Hey everyone. Sorry for not updating my blog in the last few months. I have been rather busy doing really nothing important at all. Nothing important? Well, nothing wedding important. IN December, it was crazy! The last week of December, I had numerous back to back weddings right before and right after Christmas. Then on December 31st, I jetted off to New Orleans to watch the University of Hawaii play in the Sugar Bowl on January 1st.

So why do I not have any pictures of myself at the Sugar Bowl? Well, here's the funny thing. Although I know how to take great photos, when traveling, I really don't carry around my professional photography equipment. It's bulky, it's expensive, it's cumbersome, there are just too many negatives to be hauling around my photo equipment on a laid back trip. Moreover, while I love to take photos for weddings, in my personal life, taking photos is not my hobby like other professional photographers. Strange isn't it? But, let me be real honest here. When I put that lense up to my eye, I just feel detached from what's truly happening in front of me. Watching life happen through a lense is pretty much like watching TV. It's not live...even though it is. So to me, carrying around a camera, and taking great photos on vacations, for me, actually takes away from experiencing life. Let me put it this way. If you got tickets to go to the SuperBowl, would you want to watch it with your own two eyes on the 50 yard line, or stare at through a video camera lense.... Ahh...now you get my drift.

So why didn't I just take a small digitla camera? Funny thing... I did. But I ran out of batteries on the day of the SugarBowl! Actually, my mom forgot to charge the batteries so it really wasn't my fault. But I did take these other photos...

So if you already know, Hawaii got killed in the Sugar Bowl. Literally. Colt Brennan didn't play well at all. More so, our offensive line just got dominated. But I beleive we'll be back one day in a BCS bowl, and well actually win it. But despite for the fact that we loss horribly, at the Sugar Bowl, I still had fun.

What else have I been up to this past three months? Well, partly, I've been doing weddings, watching football, and playing football. Oh, and I've been writing a lot of articles lately for an bridal educational website that I plan on releasing in a year.

I'll be posting a few wedding updates in awhile guys and gals... I'm also thinking of getting one of my personal assistants to follow me around on my weddings so they can write articles about ALL of the weddings that I do. Still tossing around that idea.....

My Christmas Gift to myself

It's not actually as green as the one pictured above. More black, with the Eagles design. Anyway, back to my blog. Well, it's all over my page and it's true. I AM THE ANTI-CHEESE, so does that mean I would do business with a cheese head. OF COURSE! For the right amount of money...just kidding!!!

Introducing Todd and Tracy. A great couple, a romantic couple, and a pretty fun one as well. Tracy and Todd were married on September 5, 2007 at Ko'olina. Yes it's been awhile, but I remember like it was yesterday, mainly two things. Tracy was a bit younger than Todd and joked that if she knew how old Todd was in the first place, she wouldn't have gone out with him. Haha. Wait a minute, did she joke about that? I think she did! The second thing I remember about why they had booked me is because I had taken a picture of myself in Wisconsin! So it wasn't my skill, my personality, or my professionalism. It was just the picture... hmm..You know, never did I think I would ever get a booking because of that cool self-portrait of me freezing my butt off in Wisconsin, but am I just that good looking? Any other takers? hahah. Maybe I'm in the wrong profession here, anyone need a male supermodel? Lastly, I remember Todd's family being a season ticket holder for the Green bay Packers.

that's a sailboat in the background, not an albino shark fin

Tracy and Todd still keep in touch till this day. In fact, it was Tracy who reminded me to blog about their wedding...haha. I apologize Tracy, I'm forgetful when it comes to this blogging thing. Todd had to email me about Philly's lost to Green bay, which was just humiliating. And when Tracy and Todd finally make it back to Hawaii, if they contact me, I plan on taking them out to a nice Korean Yakiniku dinner (Tracy you have that in writing here). As a last note, all I can say is this about this special couple is that age is not a determining factor for love. Never was, never will be. Nuff said....

Is that a nice sunset or what...

