Almost Paradise: Ernest and Vanessa
These two lovebirds are tying the knot real soon—and by real soon I mean in two days! We had the privilege of doing their engagement photos some three months back. At the time they were already beginning to count the days: “Three months to go!” the groom-to-be had exclaimed more than once. How exciting it must be for them now that it’s only a few hours ‘til they seal the deal!
We shot these photos at the Amun Ini Beach Resort and Spa in Anda, a tiny, peaceful coastal town in the northeastern tip of the island of Bohol, some 55 miles from Tagbilaran City via the Tagbilaran East Road, or 65 miles from Tubigon via the Central Nautical Highway (for some reason it was the Cebu-Tubigon ferry that we’d booked, so it was the latter route that we took). I’m not a big fan of road trips that take more than an hour, especially in this part of the world where it can get pretty bumpy, but this drive right here was worth it. Once we arrived at the resort, like magic, all my back and neck pains just melted away. Yes, that’s how beautiful the place is. I remember the first thing I said to resort owner Federico “Freddie” Carmona as I shook his hand the minute he greeted us by the pool: “People who say ‘it’s the journey, not the destination’ were obviously not coming to this place!” Built on a 4-hectare private cove facing the vast blue Bohol sea, and jutting out of lush, untouched vegetation (an ancient banyan tree greets you at the entrance, which, as it turns out, served as muse for when they were architecting the place), it was unlike anything I’d ever laid my eyes on before. I’m gonna stop with the words right here because the truth is no amount of waxing poetic is ever going to do the place justice (even these photos don’t do it justice), but if you ever plan to visit that part of Bohol, look no further and just book a night or two at Amun Ini—trust me, you won’t regret it!
It was Ernest who’d made arrangements to shoot at this place, not so much because of his family’s close ties to the Carmonas but because he’d wanted for it to be sort of like a vacation for him and his bride-to-be at the same time. Vanessa is a flight attendant at Emirates, and she only had a couple of days off to do this shoot, and so the fiancé had to make sure the whole thing was going to be half-disguised as R&R. We respected this, of course, and made conscious efforts to work fast so that they could have some time for, say, little massages in between sets. And for sumptuous dinners by the beach, to which we got to tag along! I swear, our team slipped into a coma after being subjected to a feast of local seafood (courtesy of the mayor of Anda)—I’d never had crustaceans that huge (and that many) in my life! (And that’s not even counting the lavish breakfasts whipped up by Freddie’s Manila-trained, San Francisco-honed culinary whiz of a daughter—her stylized banana fritters are to die for!) I’d like to think we were successful in not making the couple feel like this was all work. It certainly helped that our main photographer Malou was one of their closest friends from back in college—I think more than 80% of their time was spent talking about the good old days!
I loved these sets that we did at Amun Ini, especially the pool set and that one we did down the shore with the little banca (named Los Angeles!), but we were scheduled to do a couple of sets at the world-famous “man-made forest” down Bilar, too, and that was what I’d been really looking forward to. It was Vanessa who’d wanted to shoot at that location because she loved trees (and Malou was all for it because of a prospect of a Twilight feel—yes, my boss is a huge Twilight fan!). But, alas, luck wasn’t on our side: after driving two or so hours from Anda, we were greeted by torrential rain! It got me a little cranky, because an hour into our drive the weather was completely fine, but the moment we entered the Loay Road (Chocolate Hills territory) that was going to lead us to Bilar it suddenly turned gloomy and then it began to rain really hard. We all prayed for it to stop by the time we got to the forest, but it didn’t—well, perhaps it did for a bit, but everything was drenched now, and it was pretty foggy (we’re talking zero visibility). Ever the troupers, Malou and makeup artist Owen insisted that we soldiered on, despite the fact that we had no lighting equipment with us, or even tripods. I felt bad, not so much because of the prospect that the clothes I had prepared for Vanessa were going to go to waste (I’d assembled two outfits inspired by the “Taylor Swift as Rodarte muse” look especially for these sets!), but because it became very clear we never going to give Vanessa the gorgeous photos that she’d long been dreaming of. Even with out ISOs hiked up to the 1000 mark my photos still didn’t come out right! If only it was my decision to make I’d let everyone wait one more day, but then the couple had a few pre-wedding business to attend to in Cebu, so we had to leave that night. I’m posting some of the photos I took on here, anyways, never mind that they’re too dark or too blurry—I just want Vanessa to see that we did get a little something out of it.
That’s the thing about natural light shoots—when the weather turns sour and the elements don’t work out to your favor, you either pack up and walk away frustrated, or carry on and hope for the best. I’m glad that we took the latter route. The weather may not have gotten better no matter how hard we crossed our fingers, but we did the job anyways. I only hope that when people see these photos they won’t see photos that are crappy, but instead be reminded of the power of persistence.
I am praying for spotless sunshine on their wedding day this weekend, but then again even if my prayers end up unanswered I’m sure no amount of rain is ever going to stop them from walking down that aisle and tying that knot!
Thank you, Ernest and Vanessa, for giving us this opportunity to take your engagement pictures, and best wishes to you both!
Ernesto Herrera III and Vanessa V. Villareal | Photographed by Angelo Kangleon for Shutterfairy in Anda, Bohol, and Bilar, Bohol, on June 30 and July 1, 2012 | Main photographer: Malou Pages for Shutterfairy | Hair and makeup by Owen Taboada | Vanessa styled by Angelo Kangleon | Sittings assistant: Jennifer Hortillosa | Special thanks to Freddie Carmona and the staff of Amun Ini Beach Resort and Spa (for reservations: info@amun-ini.com)
It’s Fly When Girls Stop By for the Summer 2: Theresa
Couple of photos that I took of my sister’s best friend Theresa, who’d flown in from Amsterdam to visit us in California for 9 days. Yes, you read that right: 9 days. Apparently that’s all the vacation that some people need, and I salute them, because to the impractical and impossible little brats like myself if it’s not more than, say, 60 days it’s not considered a vacation at all!
Actually she wasn’t just there to visit us. She was on a mission, too—or, make that two. One was to get a box of those fiendishly delicious Avocado Egg Rolls from Cheesecake Factory for her boss (apparently they don’t have Cheesecake Factory in Amsterdam), and two was to eat at every single American diner-inspired restaurant that we stumbled upon. The latter proved to be a challenge, because although it wasn’t hard to find establishments in L.A. that served stuff similar to traditional diner cuisine and that had interiors that mimicked traditional diner décor (hello, Johnny Rockets), it was rather toilsome to look for one that had a vegetarian menu! Yes, Theresa here is a vegan—I don’t know when or how it all started, but it was somewhere between her move from London to Amsterdam. I admire people who have a certain discipline when it comes to what they put in their plate, but, damn, girl, must you make it hard for the rest of us, too? (Just kidding!)
Backpedaling to the 9-day issue: I only got to see her for 5 ½ days because I had to leave for New York, and so we never got to have the real deal photo shoot that we’d planned (the original plan had been to shoot at Malibu’s Paradise Cove, because she’d asked to be photographed at “the most beautiful beach in California”). I kept on asking her to extend her stay, but she said it wasn’t that simple because she was anticipating a busy time at work. Turned out that although the 9 days weren’t enough to afford us a decent photo shoot, they were enough to make her fall in love with America—and to convince her to consider moving to L.A.!
During her first few weeks back in Europe she wouldn’t stop messaging us about how California wouldn’t stop calling her name in her dreams. (I couldn’t blame her—I’d had the exact same nightmares, too, only a few years back, after my first visit to L.A.) I have no idea what happened between then and now, but today it looks like she’s a little undecided: she’s smitten about America, yes, but at the same time she can’t bear the thought of leaving her beloved Amsterdam behind. I’m thinking I should send her some photos that I took of Paradise Cove—you know, to remind her that we’ve got unfinished business, and to convince her that people who say “there is no place like home” have obviously never been to California! LOL. Seriously, though, my only wish is for her to stop overthinking—and for her to just follow her heart.
Theresa Marie Wakeley | Photographed by Angelo Kangleon in Los Angeles, CA, on May 3, 2012, and in San Diego, CA, on May 5, 2012
A Trio Grows in Brooklyn: Anne, Ellis and Lucas
I was at a vintage/junk shop in Williamsburg helping a friend look for various curios/bric-à-brac for her redecorating project when I got stuck in a corner with piles and piles of antique chests and was reminded of my mom. She would’ve loved it here, I thought as I ran my fingers through the more gorgeous ones (especially those with intricate carvings, brass trimmings and bone inlays)—my mom has always had a thing for old chests and trunks. I inched away from that recess to rejoin my friend, only to bump into a wall of floor-to-ceiling vintage vinyl—David Bowie’s Low from 1977, The Clash’s London Calling from 1979, Michael Jackson’s Thriller from 1982, The Smiths’ eponymous debut album from 1984 and Meat is Murder from 1985, etc.—and the whole thing reminded me of, well, my mom again, her love of music, and how I’d been surrounded by her (and her father’s) collection of vinyl growing up. Well before I could explore the entire shop it occurred to me that it was going to be Mother’s Day in just a few days—and I was nowhere near my mother! I certainly picked the wrongest of times to put an ocean between us. (And my sister, who’d recently become a mother, I’d left in L.A.!) I was starting to feel bad about my choice of travel dates when I realized that, hey, I wasn’t exactly going to be mother-less (or sister-less) on Mother’s Day—although my mom was some 7,000 miles away (and my sister some 2,000), I still had someone to celebrate with here in New York, and she was right under my nose!
Anne Alegrado is one of my oldest and dearest friends, and is my perennial hostess in New York. It was her that I’d stayed with during my first visit to the Big Apple in the fall of 2009. At the time she and her little family had lived in a modest-size 24th-floor apartment off 3rd on the Upper East Side, just a mere four blocks away from Central Park’s E 72nd entrance. So I’d crashed in their couch, and that was when I had grown fond of her children, and witnessed firsthand how much of an amazing mother she was. I think I wrote about this in a previous post—about how Anne liked to grow her own vegetables in her Brooklyn backyard during the day (yes, they have since hightailed it from the Upper East), and then squeeze her way through throngs of sweaty rock fans at, say, Terminal 5 to watch Nine Inch Nails live in concert, after tucking her babies in bed. I don’t know about you, but I personally find this trait praiseworthy. This was actually the subject of conversation between a common friend and I, one rainy evening when Anne dragged us to a Chairlift concert at the Webster Hall—Anne was swaying her head to “Bruises,” and we stared at her admirably, agreeing that it was cool what she was doing, enjoying her big city life to the fullest without sacrificing her quality of motherhood. This was what prompted me to consider: Who better to celebrate my first Mother’s Day in New York with than this super cool mom right here?
