It's the last day of Charge Up and after working through the night to compile everyone's photos to be included in the DVD, I am just dead tired. Anyway the final screening is about to be shown soon and for Ps. Victor's last PowerUp Session. I was really touched by all of the delegate's work from both the videography and photography stream. You guys are absolutely awesome!

Here are the group shots that we took on Friday.



I took a couple shots of this angle with various exposures and layered them to get the background and foreground correctly exposed.

This next group shot was taken by Grace.



Traveling back to KL after the last PowerUp Session and I can't wait for Ps. Victor's last sermon. Awesome stuff!

p.s. Super tired from collecting and sorting through all the photos taken by loads of people during the conference, got back to my room at 4am.

Yes I am here now in Penang attending the Charge Up 2009 Conference and this time not as a participant but rather as one of the coaches for the Photography Stream. Every year Livewire Media organizes a conference for the AV folks and this year it is held at the Penang Christian Centre (PCC). There are 3 available streams for all conference delegates, video, audio and photography and all of these streams are taught by experts from the industry themselves.

Here is Choon Ean giving her opening speech about how she fractured her fibula while trying to take photos while paragliding. I won't say what that gesture was ;)



Ps. Victor Wong is our pastor who will be preaching during all the Power Up sessions.



Every day after the Power up sessions in the morning, we will all proceed to individual workshops. Here is Grace teaching the first workshop on exposure.





Ke Wynn who is our head honcho for the photography stream teaches about posing and portraiture as well as lighting.





Ke Wynn was awesome and he is really down to earth. Each time to constantly reminds the participants that you don't need great gear to take great photos. It takes great photographers to take great photos.

Of course during the course of the workshop, Ian decides to have some fun with Joseph's funky stuff.



Here are some of the participants being shot and shooting with a technique using video lights.



My group which I am helping out with on their practical shoot and trying to practice what they have learned in the earlier workshops.



Joseph assisting the rest with the video light and reflector.



And of course, a quick candid of our wonderful bag seller, Jonathan. Jonathan has the most outstanding portfolio that I have seen I am still trying to get him to share with me his thoughts and thinking process behind his shoots.



Ok, I got to get back to class and begin to capture more photos of the participants.

The year has come and gone, the next thing I know I am being ushered into the next year with plenty of uncertainties roaming about my head. Uncertainties in life and uncertainties in what I do. Just about a month ago I thought I knew exactly what I was going to do but evidently now that it is the first day of the new year, I don't really know what am I supposed to do.

Should I continue in the cycle of what I call a daily routine or should I start rethinking, revisiting and reflecting on what I really want to do. Why I say that I enter 2009 with uncertainties is because I ended 2008 with loads of questions left unanswered.

Firstly, I don't really know where I will be heading to after I leave my exisiting project. This is totally entirely up to me to find out as well as check up on the senior execs in my firm to see if there are positions available in other projects. The next uncertainty would be for me to then consider whether to choose a role because of availability (times are bad now and 2009 has been predicted to be worse) or to choose a role which would help me in my promotion readiness.

The other uncertainty is because of my job allocation, shooting weddings might become a problem because I might be moved to a project overseas or even just here. With that in mind, I am quite hessitant to take any jobs in the coming month of January but thank God that it is also the Chinese New Year period so there aren't that many at the moment.

I guess when I look back at 2008, I feel that I have underachieved, I felt that I could have done more, done it better and done it more efficiently. Of course 2008 was a blast but when I look back at several areas of my life, I can't help but feel that I have let people down, couldn't achieve my targets and realised that I have strayed away for a very very long time. What went wrong?

As I continue the next couple of days to reflect upon 2008, I know I have to move forward and to achieve more, be better and buck up for 2009. What happened in 2008 will be a lesson for me and I will definitely want to make sure that if 2008 was good, 2009 will be legendary! Or so Barney Stinson might say.

Of course not everything turned out bad in 2008. There were several key important moments that have left a mark in my life such as shooting a very interesting wedding in Phuket in April 08, managed to shoot with Malaysia's most awarded photographer, joined the WeddingStory team, completed a very important project for my client, had a blast playing in the company band at our company trip, and met up with friends from the past and helped built relationships.

2009 will be a great year, 2009 will be one that I hope to achieve more.

Here's to a great and wonderful 2009!

Have an excellent and blessed new year!