On a different note, a serious note. Let's talk about photography for a bit here. Many wedding companies, many photographers who shoot for wedding companies, always struggle when it comes to sunset shots. First of all, it's all about exposure. You don't want too high of a shutter speed or else you'll just snap a picture of a yellow dot. You don't want too low of an aperture, or else you'll get a blurry background. Lastly, you need to know your weather. Sunsets never ever happen on time. Even when that savy forecaster says the sun will set at 5:47pm, that doesn't mean that it'll set at 5:47pm. In this case (the picture above), the sunset was a lot earlier because cloud cover came in. And you know what, cloud cover comes in most of the time. So what does that tell us. In order to get the best sunset shots, show up early, and wait for the perfect shot. Too many wedding companies try to cram the ceremony and sunset shots all into one hour. You really can't do that. If they claim they can do that, well, they're just in it for the money and they don't care about quality at all. They are just looking to marry you, snap a few shots, and go home. I'm exactly the opposite as you can tell....

Well, this is all for this blog. Hope you had fun reading it. I sure had fun writing it...

MY TWO CENTS - A PEEK INTO MY BRAIN
It's about 2:25am on a Tuesday morning here in Hawaii. I think it's almost been two weeks since my last University of Hawaii football game, and I can tell you that I'm still riding on a high. That Washington game was some game. Remarkable...just remarkable.

But as I was catching up on the news today, my high spirits basically fell a little. The reason? Well, as I read the news today, I realized how upside down the world has become since my father's generation. Kmart and Sears are no longer calling their Christmas trees....."Christmas Trees." They are just calling them "trees..." At one of our larger malls, Ward Center, they are not calling calling this holiday, a Christmas Holiday, but they are calling it "Festival of Gifts month." Isn't that just insane?

Then I take a look at today's sentencing for Michael Vick. He got 23 months in federal prison for cruelty to animals and being the head huncho in an underground dog fighting gambling ring. Is he an idiot...yes. Is what he did wrong and disgusting? Yes. But does he deserve this stiff of a sentence and his entire NFL career to end? No. He should have the chance to redeem himself, to bring himself back from this low. And with this sentence, it looks as though his NFL career is basically over. Now you're probably wondering why I feel this way about Michael Vick. Well, in a way, he is a victim here as well. Don't get me wrong, again, what he did was horrible. But did you see the hate that accumulated toward him for his actions. He had the animal rights group, angry protesters, you name it, calling for his head on a stick. Now that's all fine and dandy. But where is the same anger when we learn of a sick child molester in our neighborhood? Where is the anger then? How about just plain ol murderers who are sentenced in federal prison. Where are the angry mobs then? Why are these child molesters and murderers getting a lighter sentence than Michael Vick, and getting out early on good behavior? Why can they (the child rapist and murderers) plead insanity and not even go to jail? Why are there more groups that advocate that rapist, murderers, and child molesters should have the chance to redeem themselves in society, and not Michael Vick? There's a very sick double standard here.....

Guilty as charged, but too stiff a penalty?

And then we take look at the Jena six case. A case which is pretty much open and shut. Six angry black kids beat up a white student after being outraged that he may have hung nooses on a tree. If the white kid hung those nooses, yes, it was very distasteful. But those six angry black kids had no right to beat him unconscious, and to continue kicking him on the ground while he was unconscious. Here in Hawaii, that would be attempted murder. In most states that would be attempted murder. But in Jena, it is not considered attempted murder, but aggravated assault. But what really gets me is that this white kid, the victim, is not seen as victim, but more as the one who deserved to be assaulted. And the Jena Six are victims, victims of a corrupt system according to many. Am I missing something here? How can you assault someone and then held up as hero for civil rights? Something is wrong....

If the roles were reversed, and six white kids beat up on a black kid, it would definitely be charged as attempted murder and a hate crime. Again, there is a very sick double standard here.... And I know about other instances that happened in Jena, which look as though black kids looked as though they were judged unfairly, but that is a separate case, nothing to do with the Jena Six. The Jena Six are not victims here, they are the assaulter and should not be freed, but charged for their crime whether that'd be aggravated assault or attempted murder.

Jena Six the victims after beating up a white kid unconscious

So what was once right in my father's generation: working hard, getting married, raising a family, is now considered by the younger generation as laughable. Work hard? Forget it, they want entitlements. "What has my government done for me lately? What has George Bush not done for me...that's what it's all about. Getting married, ah forget about it.....I just want to have fun. Raising a family? I can do without kids because kids apparently contribute to global warming." How in the world did my generation get so off track? Did you know there are couples out there who want to sterilize themselves so they can save the earth from warming? How crazy is that?