Come to think of it, Anne reminded me of my mom in some ways, too. One thing I loved about my mom was that we shared the same taste in music, and that was me and Anne, too—we both loved the same rock bands, and we shared a concert bucket list (from which we’d just scratched the Smashing Pumpkins and Nine Inch Nails off of). And, like my mom, she, too, loved decorating and home improvement—in Anne’s case, it all started when she’d moved to that first apartment of theirs in the Upper East (apparently a first NYC apartment is like a milestone of sorts, and so you have to do it up, and do it up good), and then mushroomed when the move to Brooklyn had afforded her more room (and that’s literally speaking) to get creative. Now she was telling me about how she had every intention of going all-out Rita Konig—scouring the city for the best antique/junk shops, and even looking at design school catalogs to find out where the best short courses on interior design were being offered.
And so I told her I was spending Mother’s Day with her and her family, and that I had a Mother’s Day present for her in the form of a family photo session. It was a long overdue thing, anyway—when they’d visited Cebu a couple of months back I’d promised to take pictures of her and her kids, but then we’d had trouble reconciling our schedules so that plan had never materialized. I was afraid she would say no, thinking her husband Jovi and the kids had had something planned already. Turned out they had already made plans, alright, “but it’s just a simple Mother’s Day lunch at home, so, by all means, join us!” She said “simple,” yes, but I knew I was in for a real treat—never a dull moment when it’s her family we’re talking about!
Loved, loved, loved their new neighborhood. Can’t recall if it was Prospect Park South, or Kensington—it may have even been Greenwood, due to its close proximity to the Green-Wood Cemetery—but it was right by the Church Ave. station, somewhere in the right atrium of the heart of Brooklyn. I especially loved how the tree-lined streets and brick terrace homes—and the peace and quiet—lent the place a kind of suburban feel, very refreshing for me because all I’d ever seen in the past week or so were skyscrapers, high-rises, tower blocks, and the fast-paced life. It was like being handed a bunch of homemade cookies after days of having nothing but, say, tiered cakes! This cookie’s soft and gooey center I found once I walked up to Anne’s charming American foursquare, and there they were, her and hubby and their two kids, flocked in the kitchen making spaghetti with meatballs, and Devil’s food cake cupcakes. For the first time in a long time, I felt right at home.
My original plan was to take them outdoors for the shoot—I was thinking the Williamsburg waterfront, that area where the Domino Sugar plant stood like a beacon, because I wanted a kind of industrial feel to underscore Anne’s indie rock-loving persona; I even thought of Coney Island, inspired by that one pivotal scene from 2003’s Uptown Girls starring Brittany Murphy and Dakota Fanning (and so the kids could have a good time while I was photographing them)—but as I showed myself around their house, admiring every little detail, I began to feel it would be very remiss of me not to show this side of Anne, the young mother who worked very hard to create a lovely home for her family. Just like that, we decided to stay put. Most people cringe at the thought of being photographed in a domestic setting, but thank God Anne wasn’t like most people. I don’t know why people think being photographed at home is unglamorous. I mean, it’s all a matter of imagination! For her first set Anne and I decided to add a Bree Van de Kamp touch to it—you know, with one hand on the dishwasher, the other cradling a glass of Chardonnay. Needless to say, the photos came out gorgeous!
I was so happy I finally got the chance to photograph their daughter Ellis. Even if I hadn’t brought a camera and we’d made this nothing more than a “couch and a movie” kind of afternoon, I’d still be happy just being around the little girl. Two and a half years ago I’d waxed poetic about how Ellis was the most profound thing to ever happen to my first New York trip when she’d acted as my little tour guide and taught me to look at things through a little girl’s eyes—her referring to the Brooklyn Bridge as “the bridge from the princess movie” (Enchanted), her teaching me how to “do some mathematics” in your head to keep your mind off all that walking, and her showing me it was OK to take a power nap on your subway train from point A to point B, all these I’d kept very close to my heart, because these were the only ways I could have ever appreciated the real New York. It made my heart balloon that she still remembered me, but it delighted me even more to see how much she’d grown in just a few years. Thanks to a The Beatles songbook that she’d gotten from her mom, she was learning how to sing now; and thanks to an acoustic guitar that she’d gotten from her dad, she was learning to strum, too! And as if all that wasn’t enough, the folks had to get her a journal, too, and so now she was also getting her write stuff on! She showed me some of the stuff she’d written, and I’d never been prouder of a child in my life! She even wrote a little something about me as I was taking pictures of her in her bedroom! What a sweetheart! Asked what she wanted to be when she grew up, without hesitation she shared that she wanted to be a musician. I hope she ends up becoming a writer, though. Or, come to think of it, it wouldn’t be impossible for her to end up becoming both—not only was she being raised in such a nurturing and devoted home environment, she was also living in this incredible city where it was virtually impossible to be uninspired!
As for little Lucas, well, I wasn’t too sure where it was coming from, but he said he wanted to be a ninja when he grew up. You know, at first he didn’t even want to be part of the shoot—he saw me yank my camera out and then he ran as far away from me as possible—but then his mom tried to cajole him into it by telling him that “Uncle Angel here is a real ninja from California, don’t you know that?” Of course, the little boy didn’t believe her, even sized me up to see if there really was a single martial arts bone in my body (funny that whenever I am at the Narita or Nagoya airports people would come up to me and start talking to me in Japanese, but that there is no fooling a little boy). Ultimately it was Ellis who won the coaxing game by handing him a cup of yogurt. Yes, nothing like a little dairy product to make him weak in the knees, but don’t get him wrong: he really was serious about the whole ninja business. At one point I went down to their basement to check if there was anything in there that was photographable, but had to hurry back up because I could feel the asbestos falling from the ceiling, thanks to Lucas who wouldn’t stop practicing his flying kick on the floor directly above me! Happy to report, though, that he allowed me to take a few shots of him, and that no photographic equipment—or bones—were harmed in the process.
I’d never thought I’d enjoy photographing children this much. I’d never even thought I’d be photographing children, ever! I’d sworn to myself that I would never do anything that involved kids, thinking it would be too much of a pain in the backside to get them to sit still or whatever. But then I’d met my mentor Malou Pages (of Shutterfairy Photography), and she’d taught me how to “make a connection” with these little ones: “Just let them be,” she’d opined, “[because] if you ask them to pose or move [in a certain way] you won’t get to capture who they really are—it’s like you’re telling them to quit being children.” That was exactly the formula that I stuck to right here as I was photographing Ellis and Lucas. Ellis didn’t want to pretend like she was reading a certain book? Fine. Lucas didn’t want to put a shirt on? Fine! I just basically let them call the shots. And, you know what, it kind of worked! Because that way it became all about me trying to find that child-like wonder in order to level with them—not them trying to “grow up” to level with me! I hope these photos show that happening.
We were supposed to take the shoot outdoors after doing two sets indoors. Anne wanted to take me to the neighboring Green-Wood Cemetery because “the vibe there is so…ethereal.” Unfortunately, by the time we got there the property had already closed for the day. A common friend who tagged along with us for the afternoon quipped that she was kind of thankful the place was closed because “taking pictures in a cemetery is kind of creepy!” I wouldn’t have complained, though. I mean, to be able to shoot at a place where great people like the neo-expressionist artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and the composer/conductor Leonard Bernstein (West Side Story) have been laid to rest? That would’ve been something, right? Oh, well, there is always a next time. I was actually thankful we didn’t get to do it at the time—gave us the chance to just melt in the couch and pop in Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. I got to have my “couch and a movie” kind of afternoon, after all!
Thank you, Anne (and hubby Jovi!), for once again opening up your home to me, and for giving me a family away from home! One day I will find a way to repay you for your incredible hospitality. Until that day comes, let’s just settle for me documenting your little ones’ milestones as they journey through the years!
Roxanne Roldan-Alegrado and her children Ellis and Lucas | Photographed by Angelo Kangleon in Brooklyn, NY, on May 13, 2012
We’ll Get There Fast and then We’ll Take it Slow: Niall and Cherry
It was bound to happen. You see, if you’re a photographer based in Cebu, it’s inevitable that you’ll be doing a session at the Plantation Bay Resort and Spa. I’d sworn I was never gonna let that happen to me, and not because I’d disliked the place—it in fact remains on top of my list of favorite places in this part of the world, despite the bevy of stagy pop-up resort hotels that having cropping up like mushrooms as of late, and I will forever be in love with the architecture (nothing is as bewitching as the view of colonial plantation-style cottages and villas through dewy palm fronds)—but simply because I’d wanted to avoid doing what everyone else was doing. What I’d failed to consider was that there was always going to be someone somewhere out there who couldn’t wait to come home to the Plantation Bay, and to share that part of their world with their newfound loves from another world.
Such was the case of Cherry, who came home from Dublin with her Irishman groom-to-be Niall O’Brien and their son Leo, and wasted no time in whisking them away to a nice little retreat at the resort. They didn’t have a lot of time before their wedding, and so they decided to invite the Shutterfairy team over so we could do their pre-wedding photos right there and then while they were on holiday.
I think it took us a good 30 minutes to convince Niall to say yes to being photographed. In our exchange of e-mails Cherry had warned me about this: “He’s not used to being photographed!” He would rather take a dip with his son or hit the in-house gym to pump some iron was what it was. Thankfully, after some gentle prodding and sweet-talking from his fiancée, he said yes (on the condition that he wasn’t gonna be wearing anything silly, and that no makeup brush was ever going to touch his face)!
In between sets Cherry would fill us in with stories about Ireland, to feed my imagination of charming, bucolic Irish countrysides and thatched roof stone cottages (with the hypnotic drone of uilleann pipes playing in the background). How wonderful must it be to have a shoot there (I’m thinking à la Stella Tennant’s family portraits by Mario Testino in the October 2005 issue of American Vogue (OK, those were shot in Tennant’s home in a Caledonic countryside, and not in Ireland, but you get the drift)! Of course, that was just my imagination running away with me, because Niall and Cherry here were not from the country; they lived in a modern, bustling area of Dublin. She was quick to confirm, though, that beer was kind of “a way of life” in Dublin, which was why, even when visiting the Philippines, she would allow Niall to go out with her friends or relatives for a few beers every now and then—well, a little more often than every now and then, really. Niall declared that he liked the taste of San Miguel Beer Pale Pilsen.
