Guess what? I’ve moved!

From today onwards, I’ll be blogging from www.anna-rina.com, my new blogsite.

Why the move? I reckon it’ll be more convenient for my clients and myself to have everything under one roof instead of having to go back and forth between the website and blog.

And yes, this move was inspired by one of my wedding photography idols, Jessica Claire.

Thanks again for checking out my blog and hope you’ll swing by regularly at the new one as well. Have an awesome week ahead!

XO

I’ve known Deviana for yonks. She’s my sister’s childhood friend and when she got married recently, I was honoured to be part of her and Herman’s big day

Their solemnisation and lunch reception was held at home with family and close friends attending the celebrations. There was plenty of laughter going around as fun was to be had with karaoke sessions by Devi’s grandma and dance performances by Devi’s sister and her friends.

Devi and Herman, here’s wishing you a blessed life together and yes, I’ll be going back to KK month end so I’ll give you a buzz then In the meantime, here are a few of my favourite shots from the day.

See you soon!

The ‘hantaran’ (gifts) trays were all decorated by Devi. She does this on a part-time basis and her work is beautiful! If you’re interested in getting someone to decorate your gift trays for you, drop Devi an email.

I had the shock of my life when the confetti popped during the cake cutting :p I think Herman and Devi were caught by surprise too! Hehe…

Devi’s grandma is super sporting! She was dancing and singing away throughout the reception. Awesome!

Yes this shot of Herman and Devi has been shown in a previous post. But this is a slightly different, muted edit

Thanks to a referral from Vera & Philip (who was the first couple to fly me to KK to shoot their wedding even when I wasn’t a full time photographer yet! I’ll always be grateful to them for trusting a noob then ;D), Priscilla recently contacted me to shoot some portraits for her and her fiance Raymond at the Maple.

We corresponded via email for a couple of days before the shoot and in one of her emails she said, “The only problem is probably we are both are kinda not photogenic people so we need help on that score indeed hehehe but we surely will try our best to follow what you ask us to try :)”

Cilla, all I have to say to that now that I’ve met you two is, “Liaaaarrrrrr!!”. Heheheh…

I don’t know whether or not I told you both of you this (maybe I didn’t, since it’s so corny), but to me, you two ARE photogenic. I honestly don’t think its how you look which matters at the end of the day, but how you connect with each other.

Throughout our session, you and Raymond  were unabashedly loving to each other, you gave each other real kisses (instead of light pecks!heehehe) and the genuine smiles and laughters warmed my heart and made me feel blessed to have captured real emotions instead of only posed shots.

Cilla and Raymond, it was a pleasure to meet you two, congratulations again on your upcoming nuptials and have fun with the preparations for the wedding

Here are some of my favourite shots from the day. Enjoy!

…or ‘The Mother of All Teasers’.

Yes, this is ANOTHER teaser post.

Well, sorta.

I just wanted to post up quick note to inform everyone that I am officially on leave (yes, unbelievable BUT true! I’m on a much needed break. Wheeee!! :D).

I’m out of KL till January 1, 2009 and while my mobile will not be turned on, I’ll still be replying to emails every other day.

A belated Merry Christmas wish to everyone out there Here’s to an awesome New Year ahead for all of us.

See you all next year and do drop by the blog to check out more pictures from the sessions below :) 

Hugs

Jullian & Marie’s Fun KK Reception

The Tan’s relaxed family portraits at the park

David & Laura’s pre-wedding session

Devi & Herman’s solemnisation

Caroline’s family portrait session

Johan & Alia’s solemnisation

Kat & Sern’s tea ceremony & reception

And why in the world are they both so happy and why she’s pointing at me? Find out more soon!

Holla!

The year end holiday season is just around the corner and it has been absolute madness in my lil part of the world.

Am rushing to finish off editing and deliver pictures to a few of my couples before Christmas next week and I’ve got portrait and wedding sessions to shoot from this Thursday till Sunday. Yowza!