Classical Culture and Ethics is where we should be...

But the great news is that there is a population in America, still believes in its classical culture and values. There is still a small group of couples out there that want to tie the knot, and I am happy to provide that service for you. Well that's all for my post for tonight people. I'm sure you learned more about this plain old fashion 30 year old wedding guy today.

This is right down the street from my house!
That's me after not taking a shower for 24 hours!!!

ALMOST HURRICANE FORCE WINDS ALMOST DOWN OAHU

Well, I have a knack of good luck when it comes to weather and weddings. If I'm at a wedding, more than likely you'll have great weather. But when there's no wedding, the tide for me usually turns. I don't have a wedding till the 15th of this month. So I have two weeks off. So do I get great weather? Of course not! I get these 70 mph winds blowing in my backyard, uprooting a huge tree. I really never seen weather this bad during a regular rainstorm.

What was the outcome? As of today, close to the entire island of Oahu's power and phones were down! Not to mention, the worse thing of all, the internet was down as well. I also lost my cell phone in all this chaos, so I'll be currently without it for a couple of days. And I couldn't take a shower for almost 2 days. Trust me, that's not a good thing, especiall with this humidity!

Crazy huh...

But I'm happy to report that everything should be back to normal. The worse is over, at least for Hawaii. This storm is headed up to the West Coast of America. So watchout!!!

If you read my short bio here on the website, you probably know by now that in my previous life I was actually a screenwriter who lived in California. Was I successful? I would say very much so, because I escaped California without becoming a victim to Hollywood psuedo ethics (both political and moral). Life as a screenwriter is a fairly lonely one if you're not a staff writer working in the television industry. Basically it consist of meeting with producers and working on "could be" projects until you eventually get fired for another writer. In between those meetings, is when you work, or in my case, procrastinate until your agent bugs you to see if you're going to meet your deadline. Then of course, you say, "Oh yeah, of course man..." then go back to watching TV.

Well, during those long procrastination hours, I started on chatting on a TV show's website called "Vibe." It was a great chat room, filled with real people. It was also a rather cool place because film industry gurus would also chat there, along with the host of Vibe, Sinbad. Because I had a good relationship with with Sinbad's production company, David and Goliath, I would regularly get invited to spend time behind the scenes of the Vibe show. I had no affiliation with the Vibe show, thank god, the writing was horrible there. But I did come out making "A" friend out of there. And it wasn't the staff who worked there behind the scenes, or the celebrities that came in and out of that area on a constant bases. It was actually through the Vibe chat room, to a chatter name Dijah.

Dijah was only about 16 years old when I first met her, full of life, great morals, and interested in getting heavily involved with the music industry. I tried to fill her in on all the details as I could. I believe I was about 18 or 19 a the time. Well time went on, and Vibe shut down their production in place for the Rosanne Bar Show, but I kept in contact with Dijah as time went by phone and the Internet. Time flew by rather quickly. Before I knew it, I was back in Hawaii running this wedding company, and she had graduated from college and started pursuing a career in the real estate industry. Then, one day, she broke the news to me that she had met the most amazing guy! Bryan. A good hearted man, soft spoken, a god-fearing person, with great morals, and more so, a guy who would be a great father one day. Then one day, Brian proposed to her, and Dijah said yes.

And of course, I had to put the idea of a Hawaii wedding into her head. She bought it, hook, line, and sinker, and a year later, this happened:

Dijan and Bryan fulfill their vows at Magic Island!

Now all this time, ten, twelve years later, I had only chatted to Dijah. Never met her in person. Never met Brian either. And I never thought that the first time I would meet her, it would be 10 years later, at her wedding, with myself doing the planning. So that was very very cool.

The wedding ceremony as conducted by one of my emotional pastors, Bob Fa'apouli. He's a real minister, works with the youth a lot at his church, and has a very infectious smile. People say it's the photographer who is the most important ingredient at your wedding. I disagree entirely. The most important ingredient to any wedding in the minister. And I usually try to fit the minister to the couple, to make sure everything runs smoothly.