It was quite entertaining when Niall got into talking about the stuff he loved about the Philippines or about Cebu (it was this topic that actually helped him warm up to the cameras)—and, no, it didn’t stop at beer. Asked if he knew a few Cebuano phrases or expressions, he exclaimed earnestly, “I know some! My favorite is ‘Party, party!’” We laughed and told him that that wasn’t even Cebuano. He just turned red and said that, well, that was what most of his Cebuano drinking buddies said all the time. He also shared that he found it amusing how, every time he goes shopping at a local store and he pays for something at the counter, the cashier would say, “Ma’am, sir, I received five hundred pesos.” Sometimes he’d even buy something useless just to hear a cashier say “Ma’am, sir, I received five hundred pesos”—and he would actually get disappointed if he ended up with a cashier who wouldn’t utter the line!
No, he wasn’t allowed to have a beer during the shoot, but I did get them some tropical fruit juice. Old hat, I know, but it was something I needed to have in the picture to set the mood—I was thinking The Beach Boys’ “Kokomo,” where it goes, “Bodies in the sand/ Tropical drink melting in your hand…” Niall admitted that he couldn’t get enough of our beaches, and that he was so looking forward to doing Boracay for their honeymoon. Here I was daydreaming of the Irish countryside, and here they were willing to give anything to be able to live here!
I won’t take credit for the styling because we didn’t pick their clothes until the day of the shoot, and everything came from their own closets—or suitcases, as the case may be (I don’t take credit if I didn’t work on it from mood board development to sourcing to pre-shoot fittings and all that good stuff). But I was pretty happy with some of the dresses—the neckerchief dress in particular got me weak in the knees, ‘cause nothing spelled plantation chic quite like it did. And thanks to accessories designer Grace Querickiol-Nigel for letting me borrow bags upon bags of archival and new Gracie Q stuff! You never know when you need accessories to save your life!
It wasn’t so bad shooting at the Plantation Bay, after all. This I concluded after finding myself standing right by the deck of their singular Riverboat Suite (situated on the edge of their Children’s Lagoon, right across the Tahiti- or Syechelles-themed villas, if I am not mistaken) and I thought, Wow, this place just gets more and more beautiful as time goes by! I even fell head over heels with the white wooden railings that led to their gazebos. One thing’s for sure: This shoot has prompted me to reassess the rules I’ve made for myself—a place as beautiful as this doesn’t deserve to be punished just ‘cause I was unwilling to do what everybody else was doing! What was more magical was the feeling that washed over me as I treaded barefoot down Orion Beach and was brought back to those times some 10 or so years ago when I’d come here to style some of the more important shoots in my career (one of them a collaboration with the great Wig Tysmans)—it was like I’d come home.
Niall Francis and Cherry O’Brien (and their son Leo) | Photographed by Angelo Kangleon for Shutterfairy in Marigondon, Mactan, on January 8, 2012 | Main photographer: Malou Pages-Solomon for Shutterfairy (click here to view Malou’s photos) | Hair and makeup by Carditho Sarcol | Accessories, Gracie Q
How ‘Bout Them Cowgirls: Amanda and Mia
“If you could photograph only one thing in the world, what would it be?” A friend of mine once asked me this question almost out of the blue. She was half-expecting me to scream “Chris Burden’s Urban Light outside the LACMA!” or go all out and pick a really outrageous subject like, say, the divine Kate Moss, and so what rolled out of my tongue took her by surprise: “A horse.” And I wasn’t kidding, too—in fact, this was the most honest answer I’d ever given anyone. To which she intoned incredulously, “Why a horse?” I just laughed and said, you know, “Well, why the hell not?”
Said this a gazillion times before, and I’ll say it again now: To me, there is nothing quite like the feeling of seeing a horse throw its head up, arch its back, and whip its tail. Pure, unadulterated magic. Hundreds of other animals out there, I know, but, to me, none of them possess and harmonize two opposing qualities as effectively and effortlessly as a horse does—i.e., not everything that’s fluid can be strapping at the same time, and not everything that’s strapping can be fluid—which is almost always what makes something such a thrill to watch (the reason why we are so fascinated with ballerinas, or why we can’t stop watching those Herb Ritts music videos, no?) and, well, to photograph.
I’d been fascinated with horses since time immemorial (the first ever book I’d finished in one sitting was Anna Sewell’s Black Beauty; I’d held on to my My Little Pony blanket well until I was halfway through high school; and for a time there I’d actually considered getting that silhouette of a stallion in the lower right corner of the album cover of the Deftones’ White Pony tattooed on my wrist), but this epiphany—the joy in taking pictures of them—didn’t occur to me until a year and a half ago, when I visited the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, on a mission to take pictures of the place for my cousin Amanda Liok, who loved horses to death and had dreamt of visiting that very place one day, and I ended up spending four or so hours just clicking away at every singe horse I bumped into, living or statued. Andalusians, American Minis, Palominos, even Frieisians! Majestic equine bronze statues (Herbert Haseltine’s rendition of the legendary Man o’ War, couple of Gwen Reardons)! I even got to witness and shoot some show jumping! It was such an exhilarating experience—needless to say, I didn’t want it to ever end. Flash forward to a year later, back home in Cebu, I was starting to lament the lack of opportunities to watch or photograph these fine creatures in this part of the world when, slowly but surely, they found a way to creep up on to—or, should I say “gallop into”—my frame. For a shoot in Busay last July, I was surprised when the stylist was able to commission a pretty little riding mare named Athena to join in the sitting. And then the following month, during my first ever gig as apprentice to Malou Pages (of Shutterfairy Photography), which took us up the mountains of Carmen, my mentor had to shoot me reproving glances upon realizing I was spending more time taking pictures of this stallion named Ferrari than of our clients. And then came November, which found us driving two hours down south to Barili to do a cowboy-themed engagement session—and what’s a cowboy-themed sitting without a couple of horses, right?
Three shoots that involved horses, none of them planned or foreseen, all of them a coincidence. Glad they came along and found me, because they only gave me the chance to prepare for my biggest shoot that was to involve horses. Which brings us to this shoot right here.
For more than a year I’d been promising my cousin Amanda that I was going to find time in my frenzied schedule to visit her in her new hometown of Palompon, Leyte (some two hours west of Ormoc City), and photograph her and her daughter Mia, and, well, their horses. I hadn’t seen her in ages, and during that time our only form of interaction had been our exchange of e-mails whenever I’d found myself in Kentucky—“It’s you that’s supposed to be here,” I would write. “You are going to love this place to bits!” To me, Amanda was many things, but a lover of horses above all—naturally, no one else had come to mind whenever I’d found myself in the “horse capital of the world.” She would respond to my e-mails saying that, yes, it had been her and her husband’s dream to visit Lexington one day, and then she would send me photos of the horses in her own backyard. What beauties! She had taken her childhood fancies and whims, and then put them together to put up her own little band of horses. When I told her at one point that “it turns out naming your horses is almost like an art”—this after I’d met horse owners/equestrians at the Horse Park who’d baptized their beloved beasts with some of the most enchanting names I’d ever heard (my personal favorites: Alcatraz, Countess, and Moonshine, the latter probably after the liquor since this was the American South, after all)—she’d shared that, yes, she’d taken the naming game pretty seriously herself, and had given the most charming monikers to those in her brood. Finding out that she’d named one of her babies Moondance? Enough to make me want to meet the beauty and the rest of the family in the flesh, and that was how the idea for this shoot had been born.
So aside from Moondance there were Salsa, Chili, Ginger, Ola, Baila, and Sol. When Amanda asked me which one I wanted to include in the shoot, I picked Moondance, and she validated my choice by saying that the mare’s strawberry roan made it very photogenic—true enough, against the vast vegetation in their backyard, her chestnut coat looked so dazzling that I found it hard to stop taking pictures of her! She was the most mild-mannered of them all, too, and had a Zen aura about her. You know what they say about never approaching a horse “from the behind?” Well, I approached her a couple of times from the rear, and Moondance didn’t seem to mind. (She was the complete and utter opposite of the subject of Curley Fletcher’s poem-turned-ballad called, well, “The Strawberry Roan,” which talks of a wild bucking horse: “An’ fer throwin’ good riders he’s had lots uh luck/ An’ he sez that this pony has never been rode/ That the boys that gits on him is bound to git throwed.”) Did I mention she was very affectionate towards her master, too? Every chance she got she would stick her muzzle against Amanda’s cheeks! I thought that was just cute. I wanted to include Salsa in some of the frames, because I was in love with her smoky black coating, but the caretaker told me that that mare had to rest (apparently, horses have to take a break, too)—I did get a chance to take a few shots of her while she was taking an afternoon stroll, though, and that was enough for now (I’ll be back for you, Salsa!).
For Mia’s set, we decided to include the latest addition to their ever-growing family: a 4-year-old Miniature named Iris. Pretty awesome, because only a year ago, when I’d showed Amanda my photos of the American Minis I’d spotted at the Horse Park, she’d said that it had been her dream to get Mia a Mini, and now here we were face-to-face with a dream come true! Actually, the little girl didn’t get just one but two Minis! The other one, Barrack, we couldn’t ask to join in the photos because he was in a foul mood that day and thus had to be kept at bay. That was alright, because Iris by herself was gorgeous enough. I would’ve wanted for Mia to mount Iris for a couple of frames, but Iris was pregnant (another Mini on the way!), so we just forgot about it.
Horses weren’t the only, um, quadrupeds that made special guest appearances that day. Mia’s blue Australian Cattle Dog named, well, Blue also joined in the fun. Such a mischievous little creature, that fella—he was all over the place, darting from left to right, jumping up and down, always wanting to play catch—but when it was time for him to face the camera he was surprisingly tame and well-behaved! Suffice to say that that doggie stole the show—it was as if he was thinking, I am not going to let a bunch of horses upstage me!
It’s uncanny how much Mia looks like her mom. I was staring at the little girl’s face, and it took me back to years ago when Amanda and I were little kids, and we’d lock ourselves up in her bedroom to play with her Barbies (actually, she would take me to her bedroom so I could play with her Barbies, and then she’d rush back out to play with the boys). It got me feeling somewhat, um, melancholic thinking that Amanda finally had a “mini her,” while here I was without a “mini me!” When I asked Mia what she wanted to be when she grew up, she just shook her head, pressed a thumb against her nose (she loves to do that, so cute!), and said she didn’t know yet. One thing’s for sure, though: she’s gonna take after her mother’s love of horses. When Amanda showed me a photo album of their recent trip to Down Under, noting that some of the more beautiful photos had been taken by Mia, I said, “I hope she grows up to be a photographer!” Of course, wishful thinking in my part that, since I didn’t have a “mini me” of my own, Mia would take after a part of me, too. Wouldn’t that be nice, though?
