We have a few late entries here at WHW, entries that should have been done before the summer ended. What can I say, but work and family obligations have precedence over my life for the most part so I had to put blogging in the backburner. It's now the night before Thanksgiving, and I found some time to catch up. Let's start with this.

Last August, we went camping with two other families who are friends of ours. It was a rather late planning, so we finally found some open camp sites at Plasse's Resort, which is off the 88 just south of Silver Lake in CA. Where is that? It's south of Tahoe. Reservation pricing wasn't too bad. Between 3 families and 2 campsites, we each paid about $40-50 for 2 nights.

There were outhouses for toilet needs, and I'll admit, I really sniffed the air in there because there was no bad smell. It's a well-kept campsite. (Sorry, sniffing the air in the outhouse does sound gross, but honestly, there really was no bad smell).

The lodge was a bit of a walk from where we were camped at. and it was your typical general and souvenir shop. The weekend we were here, there was a BBQ event going on, but we didn't really go near it. While that was happening, our family took a walk in the wooded areas (collecting rocks, taking pictures of insects, observing ants, etc). Plasse's Resort is a campground for long-term camping as this was obvious with the trailers and mobile homes that seemed to have people comfortably settled in. It started to rain on our walk back, so ran we went to the safety of our canopies.

It did rain on our first night, but nothing horrible. This is the second summer in a row our camp got rained on, but hey, that's part of the outdoor life.

Here are just a few of the photos taken from camp.

The kids enjoyed the wonders of hot ice

No post-processing with this

My son collected granite rocks to take home

Beautiful scenery at Plasse's Resort

Dad and daughter time on the granite rocks....stuff we will never get to do in the big city

My son insisted on playing in the mud and dirt with his construction minis

Our family has been camping together since our son was only 1 year old, and this is his 3rd time camping (our daughter's 2nd). We hope to keep this tradition going -- our camp gear is building up. As a child, I didn't get to go camping until I was 9 years old!

The (Earth) night that Curiousity landed on Mars, the family packed up and went to Chabot Space & Science Center to join a whole lot of people to witness the event in the planetarium. True, we could have stayed home and watched it, but well, we were at Chabot which seemed to be the right place to be for an event as such.

We got there quite early to ensure that our day was full alright. There was an activity for kids in the Pleiades Courtyard with some flour and marbles, exhibiting as easily as possible how craters can form on Mars. There were also electronic projects for older kids with Legos and motors and solar which my son really enjoyed. The photos below are from these activities.

The scheduled landing was set to be late at night, and both kids had fallen asleep I think. I'm not sure how we were able to contain them in satisfactory behavior for that long as they did, but being sleepy must have helped. Photography was not allowed in the planetarium, so sorry, none pictures here.

This was our first shot at product photography, for Auva Tea, a Taiwan-imported tea locally distributed by EnBoost Company. The studio photos--shot by Rio--were set with a white backdrop as shown, and I also decided to include the "clean" version of them for the client to use. We also took the tea bags to Stow Lake--shot by Egan--to get some environmental photos with the Stow Lake pagoda in the background.

Gallery opens with the image link for Auva Tea:




File under: commercial photography, product photography, stow lake photographer, golden gate park photography, san francisco photographer

Event: School Dance
Location: Hornblower Yacht in San Francisco, CA

This was a very busy night, with seniors from Lowell High School attending their first dance of the year.

Click the image below to open up the whole gallery!

File under: school dance photographer, school dance photography, sf party photographer, sf party photobooth, school dance photobooth, san francisco photobooth, san francisco event photobooth, sf event photobooth, hornblower cruises, hornblower events, hornblower photobooth, private photobooth, photobooth rental, photobooth for rent, photobooth for hire

On our way out, we explored around the parking lot and saw sunflowers. There were some good ops to take photos so that we did.
Well, we brought the pumpkins home and carved them the same day. I think it was done too early. The pumpkins were set outdoors, and got moldy within days. Both had to be trashed, and replaced.
The conclusion: The farm was a fun visit, but we shouldn't have carved our pumpkins too early. I had to replace them with store pumpkins.