Dijah and Brian got married at Magic Island, and had a small party of 15 people there to watch her finally seal the deal. And, I got invited to her reception at the Willows. (My review of this restaurant will be coming real soon!) The pictures, well, they came out really cool like always.

A perfect match!!!

At the reception it was rather cool as well because it was nice sit down dinner buffet with Dijah's family. And let me just say this, from her mother to her grandmother, they are all great personalities. We all got along well together. I was even asked to say something to Brian and Dijah, so that was really cool.

As a general rule of thumb, I usually don't do weddings for friends of mine. More so, family members of mine. But Dijah and Brian were exceptions to the rule because they are just that awesome people.

Oh did I mention that they live in South New Jersey, literally only minutes away from Lincoln Financial Stadium, where my Eagles play? And they said I can crash on their couch when I come to watch games? How cool is that!

I never used drugs before, and never took a sip of alchol. And although I never felt one of those types of buzz's, I don't think anything can compare to what I'm feeling now. If you haven't heard on the news yet, our University of Hawaii team, which is basically, our NFL football team since we have no other football team, is headed to the Sugar Bowl. The buzz around the entire State is just amazing. Buses here are flashing "Go Warriors" on them. Airline pilots are talking about it to passengers they land their plane here. Everyone is wearing Hawaii shirts....the feeling is just incredible. I've been on a high since Saturday night, and nothing could bring me down. My Eagles even lost today...but, still, I don't care.

It's because of this man that we're there!

Now I know this has nothing to do with weddings, but hey this is my blog, I'm going to talk about whatever I want...haha. Seriously people, give me a break here, I can't be the wedding guy all the time!! I'm a season ticket holder of the University of Hawaii football. I'm not a bandwagoner fan. Been there through the tough times, and the good times. Awhile ago, when I was in the 9th grade, our football team got invited to the Holiday Bowl, and that was just amazing. My family made the trip then, where we won against the Illinois. But never in my wildest dreams did I ever dream that we go undefeated in a season. More so, never in my wildest dreams would I ever imagine that we'd be heading to the Sugar Bowl! A BCS Bowl.

This is history in the making!!!

This entire season has been rather scary. In order to get into the BCS bowl, we would have to go undefeated. And going undefeated is very difficult for any program. And this year, many number one and number 2 teams dropped to nobodies. Michigan lost to Appalachian State, a division II team. We had a lot of close games, and going into the Washington game, I new that they would play tough. And they did. In the 1st quarter, the Huskies piled on 21 points, and it looked as though our BCS hopes were over. But amazingly, we believed, we came back and took the lead in the fourth quarter! And on the last play of the game, where the Huskies had a chance to tie the game, we intercepted the ball.

The entire staidum just erupted in an overjoy. I was close to tears. fans rushed the field. I held my hands on my head, I couldn't believe it. No one could. We had done the impossible. I looked at everyone around me, everyone was close to tears. Every man wanted to cry, but we didn't. But we high-fived, hugged strangers in the stands, jumped up and down to the point where I thought the Aloha Stadium would fall apart.

It was just an amazing night!!! Wish you all could have been there!

So the big question is whether or not I'm heading to the game. The answer is YES! I have a wedding at 9:30am in the morning on December 31st, and right after that I'm on the 1st plane I can catch to the Superdome. Then, I'm back by the 3rd or 4th of January!!!!

Wish us luck againt Georgia. They are a tough team!!

So this is the double life that I lead. I am a wedding planner by day, a die hard football fan at night. I try not to plan any weddings on weekends during the football season, for obvious reasons, but since investing into my trusty high-definition Directv DVR, I've been a lot more flexible. My only rule I tell my wedding couples is that if your wedding falls on game day "DON'T TELL ME ANY COLLEGE OF NFL FOOTBALL SCORES!!"

Or I swear I'll...... Just kidding....

Now September 8th had to be one of the most exhausting days of my wedding slash arm chair quarterbacking career. I had three weddings on this day, not to mention, a University of Hawaii football game to root for when I got back home. So I know what you're telling yourself. "Steve, three weddings...how in the hell do you pull that off? Isn't that triple the stress?"

The answer is, "No, it really isn't." See, all of my weddings are on the smaller side. And if I can puff out my chest a little, I'm just that good. haha.