I was happy that I got to exercise a teensy-weensy bit of styling during this session. You see, I’d had reservations at first, knowing that Amanda and I, although we’d practically grown up together, had completely opposing views when it came to clothes (didn’t I mention me playing with her Barbies and her running off to play with the boys?)—i.e., she was the T-shirt-and-jeans kind of girl, while I favored, well, everything impractical. I was also aware of the fact that she was making a conscious effort to raise her daughter in a certain way—i.e., she didn’t want Mia to grow up appearance-conscious—and I wanted to respect that more than anything. But thank God she trusted me enough to let me have my way that day, and she agreed to wear some of the items that I’d brought along with me. I was in for a pleasant surprise, though, when, upon inspecting their closet to look for other items we could use, I spotted these exquisite little pairs of two-tone top-stitched cowboy boots (Amanda’s in aquamarine and coffee, and Mia’s in cameo pink and camel)—turned out that, although function was their utmost priority, they knew a thing or two about injecting a little form and fancy into their wardrobe, after all.
OK, OK. I know you’ve been thinking it while looking at all these photos, so let’s just get it out of the way, shall we? These are some seriously good-looking cowgirls right here. Amanda is going to laugh at this little commentary, though, even call it absurd, because she’s down-to-earth like that. But the fact that they didn’t need makeup to look this good in photos (our makeup artist friend Sheila On, my go-to girl whenever I have shoots in Leyte, wasn’t available that day) is only testimony to how naturally beautiful they are. But make no mistake, behind those pretty faces are some, well, pretty tough interiors. Like the horse that marries good looks and might, these girls possess those two qualities not easily contained in one person. Amanda, for example, is not one you would want to mess with. One can imagine her bringing home trophies from practical shooting competitions in South Africa, or hunting kangaroos in the Australian Outback—all of which, and more, as it happens, she’s actually already done. She’s the kind of girl that, growing up, I’ve been wanting to be, but, well, just can’t. But while I’m terribly unlucky that I can’t be her, I’m still lucky in that not only is she my first cousin, she’s also my oldest best friend.
Amanda Kangleon-Liok and her daughter Amilia (and their mares Moondance, Iris and Salsa, and their dog Blue) | Photographed and styled by Angelo Kangleon in Palompon, Leyte, on November 27, 2011 | Special thanks to Marnelli Uyguangco | Hyperfloral jersey babydoll dress, Topshop | Vintage wash denim jacket, stylist’s own | Chambray folk skirt, The Fab Grab
Forever Your Girls: Rael, Nikka and Nicole
Growing up, there’s always that someone you look up to. And I’m not just taking about your favorite writer (Joyce Carol Oates in my case), or your favorite musician (D’arcy Wretzky of The Smashing Pumpkins!), or your favorite girl on TV (Shannen Doherty for me, I’m sorry!), or any of those from, um, another universe. I’m talking about someone who is actually in your life, someone who is right under your nose, someone you get to see and talk to everyday. Their mere presence enthralls you. When they open their mouths to speak, you hang on to every word. When they start to move to set about doing something, you stare dreamily.
Such was the effect that my good friend Odette Tolentino’s big sister Rael had on my 13- or 14-yeard-old self. I was a sophomore in high school when she opened a store across the street from the bookstore my father owned—a one-stop shop that sold everything, from clothing to accessories, gift items to goods for the home, even stationery and secondhand books. Most of the items had been culled by her mother ultraselective Cora from various flea markets, antique shops, vintage clothing stores, and even garage sales in their parents’ new hometown of California. Everything was so pretty and charming! I would find myself hanging out there for two or so hours everyday after school, and sometimes all day on Saturdays, just looking around and not exactly buying anything (hey, I was just a schoolboy), much to the chagrin of my father, who asked nothing of me but to lend a helping hand at his own store. To me, each visit was magical, like I was stepping into an alternate world every time. Akin, perhaps, to the novelist/screenwriter Amy Ephron’s visits, as a child, to an ailing Stiles O. Clements’s (the great American architect, who did the Spanish Colonial Revival style façade of Hollywood’s El Capitan Theatre, among others) house, which had “floor-to-ceiling birdcages with parrots and macaws of all kinds,” and a large cage out in the garden that housed toucans and flamingos and peacocks. Elements, that’s how Rael called the place, and how fitting! But it wasn’t the items per se that fascinated me—rather, it was how she presented these pieces, how she arranged and rearranged every corner, how she mixed this with that. Her sleight of hand was unerringly good, and invariably chic. Also worthy of note was not only did she sell clothes, she made some of them, too—in the backroom was a seamstress or two, for patrons who wanted something one-of-a-kind or custom-made. She didn’t want to be called a designer, had had no formal training in that department, but she knew her way with patterns and fabrics, and knew how to work the sewing machine, and so friends (and friends of friends) trusted her enough to come to her for help with their wardrobe dilemmas. It helped, too, that she was a tasteful and meticulous dresser herself—everyone she knew wanted a piece or two of what she was wearing, and who better to duplicate them than the original wearer herself? I myself was a huge fan of her dress sense. At dinner parties that her aunt Violeta threw, Rael was always the one that stood out, and that was ‘cause she was always impeccably dressed—mixing structured pieces with soft, feminine ones, and even vintage with new. I would stare at her from across the room, even told my mom at one point (or, maybe even more than once), “You should be dressing like her” (to which my mom would just nod and say, “I know!”). In a small town (this was Ormoc) where there were no designers, stylists, or makeup artists (as of the time, at least), she was the closest thing to a creature of fashion that I’d ever been exposed to. And in a time when the term hadn’t even been invented yet, she was my It Girl.
We would eventually lose touch with each other, especially after I’d moved to Cebu. Not to say we would completely lose touch, as there were a couple of times when, out of the blue, she would do little things for me, and so I would remember, you know, that she was still in my life somehow. Like, for instance, when she found out that I’d started working in editorial and had become a stylist, she would call my mom and hand her copies of hard-to-find (in this part of the world, anyway) magazines and catalogs, with specific instructions to ship these volumes to me. Her own little way of contributing to my compendium of references. And how very thoughtful, right? Some of these magazines remain in my shelves up to this very day. She became sort of like a long-distance mentor, so to speak.
It had been more than a decade since I’d last seen her (which I think is funny, because she lives in Ormoc, which is only two hours away from where I am, and I get to see her sisters Odette and Anna more often, and they live in California!), so imagine my surprise when she sent me an e-mail saying she really loved my recent work and wanted to hire me for a day! She wanted family pictures—well, just her and the girls (her two daughters), because there was no way she could convince the boys to be part of the thing. “I want something that shows my closeness with my daughters,” she wrote. Of course, I said yes! I mean, how could I not? Not only was this an opportunity for me to think outside the engagement/couples box, this also was a chance to rekindle old ties—and to make new ones, with her girls (I’d only seen her eldest Nikka once or twice, when she was still a toddler, and Nicole I’d never even met before). Plus, given I was all too familiar with Rael’s taste (not just in clothes, but in everything she surrounds herself with), I just knew this sitting wasn’t going to be one of those sloppy ones. November was a really busy month for me as I was booked to style and assist at five shoots for Shutterfairy Photography (where I am currently apprenticing), but luckily I had one weekend free, which was the weekend after Thanksgiving, and so that was the date I gave Rael. I might have caught myself with a silly grin as I was packing my bags—I’d never been this excited about a trip to Ormoc before!
This whole thing was perfect timing because, while doing catalog work for Grace Querickiol-Nigel’s accessories line Gracie Q just a week before this trip, the designer had shown me a coffee table book that the great American fashion photographer Bruce Weber had done for a recent ad campaign for German outdoor furniture giant DEDON, and I’d fallen head over heels with the concept: a multi-storey tree house among the branches of a giant tree, filled with DEDON masterpieces and quirky little bric-a-brac, and then occupied by people from all walks of life (from a young couple to an old couple, ballerinas to a garage rock band, even nudists!)—it was the ultimate outdoor living fantasy! Immediately I’d thought to myself, you know, that I had to find a way to translate some of this magic into my own work! And this family shoot right here was a chance for me to do so!
My proposal to Rael included four sets—the first being the highlight, as this was where we were going to set up an outdoor family room of sorts using real furniture and other home accoutrement. Really easy and all sorts of fun because I didn’t have to source items from other people’s homes or from the shops—everything in her own living room was gorgeous, and so I had to look no further! I didn’t even have to take anything from my own apartment—well, except for this Marrakesh-style ceramic flask that had been gifted to me by a friend from Seattle, and my own precious copy of that great big red volume a.k.a. Allure by Diana Vreeland. Safe to mention now that this whole task was kind of like a test for me—I wanted to see if I had what it takes to be an effective set decorator. I was confident with my styling skills—after all, I’d only been doing it more than 10 years—and I was pretty much getting comfortable with my photographing skills, but somehow I felt that something was still missing. For years I’d been stressing over the dilemma that I couldn’t find good shooting locations or decent backdrops in this part of the world, until I realized that, Hey, if you can’t find a pretty spot, why don’t you go ahead and create one yourself? So for months I’d been doing some pretty extensive research, immersing myself in stories about, say, the decorator Rita Konig, and the set designer Shona Heath—and here I was now, anxious to add “set decorator” to my resume! It was frightening at first, standing in the middle of Rael’s living room and not knowing where to begin, but all I had to do was take a deep breath and think, What would Rita Konig do?, and just like that, I got to work. First, I pulled out a carved hardwood settee (since anything larger than a settee would be fiendishly difficult to transport), and then I threw in a patchwork quilt for that touch of shabby chic. Throw pillows, I went for an assortment—in chenille, chintz, damask, and needlepoint, even a couple with tassel fringe. Instead of an actual coffee table, I asked to use an antique-looking hope chest to serve as one, and topped it with random curios (a carved wood picture frame painted in white, an artificial twig bird’s nest with faux eggs, and the abovementioned ceramic flask and Diana Vreeland book). And then I threw in some flowers (artificial, of course), wreaths (the springtime kinds, not the Christmastime kinds), and a couple of watercolor paintings, and that was it. What look was I trying to achieve? I couldn’t decide if it was country cottage-style, or whatever—the whole thing was too eclectic to ever be put in a box! But that didn’t matter. What mattered was it looked homey and inviting—and, more importantly, it represented Rael’s style well. That a certain milieu reflects someone so well sometimes out-enriches the most essential of design principles. Of course, I was proud, too, that it didn’t take a lot of effort in my part to put everything together—only 30 minutes picking the items, and only 15 minutes assembling them on the day of the shoot, and that’s it, no to-ing and fro-ing! Turns out the less stressed out you are about the outcome, the more efficient you become. In Ms. Konig’s own words, “Don’t panic, it is only the dreariest of people who have everything immaculate all the time.”