This means my regular blog posts will only commence next week. Yaaaa, I lied about blogging this week. Bad, bad blogger :p

Frankly speaking, I’m feeling abit overwhelmed (gasp!) but fret not - with a bit of caffeine and the usual Anna hyperness, I’ll be “Wheeeeee!”-ing my way through it all

In the meantime, here’s a lil preview of Raymond and Cilla’s awesome session. Can’t wait to share more of this lovely couples’ pictures. Wheeee!

Yes they’re not in focus in this pic, the hanging ferns (or whatever you call them) are ;p Will share the focused version in the proper post. I just like the feel of this one

Ok, I’ll be back in a jiffy. Enjoy the rest of the week!

Cover pic of the Malaysian edition of Men’s Health (Dec 08), shot by one of BluInc’s inhouse photogs.

No, no. That’s NOT me! :p Hehe…

It’s Jonathan Wong, one of the founders of Pushmore Fitness Centre. He’s on the cover of December issue of Men’s Health, which coincidentally is also the issue which contains some pics I shot recently. Congrats to JW on appearing on the cover of MH!

So, when I said I’m in Men’s Health, I didn’t mean literally, just some pictures that I shot. Hehe…

Much thanks to Eric and Kenneth for giving me the opportunity to shoot for the mag! Here are digicam shots of part of the spread in the magazine.

On a separate note, I’ve got a few blog posts lined up with pictures from my recent wedding shoots in Kota Kinabalu as well as couple portraiture sessions in Kuala Lumpur.

Looking forward to posting them up soon, but my plates full at the mo as I’ve been working (and working out :p) round the clock on completing a few sets of photos before the holiday season arrives.

The blog posts will have to wait for a lil while more Hopefully by early next week *fingers crossed*. Nevertheless, thanks for dropping by and do swing by next week to check out the new pics ya?

Hugs

The lack of activity on the blog is because I’m back in Kota Kinabalu for a couple of shoots this coming weekend. Been busy with editing and catching up with the family.

Wasn’t planning on blogging about this because some people might think it’s not very nice for my clients and blog readers to know this about me. But what the hey :p

Okay.

So.

Ermm..I’m still thinking whether or not to go through with this.

Arrrrrggggggghhh! Okay okay. I’ll do it.

Wendell and I just agreed on quitting smoking together.

Yes. I smoke. A lot. Ironic I know, but one of the main reasons why I workout so much is so that I can keep my vices.

But since Mr. Wendell “Jom let’s quit smoking together” Gingging decided to bet with me that we’ll both quit smoking on January 2, 2009 (last cigarette before midnight of January 1, 2009. Gasp!), I said okay (why did I say okay?!!?).

Not only that, we have both agreed to participate in the half marathon category of the Borneo International Marathon come October 2009 (double gasp!).

I tried quitting smoking in 2007 with a public declaration on flickr (you can check it out here) and I’m trying it again in 2009. Godspeed!

Pic on left shot by Nee On and pic on right was an x-ray I got nearly 2 years ago. Oh and if you wanna know about my wonky backbone, just click on the link :p

Anyway, the first one to be spotted smoking by any one of our witnesses, will have to buy the winner a meal at Salut (a seafood place in KK) which will include AT LEAST 1kg prawns and 1kg softshell crabs.

So geng KK, please report to me if any of you see Wendell smoking ok?? Hehehe..as for me, urmmm…whoever sees me smoking in KL can email Wendell the time and date that you saw me smoking.

Let the games begin….on January 2, 2009 :p

Edit: Wendell just texted me and said “If u tapuk2 smoke tidak kira”. LOLOLOL!!

Warning: This is another ’shameless’ post totally unrelated to photography. 

Hey guess who’s in December’s Malaysian edition of Shape magazine?

Yes, the shameless photographer strikes again (or as my housemate Ninie likes to joke, “the most photographed photographer” :p). But this time round, it’s not related to photography :p

Picture from Shape magazine, it was shot by one of BluInc’s inhouse photographer.