So here's the really strange thing. All three of my wedding couples had something very similar in hand. First off, all three groomsmen, were in the military. One was in the army, another the marines, and the last, the navy. They all served honorably and bravely in Iraq, and they all had beautiful brides. Hey what hero doesn't deserve a babe on his arm right?

Dolly and Roy
Ko'olina Beach: Lanikuhonua
September 8, 2007 9:00am

My day started out with a very small wedding with Dolly and Roy. Roy was on a short two week vacation from his tour in Iraq, and elected to get married here on Oahu. I thought that was pretty cool. My first couple of the day booked the patriot package from me, which consisted of 24 pictures shot on consumer grade film, and a minister. Although the package was small, Dolly still invited a lot of her friends and family to her wedding. I think in total, we had about 15 people at the beach altogether!!!

The wedding, of course, went very smoothly. Dolly and Roy were relaxed, and ready to get married. Because the package was rather small, time flew by fast. They were married, pictures done, within the hour. For those wondering what consumer grade film looks like compare to pro film, well, the difference can be quite different. This show below is shot on consumer grade film.

Sheena and Derrick
Hitachi Park
September 8, 2007 11:30am

After Dolly and Roy's wedding, I walked back to my car to catch a few minutes of shut-eye. I had trained a little at boxing the previous night, and I was just exhausted. I then drove down to Sand Island Beach park to meet Sheena and Derrick to take a few beach photos, before heading to Hitachi Park for their wedding.

I really never took any shots at Sand Island Beach park for wedding photos and I truly don't recommend going their for a wedding. But it was basically the closest place we could think of where I could get an ocean setting similar to Lanikai. Here are some cool shots, but don't think much of it. I'm shooting towards the ocean, not to the left or right. To the right there's an abandoned baseball field, to the left, barges and a run down playground. This background is great for fashion modeling shots, not so great for a place to get married.

Now if you think Sheena and Derrick are young, you're correct. Yes, they are very young. I believe both are hovering right around their early 20's. Is it too young to get married? To me, personally, I say no...not at all. I just wish more young couples would exercise their maturity. In our days, where Paris Hilton is the role model to many younger kids, younger kids just want to have fun and no relationship. They are not thinking about marriage, or raising a family. They are just getting together because that's what cool people do. Well, to me, Sheena and Derrick, are extremely cool because they are just "that much" more mature than the rest of their generation.

So after our quick fifteen minute picture taking extravaganza at Sand Island, we jetted off to Hitachi Gardens; also a first for me and my minister. Hitachi Garden or called "Moanaloa Gardens" is a private park that is own by the Hitachi Corporation. (I believe...not sure) Yes, it's same guys who make all those air conditioners, cameras, LCD's, you name it, this is their park. This park was made famous because Hitachi used these large monkey pod trees for their logo at one time. The park is very nice, but sucks at the same time.

Why is it nice? Well, because it's beautiful, very photogenic, quiet, and a great park to have a romantic picnic in. What does it suck? Because the place basically operates like something out of Red China. There are places where you can't go to take photos, you have to check in to have your wedding there, you can't set up chairs, arches. Hmm.. You can't bring in soda, water, coolers, or any barbequeing supplies. But more so, you cannot play any type of physical sports on this beautiful grass. You can toss around the football, but if you start being a little more serious, they'll stop you and take away your football. Hence forth, that's why this place sucks.....

But for weddings, especially, this park rocked. We had a sweet ceremony for Sheena and Derrick. Her father gave her away. They didn't have customized vows, and just opted to repeat the sweet words that were repeated for years past.

Stacey and Bryan
Ko'olina Beach: Lanikuhonua
September 8, 2007 4:00pm

So the day went on. I had a nice two hour break before my next wedding so I pulled into Safeway to grab something to eat. I flipped on the TV in my truck to watch a few Mike Tyson DVD's and fell asleep for a couple of hours. Even though the first two weddings were easy, my body was still recovering for the previous night's boxing workout. More so, my next wedding included reception coverage till around 10 or 11pm, so I was looking at at least seven more hours of work.

As I closed my eyes, I basically reflected back on all my previous weddings of the day. One by one, they got progressively harder. And even I had to keep myself creatively in check, to make sure I didn't screw up for any of these weddings. What do I mean by screwing up? Well, it could be anything from not shutting the camera back on my camera completely shut, making all of my film useless. It could be something simple as not loading any film into the camera. Little mistakes would be huge mistakes. For small weddings, paying attention was easy. But three weddings in a day, capped off with reception coverage. No mistakes could be made.