When it came to the clothes, well, I had it all too easy, too. Knowing that Rael was a clotheshorse, again, I didn’t have to source a lot of items—I told her I had full confidence in her own wardrobe. She asked for copies of pictures that were in my mood board, anyways, just so we could be in the exact same page, and so in no time her inbox was barraged with photos of Olivia Palermo. Rael admitted she had not heard of Olivia Palermo before—she wasn’t a The Hills/The City junkie like I was—but I told her it was the New York socialite and reality TV star that first came to mind when I was developing boards for her shoot, just ‘cause I thought they shared the same style sensibility—i.e., traditionalist, throw-it-on chic, with a knack for mixing crisp, tailored pieces with flouncy, ultra-feminine ones. For the first set I suggested for her to wear an ensemble that was inspired by Ms. Palermo’s outfit in a series of paparazzi photographs of her walking down TriBeCa’s Greenwich St. (from last May): loose-fitting pale cornflower blue dress shirt, pleated maxi skirt, and ballet flats. Rael was quick to snap a light blue seersucker dress shirt from out of her own closet, and quicker to commission her seamstress to whip up a maxi skirt for her, in plain white. For her daughters, a variation of the same theme: plain white dress shirts, and printed skirts in blue-and-white, inspired by, well, Ms. Palermo’s outfit when she attended the Friends with Benefits premiere at New York’s Ziegfeld Theater last July. For the second set, which was going to be shot at the Sabin Resort Hotel, we decided to play with black-and-white: Nikka was going to be wearing an ensemble inspired by Olivia Palermo’s outfit in this one paparazzi photo of her filming a scene for The City at the W Hotel Miami Beach (circa July 2009)—long white cardigan over a white button-front shirt, worn with black tuxedo shorts and a huge black ribbon as tie—while Rael and Nicole were going to be in a black-and-white maxi dress and mini dress, respectively. For the third set, which was going to be shot at a private compound in the Bantigue Beach area, particularly at the charming little driveway that led to Inez Larrazabal-Vesuña’s white picket-fenced country-style home, and which was going to feature a bicycle (Rael’s idea), I wanted outfits that were punchy bright, summery, and floral, a la the Zara dress that Ms. Palermo wore to the Stephane Rolland Haute Couture show during Paris Fashion Week last July—except I wanted to throw in some solid cardigans in the mix, to make the look more girly and carefree. For the fourth and final set, back at the Sabin, I had to reach outside the Olivia Palermo box and look to someone with a more romantic sense of dress for some inspiration. One of my favorite Bruce Weber photographs is that of Natalie Portman for the December 2007/January 2008 Teen Vogue shot outside his beach cabin in Montauk, New York, in which the actress is standing in the rain (with an umbrella, of course), in an oversize cream-and-white check blazer worn over a simple white dress, the blazer cinched at the waist with an offbeat, haute-hippie-style belt. This was exactly the kind of look I wanted on Rael for the fourth set, except I wanted the blazer to be more vibrant, in the same vein as the ‘50s-style halterdress in multi-colored madras that Ms. Portman famously wore back in 2002. Luckily, my friend Vanity Salinana let me borrow a madras blazer that she got from a thrift store! What better way to contrast sunset at the Sabin’s faux boardwalk, right, than with rainbow-bright madras? The stars all aligned when I was able to unearth a patchwork madras shirtdress in Nikka’s closet, and a pair of madras shorts in Nicole’s.
It rained like crazy on the day of the shoot, and I was about to call the whole thing off when I met with Rael and the girls as they were having their makeup done, and they were just laughing and having a good time. It was refreshing to see Nikka and Nicole just being themselves around their mom—if was as if she wasn’t their mom, you know, and more like their big sister. I thought about what Rael had told me in her e-mail: “I want something that shows my closeness with my daughters.” Well, it looked like I wasn’t going to have a hard time capturing that—if I just let them be themselves! It stopped raining mid-morning, perhaps thanks to their collective sunny disposition, and we were able to go about our business. I told them to “don’t mind the camera, pretend I’m not here, and just be yourselves,” and throughout the entire day they did just that. It was obvious the girls loved being around their mom more than anything—they were more comfortable during the frames that they were with her versus when they had to face the camera solo!
I couldn’t help but marvel at how Nikka looked exactly like Rael. “I look at you and am reminded of the first time I met your mom more than 15 years ago,” I told her at one point, and to which the young lady just beamed. Swear to God, the resemblance is uncanny. Even the way she moved her hands, the way she spoke, the way she laughed—just like her mom! Guess it’s worth mentioning now that Nikka almost couldn’t make it to this shoot. A medical student at Cebu Doctors’, she had asked her mom for a rain check because she’d wanted to spend her weekend hitting the books—but she’d said yes at the last minute, perhaps ‘cause she couldn’t bear the thought of letting her mom down.
As for little Nicole (I really shouldn’t be using little because this girl has some serious legs on her), well, it’s obvious she took after her father in the looks (and in the height!) department. When I asked her about her plans for college—i.e., if she ever considered going to fashion or arts school—she said she was interested in pursuing something that had to do with a lot of mathematics or athletics. This didn’t mean, of course, that she didn’t inherit some of her mom’s love of clothes—in fact, as Rael would later reveal, Nicole had been the most excited about this whole thing, and on the days leading to the shoot would rush home from school and spend hours on end trying her outfits on even when we hadn’t finalized them yet! She was very polite, too: when she spotted a couple of friends hanging around the pool at the Sabin, she waited until I was done with my frames before asking if she could go talk to them for a bit. What a sweetheart!
I’d never thought I’d be doing family sessions this soon. Always I’d thought I’d had to master/do nothing but couples sessions for, like, years before I could graduate to anything else (and don’t ask me for my logic behind that!). And then this one right here just made me realize that it’s so much easier doing families versus couples! Sure, there’s going to be more than two people to style, which means more work, and plus the prospect of having a child or adolescent misbehaving on set is kind of scary, but, hey, at least it’s more, um, relatable, right? I mean, not everyone has a better half, but everyone has a family! The moments that unfold before your eyes are things you are all too familiar with, and so it’s not hard to chase after the ones you should be capturing! Perhaps I’m speaking a little too soon here, but what I’m absolutely sure of is that I enjoyed every minute of this session, and I look forward to doing more family shoots in the future!
Speaking of family, another reason this shoot was extra special to me was ‘cause it was my second time to collaborate with the makeup artist Sheila On, after working together on my first ever solo shoot some 9 months back. Sheila is one of my oldest and dearest friends—we were playmates when we were kids, and classmates all throughout high school. We’re not exactly blood-related, but we grew up together, and she reads my mind, and I read hers—sometimes that is enough to make a family, you know?
I should also mention that it was my mom who assisted me during this session—she helped carry my equipment around, assisted with the styling, even took behind-the-scenes shots. Most people don’t work well with their mothers around—I’m proud to declare my mom has the opposite effect on me, and I actually become more efficient when she’s there. I said it once, and I’ll say it again: there’s no affair quite like a family affair!
Oh, and Happy New Year to my readers/viewers! I hope you all have a stylish 2012!
Rael Tolentino-Matuguina and her daughters Nikka and Nicole | Photographed and styled by Angelo Kangleon in Ormoc City on November 26, 2011 | Hair and makeup by Sheila On (to book Sheila, click here) | Special thanks to Monique Rosal and Vanity Salinana | All accessories for the black-and-white set from Gracie Q Creative Designs
In my mood board (see below) Top row, L-R: New York socialite and reality TV star Olivia Palermo walking past TriBeCa’s Ivy Bistro (after leaving International Plaza Nails) on May 3, 2011, photographed by Bauer Griffin/Zimbio.com; Ms. Palermo attending the Friends with Benefits premiere at New York’s Ziegfeld Theater on July 18, 2011, photographed by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images North America; Ms. Palermo filming a scene for an episode of The City at the W Hotel in Miami Beach on July 18, 2009, photographed by James Breeden/Nate Jones/PacificCoastNews.com; Natalie Portman wearing a ‘50s-style multi-colored madras halterdress, circa 2002, photograph from PEOPLE.com; one of my favorite images from Coming Home, the coffee table book that the fashion photographer Bruce Weber did for a recent DEDON ad campaign. Middle row, L-R: Ms. Palermo in a floral Zara dress attending the Stephane Rolland Haute Couture F/W 2011/2012 show during Paris Fashion Week, July 5, 2011, photograph from hillsfreak.blogspot.com; Natalie Portman photographed by Bruce Weber in Montauk, New York, for the December 2007/January 2008 issue of Teen Vogue. Palette used in this layout, bottom row, L-R: Powder blue, light pistachio, earth yellow, bittersweet, and chamoisee.
Behind-the-Scenes Instagrams Top row, L-R: Cross-checking an outfit I have put together for Nikka versus an Olivia Palermo photo in my mood board; Nicole trying on outfit # 1 the day before the shoot; sorting footwear is tough (I’ve never seen this much ballerina flats in my life!); finalizing outfits for the madras set. Middle row, L-R: Me photographing the girls during the bicycle set; me hard at work on the set decoration; I loved, loved, loved these watercolor paintings; me and the girls at the Sabin for the black-and-white set. Bottom row, L-R: Sheila On putting on Rael’s makeup; it’s always fun watching Sheila as she does her magic; Sheila’s makeup box looks good enough to eat; Nikka’s turn in the makeup chair.
Show Me a Garden that’s Bursting into Life: Luigi and Maricor, Part 2
“If I lay here/ If I just lay here/ Would you lie with me and just forget the world?”
How beautiful are these lines from Snow Patrol’s “Chasing Cars?” In fact, how beautiful are all the lines from that one song? Sources say frontman Gary Lightbody considers it the “purest love song” he’s ever written. Eschewing intricate imagery not uncommon in arena ballads, the muse having struck the songwriter during a hangover, it uses stark sentences, simplistic metaphors—“a garden that’s bursting into life”—and languid cadences, and this is probably why it’s so catchy. When you keep your words simple (which is one gift I definitely don’t have), you see, they go straight to the heart. “I think that the song has worked because it has an emotion that people can relate to,” Lightbody has been quoted as saying (after a UK-based music licensing body declared it “most widely played song of the decade” in December of 2009). In the same way, TV music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas told Los Angeles Magazine about her choice of the track for the second season finale of Grey’s Anatomy (a listing that would be responsible for propelling the song to the top of music download charts in 2006): “It connected on multiple emotions at once.”
Even to people like me, who don’t have someone we can lie there and just forget the world with, it has a way of sending chills down the spine. (Especially Natasha Bedingfield’s version—have you heard it? It’s pretty much like the original version, except the words are sung kind of breathlessly. It’s on constant repeat in my iPod.). It pushes buttons in that it conjures visions of all sorts of escapism. I mean, to just withdraw from everyone and everything, and just lay there, not caring—how nice would that be? Although, of course, I’m sure it’s no more nicer than to have someone to escape with—or someone to be your escape, if you will.