PanFocus Studios will be re-branding this winter, with projected launch of our new look and updated name sometime around the first quarter of 2013. This means new website too.

This past year, we have focused on events upon realizing this is where our strength is. We also launched our open-air photobooth service in the summer.

We will be taking on 2013 as a dedicated event photography service for both private events, public events and business to business. Our packages will be changing a little bit, and will soon be taken off our website until things are ready for our launch. However, our photobooth packages will remain the same, and we will continue to be available for events throughout this process. Family portraits will be almost unavailable, but not completely out of the picture. We will only be doing family portraits for very select inquiries, and mostly for personal connections. However, portraitures will be included or be available as an add-on with certain event packages.

Throughout 2013, we will also be developing another photography service which we can't say too much about yet. We have somewhat started on it this year, and would like to explore more into it. It is a type of photography we have talked about doing for sometime now, so it is something to start pushing.

In the meantime, we have a lot of blog updating to do with the recent events we've covered.

PanFocus Studios will be re-branding this winter, with projected launch of our new look and updated name sometime around the first quarter of 2013. This means new website too.

This past year, we have focused on events upon realizing this is where our strength is. We also launched our open-air photobooth service in the summer.

We will be taking on 2013 as a dedicated event photography service for both private events, public events and business to business. Our packages will be changing a little bit, and will soon be taken off our website until things are ready for our launch. However, our photobooth packages will remain the same, and we will continue to be available for events throughout this process. Family portraits will be almost unavailable, but not completely out of the picture. We will only be doing family portraits for very select inquiries, and mostly for personal connections. However, portraitures will be included or be available as an add-on with certain event packages.

Throughout 2013, we will also be developing another photography service which we can't say too much about yet. We have somewhat started on it this year, and would like to explore more into it. It is a type of photography we have talked about doing for sometime now, so it is something to start pushing.

In the meantime, we have a lot of blog updating to do with the recent events we've covered.

Friends of the SF Library brought us on to provide a photobooth for its Tricycle Music Fest finale, headlined by Elizabeth Mitchell and Lucky Diaz. It was such a fun event with a lot of rockin' little people in their costumes! The library chose to have a green screen, and they provided us an image of the library's building.

Click the image to open the gallery.



File under: library events, sf library events, sf library event photographer, san francisco main library events, tricycle music fest, tricycle music for kids, kids photobooth, event photobooth, sf party photobooth, sf event photobooth, san francisco party photobooth, san francisco event photobooth

We had a fantastic afternoon at the Tricycle Music Festival today, which was held at the San Francisco Main Library. So many cute smiles and costumes, and awesome families spending their Sunday jamming out to music!

We held a raffle called GUESS THAT MACRO!, where participants had to take a guess on a printed image that was laid out on the table. Only correct entries with email addresses were entered into the drawing, and we had mostly correct guesses! The answer was: STRAWBERRY.

Our prizes today were three PanFocus Studios tote bags, and a grand prize of our 2-HOUR PHOTOBOOTH package (a $450 value)!! Here are the random winners we drew, and all of you had been contacted already. However, one of you had a bouncing email, so if you are reading this, please contact us ASAP to redeem your prize. You have until Monday 11:59pm, November 5, 2012 to contact us and if we don't hear from you, the prize will be forfeited.

PanFocus Studios tote bag winners:
Gareth Scott (please contact us ASAP)
Valerie
Hanna Kampermaan

Photobooth winner:
Noemi Hernandez

Congratulations to all of you, and thank you for stopping by our photobooth today!

(This was the image)

We had a fantastic afternoon at the Tricycle Music Festival today, which was held at the San Francisco Main Library. So many cute smiles and costumes, and awesome families spending their Sunday jamming out to music!

We held a raffle called GUESS THAT MACRO!, where participants had to take a guess on a printed image that was laid out on the table. Only correct entries with email addresses were entered into the drawing, and we had mostly correct guesses! The answer was: STRAWBERRY.