I woke up, and dragged myself to my next wedding. Lets be honest. I really wasn't looking forward to shooting Stacey and Bryan's wedding. I was just beat. But then as I turned the corner into Ko'olina Cove, I saw a similar face. See, I had met Bryan and Stacey before their wedding since they lived on the island and they were a very cool couple. Bryan was very much laid back, and you could tell he loved Stacey tremendously. But he was also very cool to talk to as well. And being a special forces Iraq veteran, he has a lot of cool stories to tell me as well. So I turn the corner, and I see Bryan dressed up his Navy Whites, decorated with all of his medals, purple hearts, you name it and I tell myself. Thank God, for my last wedding, I have the cool couple.

So some pretty cool things happened at this wedding. When I arrived at their wedding, to my surprise, there was an archway, chairs, the full aisle setup. We performed the entire wedding there, Bryan and Stacey opting for a spiritual wedding rather than a Christian one. Which is 100% a.o.k. in my book. After the wedding, Bryan tells me, "Man, this is a nice setup you got here for our wedding, thanks."

I turn to him and say, "My setup? I thought this was yours?"

It turns out that it was the setup from a previous wedding. Bryan and Stacey just lucked out.

The reception went well. It was really cool because it was filled with special forces people, almost all had a war story. All heroes there. What was really cool too was that their DJ was a Philadelphia Eagles fan! And Bryan's neighbor, whose an actor for Lost, I think his name is Frederic something...but anyway, he sat next to me and we had a great conversation about Hollywood. Taking pictures at receptions are rather easy. You just have to be in the right place at the right time. You really can't take that creative pictures since there is not much lighting to play with. You just have to make sure that you have to be there, when something happens. Usually, it's the photographer who directs what goes on at a reception, if he's good. The table captian will come to the photographer when it's time to cut the cake, toast, do the garder belt thing. The photographer basically runs the show...because nothing can go on until the photographer is ready to shoot. Some DJ's try to take control of the show by making the entire party particpate in silly games. But that's just what they are...silly and cheesy.

Now, usually for a reception, it's all about roasting. For those of you who don't know what roasting is, basically, it's embarassing those on stage when they can't do anything. So you have a bridal party who the MC can roast. Usually you have a bestman and a maid of honor who will tell the story of how the couple met, and then...they roast them with embarrassing stories. Fathers come up to do the toast, to roast his son or his daughter. It goes on and on. Receptions are all about embarrassing moments coming out to the forefront.

But Stacey and Bryan really didn't have any of this. There were no bestmen or bridesmaids, no mc. Bryan actually said that he was going to MC his own wedding, and he was rather nervous. So I helped him through a bit...telling him the jist of what to talk about. But he had a page full of notes, and really great personality. So once Bryan started talking about how they met, how they fell in love, everything just fell into place. The coolest part of the love story. Well, before he set out on his mission in Iraq, he wrote a love letter to Stacey confessing his love to her. It was one of those "emergency letter" that he would carry with him throughout all of his missions just in case something unfortunate happened. Well, something did happen to him, luckily, though Bryan was okay. But when he came back to America to see Stacey, he finally took out that letter that he carried around, blood stained and everything, and read it to her. He then proposed to her, and of course, she said yes. Till this day, Stacey carries around that letter.

Isn't that awesome?

AND FINALLY...THE FOOTBALL

Bryan and Stacey's wedding ended at around 10pm, which allowed me to get him in time to see the Hawaii/Lousinana Tech game. During the wedding, I overheard a couple of guys talking about how Hawaii just wasn't playing great, and that we were losing. I didn't want to hear it, because I was going to watch the delay with my dad back at home. So I get home, tired from my day of three weddings. And lets be honest here, I'm not looking forward to watching Hawaii lose.

Hawaii did play horrible in the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd quarter. I think we were down 14 points going into the 4th quarter. Then suddenly, Hawaii comes back! We take the game into overtime...and we win! Amazing....just amazing.

And by now, you know the entire story. We're in the BCS Sugar Bowl now.