I had been toying with the idea of translating this whole song into engagement photos for so long. Luckily I found a couple whose very relationship embodies the carefree, almost hypnotic premise of the song. Luigi and Maricor, they knew the formula too well—some events (and people) in their lives threaten to shake them, but instead of breaking down they just withdraw and look for a means of escape. And so spur-of-the-moment road trips are not uncommon. Like this one right here, for instance.
We’d already done a session a couple of weeks back, and I’d thought, you know, that that was that. But suddenly they wanted another session, “away from the city” this time. Served me well, because although that first session had covered the track’s main lines—“Let’s waste time/ Chasing cars/ Around our heads”—complete with an actual car and all, I had been left with a hunger to translate all the other lines, and here was my chance to do so (I did not have to wait for the next couple to come along)!
Two hours north of Cebu, that was where they took me. A place called Borbon, some three or four towns after Danao, and right before Tabogon. Shame on me—up to that point I had never heard of the place. (We’re always in a hurry to go to, say, Bantayan Island, and we tend to overlook the gorgeous places along the way.) We were going to be shooting at Luigi’s grandfather’s vacation house (or “rest house,” as they call those things here in the Philippines), and during the ride there I thought I had a pretty good idea of what the whole thing was going to look like, but was proven wrong once the gates were flung open. More garden than house, really, and the area was so huge you could get lost in it if you weren’t careful. And unnervingly perched atop a cliff! Yes, overlooking the sea that separates the islands of Cebu and Leyte. There was a makeshift tree house, too, with an old telescope—presumably for those who wanted to look across the water at Isabel, Leyte. But my favorite part was how the whole place was made to look unmanicured—wildflower shrubs sat alongside well-tended garden plants, giving off a bittersweet, unstudied kind of appeal (give a wedding stylist five minutes to pluck the flowers and whatever else there is to pick at, and he would be able to come up with maybe 10 different kinds of whimsical bouquets, or quirky little boutonnieres). I was quick to thank the heavens for giving me a setting that was my very idea of “a garden that’s bursting into life.”
The photos of the couple lying in the grass (with a mahjong set, and don’t ask me why) were taken, well, from the top (how else?). Yes, there was the tree house to support me, but it was only the lower half of my body that it bolstered—my torso was pretty much suspended in the air! It was dangerous, and I almost dropped my camera—twice! I think I might have felt my back snap, too. Luigi’s friend Roland Caballero pleaded for me to give it up, saying he was scared for my life, but these pleas fell on deaf ears. I was willing to stay all day up there, and to risk my life, all for the sake of getting my perfect “lie with me and just forget the world” picture!
Speaking of Roland, I must not forget to thank him. And not only for his genuine concern about my safety. A graphic designer and illustrator by profession, Roland had been asked by Luigi to come with during this shoot to act as “creative director,” after I’d brought up that “I am going to be needing some help if we are going to be shooting somewhere where there’s trees and plants and all.” My mentor Malou Pages-Solomon (of Shutterfairy Photography, where I am currently apprenticing) very recently wrote about how she was more comfortable shooting in the mountains, where nature is aplenty, versus, say, in an urban area. For me, at least up to this very shoot right here, it had always been the opposite: I’d preferred shooting in the city (where there’s buildings and concrete and glass and etc.), and I’d been deathly afraid of, um, vegetation. In a city setting, you see, I’d found it easier to mind my composition and manage my angles—always a straight line somewhere, always a plane or two, always a perfect circle. Plants, however, I’d had a hard time grasping—too abstract, too all over the place! Thank God Roland was there to show me how to make all these nature-y elements work to my advantage. Taught me how, for example, to look at things two-dimensionally, versus in three dimensions (i.e., take a test shot before deciding against a certain spot), and how to use leaves and barks and all that for framing. Even showed me where the best lighting was coming out of—and wasn’t that supposed to be my job? To cut to the chase, what I’m saying is, yes, it doesn’t hurt to second pair of eyes with you when you’re shooting, and it doesn’t have to be a secondary or assistant photographer (Roland here does like taking pictures, too, but decided to go camera-less that day so he could focus on helping me out with my shots)—especially when it’s someone who’s professionally trained in color, shape, structure, composition, and in understanding the nuances of space. I do not think I could’ve done all this without him. I mean, sure, I had a pretty good idea of how I wanted my subjects to be positioned within my frame, but I wouldn’t have been able to get the third character—the location, the surroundings—to cooperate if it weren’t for him. Needless to say, I took note of everything that came out of his mouth, and would end up applying all these lessons a week later during my session with Christina Garcia-Frasco for the Shandar catalog (the concept had called for a farm set).
I think I mentioned this already, but I’ll say it again: This is my second session with this couple, the first having been completed a month earlier in Mandaue. They had a third session after this, because Luigi had wanted a kitchen setting with him wearing his chef whites (yes, he is a chef), but I had to excuse myself from that—they were going to be shooting at the Casino Español de Cebu’s cookery, and at nighttime, too, and I did not want to jump into indoors and strobe without proper training. And so that set was taken care of by a photographer named Burton Raya. I’m not sure if Burton has a Website and I haven’t really seen the photos from that set, but I’m sure they came out gorgeous—must have gone really well with the couple’s choice of wedding souvenirs, which were measuring cups, with a little note that said “Love knows no measure” (the cups came with rulers, too, as Maricor here is a teacher by profession).
I hope you enjoy looking at this set as much as we did shooting it.
Luigi Mangubat and Maricor Teves | Photographed by Angelo Kangleon in Borbon, Cebu, on April 10, 2011 | Hair and makeup by June Sy | Creative Director: Roland Caballero | Special thanks to: Mia Bacolod and Vice Mayor and Mrs. Ace Serafin of Tabogon
Carter
Empire State of, Um, Month: My Month in Instagrams | August 2011
Am I boring you yet? You know, with all these journal-type posts? That question, of course, goes to those who know me personally—friend or foe, I must say—because I just know that a couple of brows are going to raise, and they’d be, like, “Tell us something we don’t know,” or, “Show us something we haven’t seen!”
I can’t exactly blame them. It’s no secret that when I put up this blog a little over two months ago I declared that I was going to be using it as a vehicle for my foray into photography. An inconvenient truth, as it turns out now, but it’s the truth anyhow. It’s only natural that people are expecting this to be more of a photoblog than anything else.
But you gotta cut me some slack. One thing I can tell you right now is that, being new to this whole blogging thing and all (I’m not even sure if I can spell blogosphere correctly—did I get that right?), I’m not sure if it comes with a set of rules, and if it does, where to get a reliable handbook. You must remember that, in the beginning, I wasn’t exactly sold to the idea of blogging. I’d never thought I’d live to see the day that I would be putting up a blogsite. For eons my friends had been badgering me to start a blog, and always I’d rebuffed them by saying, “I’m a writer, not a blogger.” My contention was that to those of us who had seen our work on newsprint or some other sort of physical medium a little over a hundred times pre-Internet era, the idea of intangibility was frightening, not to mention the notion of self-publishing a little unceremonious, slapdash and narcissistic. And so when that day came when I had to erect this whole thing, I didn’t have a single clue what I was doing, much less if I was doing it right. Safe to say that until this very day I’m still clueless! Which is why I rely on friends who’ve been doing this a long time to give me some direction (one of them my writer friend Debbie Rojonan, who maintains two blogs—including Balaki Ko, which aims to encourage penning poetry in the vernacular—and whose Tweet from months ago that said “Where in the social media engagement pyramid are you? Still a lurker? Move up. Share, comment, produce, curate. It’s the information age” was what had given me that much needed thrust).
To cut to the chase, the consensus was that, no matter what your reasons for putting up a blog, it has to show the world your character, a dose of your personality, and ensure that your identity doesn’t get “lost in translation” in the process. This tenet is especially crucial for someone like me, a startup photographer, because it offers people who have not met me or heard of me yet a window into what it’s going to be like working with me. I’ve decided the best way to do it is through snippets from my journal—not only does this give my audience a peek into my progress in learning the craft, it also shows what inspires me, in the hopes of perhaps catching the eye of those who are inspired by the same things, and of eventually paving the way to winning collaborations.
That being said, you’re going to have to get used to this, because from here on out, at least once a month, this is what you’re going to be getting from me. What it is is I’ve elected to tap into Instagram to help me carry this whole thing out. (I’m sure all of you know what Instagram is, but to those of you who don’t, it’s the free app for iPhones that lets you take snapshots, apply filters to them, and then instantly share them with friends.) And so, you see, it’s not going to be all writing, and somehow I’ve managed to figure out a way to carry on in the same lane! Instant photos are still photos, whether you like it or not!
One day I will eventually get to that point where I get to do what most seasoned photographers do—that is, just STFU, post the damn photos and then let them do the talking. Wouldn’t that be nice? But I know I got an awful lot of work to do before I can turn up at such plateau. In the meantime, I’m just glad I can share with you the little things that make this work in progress an exciting one and this journey worth the while.
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The beginning of this month saw me getting the New York blues. I was browsing through my good friend Kathleen’s Facebook photo album of her trip to the City that Never Sleeps, feeling sorry that I wasn’t in any of the pictures. I was supposed to go with her on this trip, you see. We’d talked about it for a year—the plan was for me to leave for L.A. late May, and then meet her in the Big Apple a month later—but, as luck would have it, her vacations dates were approved, while mine got the red light. To say that I wallowed in pain would be saying the least. My brother would find me crouched in the breakfast nook, just staring blankly at my I Heart NY keychain and the MTA subway/commuter railroad map (01) from my first trip. I even hung my $3 I Heart NY souvenir shirt in my bedroom window (06) just so I could stare at it before falling asleep. It all turned out fine, though, because while I couldn’t go to New York, it was New York that found its way to me!
