Jacky Yong

Regine engaged my service 2 weeks before her wedding! I was rather surprised that she would risk her that until the very last minute! Nevertheless, I was also free that day, and so I took on the challenge.

As with almost all my assignments, I always scout for the place before I go to the actual day, especially if the place is in Klang Valley. And what I found out was that the place was really quite small. It was not a bad thing, creative pictures can be produced if you break out of the norm.

I have always worked alone. The drawback is that I can almost always get the shots from the bride’s side. I have always communicated this to my clients before they commit to my service. However this time is a bit different. Two other photographer friends were colleagues with Regine as well. Ivan Ng was a newbie photographer, while Chee Fai is experienced, but wants to learn as well. I admire their spirit of tagging along to learn up. That was how I learned the trade also.

Ivan and I met up in Taman Connaught at 6:30 am, intending to have that famous “叶子楣” big pao. But we couldn’t find it. So we went to Regine’s house at 7:00 am.

The makeup artist was late, so we had plenty of time taking pictures of this and that.

Since I was covering the bride, I have only minimal coverage of the groom Mun Yew.

While the brothers are being “played” by the sisters, I remained in the room with Regine, taking more shots of her. I remember seeing a similar shot somewhere, so I did my version of the shot:

It helped a lot that the couple are two of the most funniest couples that I have ever worked with. They posed willingly, and they joked and smiled a lot, and they were very natural at it! It helps too that they looked photogenic as well.

We went back to Mun Yew’s house, which is only 3 kilometres away! Mun Yew’s family was the modern type. There was no excessive chinese customs to follow. There was not even a dai kum jeh (the chinese master of ceremony, if you will) to help with the coordination. Which is really fine with everyone.

There was pure enjoyment without the annoying dai kum jeh, IMHO. Everyone was laughing away, joking around with the very concept of the chinese customs. They did follow through the entire tea ceremony and everything, but at a very light-hearted pace. Truly an enjoyable moment!

The wedding dinner was in Overseas Restaurant in Jaya One. It’s been a long time since I worked in PJ, so I was surprised to find such a happening place in that area.

The dinner went smoothly without much hiccups. The ceiling was low, and although the environment was orange-tungsten in colour, I had no white balance problem shooting in JPEG, without the coloured dome, in Auto White Balance!

I did a wedding slideshow of the pictures taken earlier that morning. It was a combination of the pictures taken by myself, Chee Fai and Ivan that morning.

When I see the smiling faces of the guests that night, I knew that I had done a good job with the pictures and the slideshow. And of course, I can’t miss capturing the smiling faces!

There was a very embarrassing thing that happened that night, and it wasn’t me! It was Ling Nee. Exactly a week ago, she got so drunk, she broke a glass when doing the yam seng. Guess what? I saw it myself with my own eyes that night! I even captured the moment! I didn’t know I had that picture until I checked back the pictures that I took.

It was a happy ending to a happy marriage. But hey, why is this guy crying?

EDIT 12 Oct 2009:

Added a few more previously unseen pictures, taken from fellow photographer that day Chee Fai:

Edit 17 Oct 2009:

Added previously unseen photos from fellow photographer Ivan Ng:

For more pictures, head on to my gallery.