Viola Sutanto!

Here's Augie and me being silly.

Then, on Wednesday, The Knot had a gala event at the SF Design Center Galleria and I was invited to be the official videographer at the event. (The fabulous Michelle of MB Wedding Design was the selected coordinator of the event! Great job, MB!) While there, of course, I was able to meet up with many old friends and meet some new ones! I snapped just a couple of pictures; here are some of them.

^ Liz Guthrie and Evonne Wong.

^ Fu Chung Wong of FCWong Photography and Kathy Goodman of Well Rehearsed

^ Evonne, Jubilee Lau and Jean Marks

Then, on Thursday, I headed back out to San Francisco again to meet up with the aforementioned Kathy Goodman for some pastries and a chat just before heading off to a prospective client meeting in the Mission District.

I need frequent flyer miles for crossing the Bay Bridge!

Hawaiian Vacation - Day 8

On our eighth day in paradise, we did the touristy drive up to the north shore area of Oahu where the we watched sea turtles swim, ate garlic shrimp and shaved ice at Oahu's most famous eateries. No wait. We didn't watch sea turtles at famous eateries... that sentence was weird.

Anyway, here are some pictures of that excursion!

Looking for sea turtles.

Looking...

...still looking...

Oh look! There's one! I think it's a robot (see the antennae on its back?)

There's another.

Yikes! It's coming up on shore! RUN!!

 

Good times.

Hawaiian Vacation - Day Seven

Monday, my seventh day on the islands, was spent on a Vendor Chic shoot with event planner extraordinaire, Evonne Wong. Evonne is a Bay Area transplant but now makes her home in Maui. So I flew from Oahu to Maui in the morning and spent the rest of the day shooting on a private estate near the famous Wailea beaches on the south shore.

^ It seems someone knew I was coming! That's quite a welcome. Aloha to you, too, Hawaii DMV!

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Here's Evonne and me after the shoot. I'm a little sunburnt. I had forgotten my sunblock and you certainly can't rely on the locals to carry any. They're locals!

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This is photographer, Matt Alvarado of www.abelovedwedding.com. He's very used to paparazzi, as you can tell. Jazmin, his lovely assistant (seen below,) is not as shy in front of the camera.

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Here below are our models, Rachel and Mike. We initially only booked Rachel for the shoot, but a few hours into the shoot, I decided we really should have a *guy* model as well. Rachel called up her boyfriend, and within a few more hours, we had ourselves a hot couple to shoot! Thanks guys!

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Here's the crew all wind-blown and tired. Continue below to see the resulting teaser trailer for Vendor Chic IV: Paradise Maui!

Maui Photoshoot: Sneak Peek

Direct from photographer, Matt Alvarado's blog post; some behind-the-scenes photos from the Vendor Chic IV photo/video shoot I did in Maui last month.

(click photo to enlarge!)

Check out Matt's blog and site!

Hawaiian Vacation - Day Six

Day six was our big sigh-a-breath-of-relief day. It was the day after the wedding and we had a chance to go and relax (not that the previous days weren't relaxing... it is, afterall, Hawaii.) So we took our time going to Pearl Harbor and some other places, then meeting with friends for dinner.

^ The entrance to the USS Arizona tour/exhibit showcases this actual salvaged anchor. Massive. There were several hands-on type of artifacts/monuments that the kids could explore.

^ Leave it to my daughter to play the role of the chatty teenager on a battleship. She picked up the phone and said, in a sing-song voice, "hello, USS"

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^ My kids in wartime. I think they could hold their own.

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^ In spite of the fun and games, I still took time to contemplate the sacrifices and tragic loss-of-life on that fateful December day in 1941. The memorial you see above had statistics listing the civilian deaths, their names and their ages. It was very sobering. God bless our military and our veterans!

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^ That evening, we found time to hang out by the hot tub for a while before heading off to dinner.

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The Waikiki skyline at night.

Hawaiian Vacation - Day Five

Saturday was the big wedding day. In case I was unclear about why I was in Hawaii, it was because my friend was getting married and I was asked to be one of the groomsmen.

The ceremony was held at a new campus and chapel at the groom's alma mater, Hawaiian Baptist Academy. The reception was held at the gorgeous Ko'olau Golf Club in the shadow of the amazing Nu'uanu Pali mountains!

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^ Anton Lorimer of Lorimerworks.com was the photographer and James Burkart of Burkart Video Productions was the official videographer of the event. I introduced the bride and groom to the talented vendors and I'm sure they're going to get some awesome stuff as a result!

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Here's my wife and my mainland buddies.

Hawaiian Vacation - Day Four

On our fourth day in Hawaii, we went to the Dole Plantation where my kids had a good time navigating the world's largest maze and learning about pineapple facts. Here are some pics from that day:

^ Here's the outside of the pineapple maze. You can see an aerial photo here. (My daughter is such a ham. I have no idea where she gets it from.)  :-|

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There were many different pineapple varieties in the garden area. Most of the ones on display were miniature! Weird.

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^ Here's the Pineapple Express where we took a tour of the plantation.

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This is the world-famous "Dole Whip" pineapple ice cream with crushed pineapple bits. It's pretty yummy! But you know what's even better? I found this gem by the cashier:

^ It's caffeineated mints! Holy smokes. One mint has the caffeine content of one cup of coffee? How rad is that?!

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^ My kids being silly.

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Click on the picture for the full-sized images. (p.s., See? I told you my daughter was a ham.)

Hawaiian Vacation - Day Two and Three

I'll keep this post less wordy and more pictorial. But some of the pictures won't make much sense if you don't read the caption. :-) Enjoy!

^ We spent a good amount of time on the beach on our second day. It started out kind of boring, but watching the kids have fun and getting a REAL chance to unwind proved quite enjoyable.

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^ That night, on the suggestion from many friends who live or have lived in Hawaii and other friends who have visited Oahu before, we went to Zippy's - a fastfood Hawaiin lunch plate restaurant. Above pictured is the Koren fried chicken plate that I got. It was much better than I anticipated. Props to Evonne, Diane, Hosannah, Karl and Justin for all their suggestions!

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^ This is the famous "Leonard's Bakery" - THE place to go for malasadas, apparently. malasadas are a sort of a Portugese donut that you really can't get anywhere else. At least I've never seen on on the mainland before. The parking lot maybe could hold 10 cars and when we showed up, there were cars lined up out of the lot. Business majors will recognize this as a classic case of keeping supplies low in order to create demand. :-)

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^ Zach and I built a Bionicle.

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^ I taught Zach and Hannah the trick of timing your jump while in the elevator - if you jump right when the elevator stops going up and time it just perfectly, you can almost hit the ceiling! Conversely, if you jump right when it stops going down, you feel like the force of gravity is three times stronger and you come crashing to the ground before you have a chance to gain much air! They've done it on every elevator trip since the first day I showed it to them.

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^ Hannah tossing a coconut.

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^ Here's a photo of a near sunset at Ala Moana Park. Click on it to enlarge.

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^ Zach and a model Ferarri F1.