Yes, my friend Anne Alegrado and her family (04, 05), my gracious hosts during my first NY trip some two years back, came to Cebu for a quick vacation early this month. It was nice to be within hugging distance with her again, and with her daughter Ellis (02). Remember Ellis from my previous post? The little girl who took me to the Brooklyn Bridge—or, as she called it, “the bridge from the princess movie” (she was talking about Enchanted)? Yes, that girl. She remembers me as “the uncle who slept in our couch and walked me to school couple of times.” Last time I saw her she was into, well, “princess movies” and mathematics. Now she’s into ballet and yoga (03). Proud mother Anne was happy to report that the little girl was learning to play the guitar, too! “[Her Dad] Jovi bought her a Beatles guitar chord songbook,” Anne shared, and then Ellis wasted no time in singing to me her favorite Beatles song, “Here Comes the Sun” from Abbey Road (07). She knew all the words, and sang in perfect tune! It makes me happy seeing my friends’ kids grow up like this—I’m never going to have kids of my own, so moments like this are the closest I can get to feeling like a proud parent. Our reunion had to be cut short ‘cause they had lots of other people to see—and plus they couldn’t stay long in Cebu ‘cause they had a European trip to embark on (as of this writing they’re in Madrid, I guess). For days I couldn’t get Ellis’s rendition of “Here Comes the Sun” out of my head. It inspired me to take this snapshot of a sunrise one morning (08). To me, the song represents her future, one that’s definitely going to be bright. I hope I live to see the day when she gets there—remind me to bring sunglasses!
Not really big on taking photos of flowers, but I was inspired by Hans Christian Andersen (it was the 136th anniversary of his death the beginning of this month) and the stories I’d grown up with—particularly that one that told of a butterfly looking for a flower to become his bride, and it was a daisy named Marguerite he first approached for guidance as she was “the wisest one.” I’m not really sure these were daisies (09, 10), but they were gorgeous.
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My favorite pieces from fashion designer Dexter Alazas’s most recent collection (12)—he calls it the “peacock collection.” Always I’ve been a sucker for tasteful melees of ornamentation, and these pieces are testimony to Dexter’s mastery in this department. I would love to be able to use them for a shoot one day—that is, if no one beats me to it and I can find a client who can fit into them! I love visiting my friends’ ateliers and browsing through the racks. Dexter’s atelier (11, 12) is special because not only does he put on display his newest creations, pieces from his past collections are within reach, too—and these things, they have a way of taking you back (I think he still has this one gala gown that was used during a shoot I had with the photographer Wig Tysmans and the model Melanie Ediza for CeBu! Magazine some 10 years back.) Rumor has it that for his 15th anniversary two years from now Dexter will be putting up a retrospective. If there’s any truth to that at all, then I’m not the least worried—his archives are carefully arranged, and so curating is going to be a no-brainer.
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The indefatigable Ms. Marlene fitting me into a Dexter Alazas barong Tagalog (13, 14). This was my first time ever to slip into a barong. Always I’d been a suit person. My sister saw these snapshots and exclaimed, “Never thought I’d see the day!” I mean, I still remain partial to suits, but this time I had to make an exception—I was about to attend one of the most important wedding of my life, and the dress code called for traditional Filipino for the gents. The things you would do for a best friend getting married are nothing compared to the things you would do for two best friends getting married to each other! Well, that, plus the fact that, as you get older, you strive to be more polite in social functions—and that includes playing close attention to the dress codes. Turned out wearing a barong wasn’t too bad after all—the only downside is that you can’t smoke a lot or be around smokers ‘cause one flick of ash on the material and then you’re dunzo.
But enough about barongs and dress codes and stuff. Let’s talk about Ms. Marlene. Most of you don’t know her, but I have so much respect for her. She’s, like, the Cebu fashion industry’s best kept secret. She’s non-exclusive; she works for quite a handful of local design houses. The reason she is indispensable is that she sees eye-to-eye with these designers. A designer gives her a sketch, or an idea, and she executes it flawlessly. She is very diligent, too—working long hours, especially when it’s show season. She and I go way back—always at my side whenever I was commissioned to style a Kate Torralba fashion show, and always ready with her quick fix kit for instances that required last-minute alterations and I refused to let pins and binder clips do the trick. I look up to people like Ms. Marlene—the people who work behind-the-scenes tirelessly and fervently to bring beautiful clothes to life.
New York just wouldn’t stop coming to me. This time it was in the form of Nila Romano and Dr. John Seno, who flew into town early this month so they could get married in front of family and friends (17-28). Well, technically they’re not from New York but from New Jersey, but they live in a town called West New York, which is nestled right by the Hudson River and is considered a part of the New York metropolitan area—you can see the Upper West Side of Manhattan if you face east—so, yeah, they’re still New Yorkers to me. (Nila was also one of the few people who showed me around the Big Apple when I was there during my first visit two years ago.) This wedding was special to me—I’d waited for it like it was my own. I’d been with this couple, you see, since the beginning, since the courtship stages, and I’d witnessed the whole thing blossom into a beautiful, strong bond. Fifteen years! That’s how long they’d been together! Very few relationships get to stand the test of time. It’s a connection cemented by his unwavering faithfulness and her eternal optimism. Nila’s older sister Dory Cusi, who’d flown in from SoCal, would later toast to many of John’s finest qualities and heroic deeds, including how, when Nila couldn’t fly to the Unites States yet, he single-handedly chaperoned Dorly’s little children across the Pacific so they could finally be reunited with their parents—“and that’s when I knew he was the right guy for my sister.” They tied the knot at the Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral (21-23)—it was my first time to step inside that church, and it was glorious. The bride wore a dazzling floor-sweeping strapless sweetheart-neckline gown that they’d snatched in Manhattan. John’s mother had commissioned a choir to sing “Ave Maria” as Nila’s walk-down-the-aisle song. The whole thing was so surreal I was brought to tears. A great bonus was that I got to be reunited with my some of my closest friends from college, and with the rest of the Seno family, especially John’s brothers Joey (25, delivering his best man’s speech) and Rico (26), both of whom I had become close to as John and I had lost touch.
Just a couple of photos from a recent engagement session that I did (29-32). This one took two days because we had to go up the mountains! Yes, it was grueling! The pictures came out pretty good, though, thanks to the fact that this was the first engagement shoot wherein I had absolutely nothing to do with the styling—i.e., someone else took care of the clothes, leaving me with nothing else to attend to but my camera! I should do this more often—you know, just take pictures and leave all the other aspects like the styling and the props to others. It gets you focused like that. I am unable to upload that set on here just yet ‘cause I am not allowed to publish the photos until the days leading to the wedding, so you will have to stay tuned.
Every Wednesday morning my friend Jeff and I make it a point to visit the Carmelite Monastery down Mabolo (just a good 10 minutes’ walk from our office) to light a few candles and say a little prayer (33-35). (By the way, last week, August 24, was the 48th anniversary of the consecration of the Monastery.) I can tell you that not one prayer has been unanswered. More often than not I pray for good health for me and my family. Sometimes I pray for good shoot weather, and I almost always get it! Of course, I go to the Redemptorist Church, too (36)—I live right next door!
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So a friend brought me to a place that specialized in bespoke menswear (37). I can’t disclose the name of the institution ‘cause I’ve kind of been sworn into silence, but they’ve been making bespoke suits and barong Tagalogs for a privileged group of Cebuanos for years, relying mostly on astute word of mouth. I ran my hands through some of the suit jackets laid on the dress forms and was amazed by the precision and the sharpness—what great handiwork! I hope to make an appointment soon.
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That’s a tally of my daily cigarette consumption right there (38). I was really sick beginning of this month, and when the doctor asked me “How many sticks do you smoke in one day?” I could not answer her. And so she told me that I “better start keeping track.” And so here we are. Turns out I am a pack-a-day smoker. Yikes. The good thing about keeping a record, though, is that it kind of disgusts you every time you look at it, and so it kind of keeps you in check. I am not in a struggle to quit or anything—I just really want to minimize my burning up is what it is. Smoker’s cough is not exactly music to anyone’s ears—even to the smoker himself.
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One of my best friends from high school, Rhoderick (39), blew another birthday candle this month. While I could count the candles, what I couldn’t count was how many times this person had been there for me and my family throughout the years, so I knew it was time to give back. I threw a little birthday dinner for him at my place, and we had habichuelas (his favorite), among others, and I made Do-Over-style sangria, too! I’m happy to report I’m getting good at this thing—that is, cooking and entertaining at home. Sure, it’s labor-intensive and time-consuming, but it gives little celebrations a great punch of importance and a touch of individuality, as opposed to, say, just dragging someone to the usual restaurants. Just a little something I picked up from my recent obsession with Rita Konig (I talked about this briefly in my previous post). It is not my intention to do this more and more, but to do it more often than not, maybe at least once a month. You see, there was a time I could not cook, even if it meant saving my life. To borrow a line from Carrie Bradshaw, “The only thing that I have ever successfully made in the kitchen is a mess.” But I’m not twenty-something anymore, and now that I am running my own household I am somehow responsible for injecting a little, um, wisdom into it. Those closest to me will laugh when they read this because they know I am a first-class slob. But, hey, I am working on that, too. One step at a time! This year it’s all about cooking for me, and maybe next year it will be cleaning (LOL). Here’s a serving of the vegetable/seafood pesto pasta that I whipped up some two weeks ago (40). Yes, my brother loved it, and I’m making it again this week.
One of my all-time favorite shirts: a black and white “she-Che” raglan (41) from Cecile Zamora’s Defect that my best friend Yna Varias gave to me for Christmas ’99—yes, it is 12-years-old, and I still wear it like I only got it yesterday!
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Herb Ritts is, like, my all-time favorite photographer. As a young boy growing up in a small town, I would flip through my Mom’s and my aunts’ old Vogues and be mesmerized by his work. The first time I knew I was going to make fashion a huge part of my life was when I saw the cover of American Vogue’s April 1993 issue—Helena Christensen, Claudia Schiffer, Naomi Campbell, Christy Turlington and Stephanie Seymour all playful, wearing candy-striped crop tops by Marc Jacobs paired with white Daisy Dukes, photographed by Herb Ritts. I would later find out it was him who’d directed two of my all-time favorite music videos, too: Madonna’s “Cherish” from 1989, and Janet Jackson’s “Love Will Never Do (Without You)” from 1990. Ever since then I’d become obsessed with his style, his penchant for black-and-white and the way he’d approached chiaroscuros. I remember crying so hard when he died in December of 2002. Three weeks ago, on the week of his birthday (August 13, he would’ve turned 59), I paid tribute by setting my favorite Herb Ritts photograph (“Versace Dress, Back View, El Mirage, 1990″) as wallpaper on my phone (42, 43). Around the same time, the Getty announced that they had just acquired 69 Herb Ritts photographs, and that they were planning to put up a retrospective in the spring of next year—God, I hope I’ll be in L.A. in time for that!
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Another person whose demise brought me to my knees: the Filipino actor Rico Yan. I was watching Got 2 Believe, his last movie, in which he’d played a wedding photographer. I had to grab my phone and take pictures of freeze-frames (46, 47) of him crying. He was most beautiful when he cried.