On another note, I just noticed that the number of comments in this blog has passed 650 comments. Wheeeee!

To celebrate the fact that other people do read this blog and I am not just talking to myself half the time (at least I don’t think I am :p), a new blog design will be coming soon. When the time comes, you my friend, will be the first to know (abadennnn??)

Thank you, yes YOU, for taking the time to read this lil blog of mine and for checking out the pictures that I post up here.

For those who have left their comments here, I truly appreciate your kind words, feedback and general tokkok ;p It really does make my day *skips with joy*.

Have an awesome week ahead!

Before I begin, I would just like to explain that photos in this set were watermarked quite extensively as I found out that some personal shots were ’stolen’ from Facebook and used on another website under another person’s name. Whoever this person is, appreciate if you can respect a photographers rights and give credit where its due.

Okay, having gotten the above off my chest, let us continue on with our regular programming

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Intan and Rudy met during my quarter century birthday party and from thereon, sparks flew.

While it was subtle initially, I could already tell they had something for each other. Come to think of it, since he asked me about her AND she asked me about him, it was rather obvious to me ;p

They’ve been through many ups and downs and I know it hasn’t been easy to get to where they are today. I still remember the moment when I found out from Intan that Rudy had proposed to her at Niagara Falls. I was absolutely ecstatic!

Rudy, on behalf of the rest of the monkeys, thank you. Thank you for loving Intan the way you do, thank you for making her the happiest I’ve ever seen her be. But if I ever see her unhappy, you better watch out cos a certain somebody’s ‘muskels’ are gonna squash you. Heheheh…I kid, I kid.

And Intan, we’ve been friends for yonks and I’ve got no regrets at all about all the stuff that we’ve gone through (yes, even the times when we didn’t speak to each other for a whole year! hahahahah). Even though you’re now somebody’s wife, you’ll always be our best friend.

Take care of each other and I wish upon you both happiness,  success, love and tons of fun! Oh, and lets not forget great sex too :p

And about the speech that you want me to do later during your dinner reception later, let me warn you that I’ll either end up swearing like a sailor or bawling like a baby :p Talking about that, I haven’t prepared the speech yet. Eeeks! See you newlyweds later

Love, Anna.

The solemnisation ceremony was held at Intan’s parents house back in Kota Kinabalu. Here’s some of my favourite shots from the day.

Disclaimer: We were mocking kawaii poses!! We don’t do this all the time!! *shy* :p Heheh…’The Monyets’ shot by Carliff. Ta!

After the solemnisation ceremony, we headed off to Shangri-La Tanjung Aru Resort, where we took some casual portraits with Rudy’s family and also the newlyweds

Congratulations again Intan and Rudy

Jullian and Marie were married last weekend and I had the pleasure of being part of their special day! It’s been three months since I last shot Jullian and Marie’s casual portraits in Kota Kinabalu and flying over to Miri to shoot their wedding was icing on top of the cake.

They first met when Marie was working in San Francisco Coffee in Miri. Apparently, Jullian frequented the place over and over just to see Marie to the point where he finally managed to get her number. And from thereon, love blossomed

With Marie being based in KK and Jullian in Miri, their long distance relationship endured on thanks to frequent calls and trips (thank goodness for budget airlines :p).

I now present to you, some pics from Mr & Mrs Jullian A. Sultan wedding

The glowing bride :) 

How many persons does it take to fit the rings into the ring cushion? ;p Hehe…

Here comes the bride!

The venue of the dinner reception, Park City Everly Hotel

Ian, one of Jullian’s bestfriend and also the person who introduced me to the couple, was the emcee for the night. Thanks for the referral Ian!

Congratulations again you two! Thank you so much for flying me over to capture the event for you. Can’t wait for the KK reception next week! See ya

More pictures from the church ceremony in the slideshow. Enjoy!