Our prizes today were three PanFocus Studios tote bags, and a grand prize of our 2-HOUR PHOTOBOOTH package (a $450 value)!! Here are the random winners we drew, and all of you had been contacted already. However, one of you had a bouncing email, so if you are reading this, please contact us ASAP to redeem your prize. You have until Monday 11:59pm, November 5, 2012 to contact us and if we don't hear from you, we will draw another winner.

PanFocus Studios tote bag winners:
Gareth Scott (please contact us ASAP)
Valerie
Hanna Kampermaan

Photobooth winner:
Noemi Hernandez

Congratulations to all of you, and thank you for stopping by our photobooth today!

(This was the image)

We brought out the open photobooth to Sunday Streets in the Excelsior. We love Sunday Streets!



File under: sunday streets, sunday streets photobooth, outdoor photobooth, san francisco event photobooth, san francisco party photobooth, open air photobooth, san francisco open air photobooth, san francisco events, san francisco outdoor photobooth

One Kapamilya Go is an event I can say I have truly put in so much blood, sweat and tears for. It's The Filipino Channel's (TFC) big annual event, and I am proudly part of the team that puts this together. As I'm sometimes able to walk around and take pictures, I take as many as I can. It's a very laborous event, so there's really no chance to sit and enjoy. Although, I can attest that my "sit and enjoy" is to walk around and take pictures. This year, our event was headlined by TFC's popular teleseries titled, "Walang Hanggan" (it means "infinity") which is loosely based on the book, Wuthering Heights. This was a sold-out event, and as a photographer, I loved catching fans' reactions who were lucky enough to get front row seats.

Enjoy the gallery by opening this link!



File under: tfc event photographer, tfc events, redwood city event photographer, redwood city concert photographer, one kapamilya go photographer, tfc photographer, universal studios photography, filipino event, filipino event photographer, filipino photographer san francisco, filipino photographer los angeles, filipino photographer in california

Below are highlights from his baptism.



File under: st raymond's church photographer, san francisco baptism photographer, san francisco christening photographer, sf baptism photographer, sf christening photographer, san francisco family photographer, san francisco family photoraphy, church photography, bay area event photographer, san ramon baptism photographer, san ramon christening photographer, san ramon child baptism photographer

We are planning out a very fun contest starting next month, around Halloween time until about Thanksgiving week. We are telling you this early because we need your help.

What sort of help? Making this even more fun! Every contest needs competition, so we would love your help in spreading the word about our photography page on Facebook. That's at www.facebook.com/panfocusstudios.

The contest will only happen here on our website's blog, but we know that more people have their eyes on Facebook so the best way for us to tell the world about anything is through the wall.

There will be some really awesome prizes, even people from any part of the world can participate (for the prizes that can be mailed or transferrable, of course...) It's open to past clients, new clients, current clients, non clients, everyone!

We can't reveal too much right now, but it's an ode to our new macro lens, the Canon 100mm f/2.8! We love this sweet glass so much that it's going to be a big part of the game. At the same time, we are going to have a lot of fun playing with it, and with everyone who wants to win something cool.

Now we would really love your help in drumming up this contest... it's all in the nature of fun... and of course, we're not going to hide it -- we would love to be heard of by more people! 

We are planning out a very fun contest starting next month, around Halloween time until about Thanksgiving week. We are telling you this early because we need your help.

What sort of help? Making this even more fun! Every contest needs competition, so we would love your help in spreading the word about our photography page on Facebook. That's at www.facebook.com/panfocusstudios.

The contest will only happen here on our website's blog, but we know that more people have their eyes on Facebook so the best way for us to tell the world about anything is through the wall.

There will be some really awesome prizes, even people from any part of the world can participate (for the prizes that can be mailed or transferrable, of course...) It's open to past clients, new clients, current clients, non clients, everyone!

We can't reveal too much right now, but it's an ode to our new macro lens, the Canon 100mm f/2.8! We love this sweet glass so much that it's going to be a big part of the game. At the same time, we are going to have a lot of fun playing with it, and with everyone who wants to win something cool.

Now we would really love your help in drumming up this contest... it's all in the nature of fun... and of course, we're not going to hide it -- we would love to be heard of by more people! 

Portraits: Family and Lifestyle
Location: Roosevelt Beach (Half Moon Bay, CA)