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So, remember last month when I talked about how I stockpile on Celestial Seasonings Sleepytime Green in Lemon Jasmine? I got an e-mail from someone who blogs about teas asking why I loved them when there were a lot of better tasting sleep-inducing teas out there. Here’s my answer: They come in string-less, tag-less, staple-less pillow-style teabags (44)—in short, they are environment-friendly.
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Another e-mail I got was from someone who wanted to know how the oversize mustard grandfather cardigan that I let a client wear for a nautical-themed set qualified as, well, nautical. My answer: I know that when we say “nautical fashion” we are quick to think blue-and-white stripes, and then a little red highlights here are there, but what some of you don’t know is that yellow is part of the basic sailorman palette, too—owing to the yellow slickers that sailors use (I did a little bit of research and found out that the yellow “resulted from treating canvas with linseed oil to make it waterproof”). Also, I did take a closer inspection at the buttons of that cardigan: they were gold-colored, like those of the traditional Service Dress Blue uniforms, and they had these embossed yacht anchor details, too (48)—you can’t get any more nautical than that.
This past month was special for a lot of different reasons, but this one right here could be the biggest highlight of them all: A little over two weeks ago I started my apprenticeship at Shutterfairy Photography. Single-handedly run by the beautiful and brilliant Malou “Mai” Pages-Solomon (49, 50), Shutterfairy is one of the best-known boutique wedding/lifestyle photography firms in this part of the country. I had been an avid follower of her work, even before I could get a camera of my own. It was a bold step in my part deciding to pursue this apprenticeship. Towards the end of June, after five or so solo shoots, I’d felt I’d needed to push myself some more, and that all this business about being self-taught was getting old. I’d read somewhere about Victor Demarchelier, Patrick Demarchelier’s son, being his father’s principal assistant. “There are [other aspects of photography] that you can grasp faster as an assistant,” he had been quoted as saying. How cool is a father-and-son team? But my father was no longer here to teach me, so I had to look outside the family circle. I pulled a couple of strings, managed to get good viva-voce recommendations, sent a letter of application, and in no time found myself under Mai’s wings.
My first session with her was for an engagement shoot. We were going to be shooting at a farm up the mountains in Carmen, some two or so hours northeast of Cebu. As luck would have it, the couple we were going to be shooting were from New York—I swear to God, the New York streak just kept on coming! Cherry, who has roots from Cebu, was about to marry her fiancé Christian (56) in less than a week. I asked why they decided not to have their engagement photos taken in their new hometown of New York, and she said it was Christian’s idea for them to be taken here, in this very farm, ‘cause he’d fallen in love with this place when they’d first visited about a year ago. What was not love? I looked around me and I couldn’t keep my jaw from dropping—everywhere you turned it was picturesque (49-56). The place is called Noah’s Farm, and it is owned by Cherry’s sister, Toni Grace “TG” Villamor, who likes to take her family up there once in a while when they want to shy away from the city life.
What I did was mostly help the couple with their outfits and scout for settings, but I did take a couple of pictures, too, ‘cause Mai would be, like, “Where’s your camera? Why aren’t you taking pictures?” I can’t post any of my photos from that day on here yet, ‘cause I have yet to get approval from Mai and, well, the clients, but, here, feel free to go to the Shutterfairy blogsite to view Mai’s gorgeous set from that day.
Remember two months ago when I inaugurated this blog and I talked about how photographers these days, in an effort to stand out and be cut above the rest, “hold back on the sharing?” Well, I take that back now, because Mai here was just amazing. She answered all my questions, even those that I did not ask out loud (it was as if she was reading my mind!), and she was always pushing me to get to the work at hand. I will write more on the things I’ve learned from her in my future posts. Right now let me just soak up in the awesomeness of how lucky I am to have found a mentor who is as generous as she is talented.
I have quite a number of Nike Dunks, but this pair right here (57), I must say, is my favorite. The sangria/saffron combo always does it for me.
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OK, so I’d been hearing through the grapevine that there was this store in Cebu that sold items from IKEA, but I’d never really paid attention to the buzz. And then I chanced upon the store myself. The store is called Förskö (60), and they are located at the second level of the Banilad Town Centre. I must’ve foamed in the mouth a little when in the corner of my eye I saw the IKEA logo. Never in my wildest dreams had I seen this coming! Not a lot of stock in there, though, and their space isn’t large enough to accommodate the showroom types of displays that IKEA is known for, but they do have a couple of winners, including the LACK side tables (the solid painted versions and the clear lacquered birch effect versions), the silver TERTIAL work lamp, and the MAKROS pendant lamp (58) that I loved from the 2011 catalog. They also have the KNAPPA pendant lamp (59) which I don’t remember from the 2011 catalog, so presumably it’s from a newer line. If you can’t find anything you love, that’s alright—just flip through the pages of the catalog, point at something, and they’ll place the order for shipment later! I’m thinking of getting the NASUM storage baskets (in clear lacquered banana fiber weave). We’ll see.
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The fresh carabao’s milk pastillas (64) from Carigara, Leyte, are simply the best. You should try them.
I forgot to mention my apprenticeship at Shutterfairy comes with a huge bonus: For package deals—e.g., engagement session plus day-of-the-wedding coverage—Mai works with a husband-and-wife team, Paul and Charisse Calo (71), a.k.a. Calography. I met Charisse (66) during the previously mentioned first session with Mai, and I would get to work with both her and her better half a couple of days later during my second session. Both teams were commissioned to do the engagement photos of visiting Zamboaga-based couple Al and Pie (67, 68, 69, 72) who were going to be married in two months. It was fun for the most part because Paul turned out to be the adventurous, adrenaline-driven type, and there was never a dull moment because we were always moving from one location to another. Even more amazing was the camaraderie between the two teams, and that they saw eye to eye and there was never a conflict of ideas. That day I learned some of the technicalities of shooting under harsh lighting conditions, like minding my ISO and all that other good stuff. It’s so cool that I get to pick at not just one brain but three! I cannot wait to work with them again. Click here for a couple of Paul’s and Charisse’s shots from that session.
Proud of myself because this month I kept true to my promise of buying more books and fewer magazines! In fact, no magazine purchases at all this month! (Well, next month is a going to be a different story altogether, as I am determined to grab the September issue of Vogue—Kate Moss on the cover, my dears, and an exclusive coverage of her wedding to Jamie Hince!) So my brother Jake came across this bookstore that sold hard-to-find volumes at steeply discounted prices, and I wasted no time in checking it out. The photography shelf was what I checked out first (73), but it turned out all it contained were books on graphic design and illustration—the salesperson told me they were running low on photography titles, but I enlightened her that maybe all they needed was a little rearranging, because I did find this one baby, Forever Young: Photographs of Bob Dylan by Douglas R. Gilbert (with text from music journalist Dave Marsh and a foreword by The Lovin’ Spoonful’s John Sebastian), in the shelf labeled Fashion. I couldn’t believe they were selling this book for, like, less than Php 200. I loved all the photos in it, but my favorite was this one photo of Dylan singing to the poet Allen Ginsberg in some kitchen while Sally Grossman (better known as the lady in red on the cover of Dylan’s 1965 album Bringing It All Back Home) looked on (74). As I did more digging I was able to unearth a copy of Vivienne Tam’s China Chic (75). For years I had been looking for this title, and finally here I was holding a copy of it with my bare hands. My first impulse was to add it to my cart, but then after leafing through the first few pages I decided it wasn’t for me. No disrespect—Vivienne Tam is one person I look up to, along with other Asian and Asian-American designers like Anna Sui, Vera Wang, Jason Wu, and Alexander Wang. But this book was just not me at all—best left to Winnie Narazeths of the world. Perhaps Anna Sui by Andrew Bolton would be more in my lane, what with her rock ‘n’ roll aesthetic and all. So, no, I do not regret not buying this one. One thing I do regret not getting was this huge Collector’s Library Edition volume of Oscar Wilde’s works (76). I’d turned away from it in favor of a book on the makeup artist Kevyn Aucoin. Asinine move in my part, really, and I should’ve listened to my writer friend Xiomara Demeterio-Glindmeyer when she said, “I would grab Wilde in a heartbeat.” I was tempted, you see, by the immediate practicality the Aucoin book had offered—like, hey, I was going to be doing shoots for a living, so best to grab the one that would teach me a thing or two about makeup, a very important aspect of every shoot. I realize now, of course, that the Wilde book would’ve been the more practical choice—the Aucoin book, easy to find, whereas the chances or finding another Wilde book in this part of the world, close to impossible. Oh, well, you live, you learn.
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Just a couple of days ago I was reunited with someone I hadn’t talked to or seen in a very long time—I’m talking about the singer/songwriter Cattski Espina (77, 78). She had just finished titling and tracklisting her new album (to be released really soon!), and now it was time to get to work on the album cover. She had commissioned Shutterfairy to do her portraits, and since Mai was in Manila for a family thing I took the liberty of setting up the pre-shoot meeting myself. What was supposed to be a quick discussion turned into 3- or 4-hour meeting, ‘cause there was a lot of catching up to do in my part. I confessed that the last album I’d heard about was Vacuum My Inside (released late 2003), the follow-up to their 2001 debut Cattski EP. Turned out that I’d missed out on a third album (a 2009 release called Sound Minds Speak Volumes) because this thing she was about to launch was her fourth. I also learned that she was on her own now—this new release was going to be the first from Cattski the solo artist; Cattski the band was no more. “Which is why I’ve decided to call it Zero,” she shared, “because it’s like I’ve gone back to zero.” I’m not allowed to let anyone in on the details just yet, but suffice to say that, like the album title, the recording is going to feature a pared-down sound—a departure from the heavier sounds in her previous works. “More electronica than rock,” she pointed out. This called for a brand spanking new look. We got to work, and I was happy with the styling concept we were able to come up with. The shoot’s this weekend, and I’m excited. I can’t wait to see how it’s all gonna turn out.
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Cattski couldn’t help but notice the wallpaper on my phone. I told her that this was my own little way of paying tribute to someone. Couple of weeks ago it was Herb Ritts (42, 43), and these days it was Aaliyah (79, 80). It was the 10th anniversary of Aaliyah’s death last August 25. Can you believe it’s been 10 years? Feels like it was only yesterday that I cried myself to sleep, after seeing the news on the plane crash that killed her. In her song “Try Again” from the soundtrack to Romeo Must Die, Timbaland ad libs, “It’s been a long time/ We shouldn’t have left you/ Without a dope beat to step to.” Well, at least Aaliyah didn’t leave us without a dope beat to step to. Up to this very day I still dance to “Back and Forth” in my room, the same way I used to do it back in ’94, and it’s something I’m not ashamed of. Nothing wrong about getting up and letting “this funky mellow groove get you in the mood”—yes, “you know it’s alright.”
