Wednesday, January 30, 2008

Another Round of Things To Talk About!


W
ow, what a week it has been! Where do I start?!

Monday began with rehearsals for the NBC Nationwide Sketch Comedy Showcase, in rehearsal hall 1, literally steps away from Studio 1A on the NBC lot. For those of you who aren't familiar with Studio 1A, it's Jay Leno's set (formerly Johnny Carson's and I believe Bob Hope's). It was awesome! There we were in a large rehearsal hall with worn hardwood floors, gymnasium height ceilings surrounded by props from the Tonight Show (well, they were outside the door, but still!) Basically, Cold Tofu was asked to take part in this showcase to perform in front of their producers, casting directors and agents! How cool was that! The actual showcase happened last night, Tuesday at the Ivar Theater in Hollywood. Great times as we were surrounded by some pretty talented groups, including Loose Screws from Hawaii, KevINda, Mike Rose and friends, Claudia (something) and the SC All-starts, and a group from NY named Derrick. Boy, when you get 6 comedy groups together, things can get pretty funny!

(On a side note, not only did we see Jay Leno's set, I also saw that one guy "Ross the Intern" who frequents his show, and on Tuesday, while getting coffee, Stephen Baldwin, near the Ivar. Yup, it's Hollywood alright.)

Who knows who else has been in this rehearsal hall


Here's Denise, Aaron, and Helen in front of the different NBC logos throughout the years. Jay Leno's studio is to the right.


The Ivar Theater - site of the "Showdown"


Room full of sketch groups.


Loose Screws from Hawaii, in full Kubuki costume, getting ready to perform their patented "Screw-buki" improvised show. These guys are awesome (and funny!)

Needless to say, it was an awesome evening of sketch comedy with a great audience of industry folk! So much so, we are invited back to meet with their casting department in the upcoming days. How cool is that?! Great times indeed!

Lastly for this post, I am so honored to have been chosen by Saki and Taka to photograph their wedding in August. It's going to be a terrific wedding that is going to be held at Taka's parent's house. I can't wait to photograph their big day! A huge and heartfelt thanks go out to this super couple for choosing me to capture their wedding day - I KNOW we're going to get some great images! More to come in the months leading to their big day!


The lovely couple Taka and Saki.
Did you know that Saki played on the Professional Golf Tour for 2 years and prior to that, won a national collegiate golf championship with UCLA?!
Taka is also an avid golfer with a course record at his nearby golf course - how cool is that?!


That's it for now. I have more photos to share from the sketch show, but I'll post those later. Hope you all are having a great week!

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

So Much to Talk About!

What a weekend! First off, whenever there's a long weekend, it's great! But when you add activities, and meeting people, and doing absolutely NOTHING, it's even better!

The weekend started off for me rather stressful, on friday afternoon, cause I had some work stuff to get done, seriously, number crunching! I hate number crunching! But thanks to my good friend Mariko and the wonders of Excel, I was able to get a whole year's worth of numbers down to 1,214. Long story, so don't ask. Let's just say it was time consuming!

The real fun started when I left my "day" job for the awesome long weekend. From work, I went home and worked on an album for another client, then logged on to Xbox Live for some Halo 3 fun with the guys! Woo hoo!!! Nothing like wearing futuristic space armor and going after all your buddies with lazer guns (and that's before logging in!)

Saturday was even better as I was able to meet with my "first" wedding couple. Michelle and Rene, two of the coolest people you will ever meet! Plus, they are great together, seriously! Very fun and outgoing, and just the nicest of people. Oddly enough, it wasn't a "cold" call for Michelle to hire me as their wedding photographer, cause back in high school I dated her aunt, but hey, a referral is a referral right? Thank goodness I don't burn bridges!!! Here's a photo of the soon-to-be- wed:


Aren't they cute?!


Hopefully, those of you who read this blog often, have already checked out the Cold Tofu link, as saturday was our first show of 2008! What a great way to start off another year of performances and just plain having fun! Despite having a great show all around, the highlight of the night was when we were all introduced to the newest member of the Cold Tofu family, Zachary, 3 mos out of the womb and already attending a Cold Tofu show! (His mom is a member, so he kinda has to). Here's the little bundle of joy:



A literal "bundle" of joy!

Afterwards we all headed out to eat in Little Tokyo near downtown L.A. for all you non L.A.-ites. You have to check out Suihiro Restaurant if you get the chance - great food, very reasonable prices for that any-time-of-day craving of Japanese food. Can't be beat!

Then, after all the eating, then came the video game debauchery! Xbox 360 at David's house for literally the rest of the night and early morning! Playing Halo 3, CofD 4, and a small bit of Madden '08. This then repeated on sunday throughout the day and night, until monday morning at 4:10am! Can you believe it? And I still suck! Well, I don't suck, but I'm not always the high scorer. Oh well. I guess I have to practice! What am I, CRAZY?!

Monday was spent shooting my buddy Alden. Here's one of the session's photos:



Top this off with doing laundry and finally getting to watch Johnny Depp in "Sweeny Todd" and you get an awesome weekend to recover from during the week! Whew!

Thanks for reading as always, and if you get a chance, do leave a message :) Happy Tuesday everyone!

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

M Palma Photography

Hooray! Just a day after I announced it, my new wedding photography website is up! You can check it out at:

www.mpalmaphotography.com

I'm so proud cause it's my first REAL site dedicated to my photography, and my pursuit of capturing the best wedding images I can create!

So if you are reading this blog, and perhaps live in the L.A. area and need to refer a wedding photographer to someone, please don't hesitate to forward them my website.

Lastly, just like with this site, do check my main site often for new photos! I can't wait to post all the exciting images, couples, families, etc. that I will be photographing in the near future!

Thanks everyone, and enjoy!

Monday, January 14, 2008

New Website Almost Up!

Yes! As the subject heading reads, my wedding photography website is almost up! I recently signed with Bludomain for their terrific work with photographers' websites, and I'm anxious to finally put it up live! (Hence, all the exclamation points)

As you will also notice, I also changed the blog header here. I figured it should reflect more of who I am and what I really look like! I know, it sounds weird, but I recently read this great article by another wedding photographer, Jasmine Star, on how to market yourself to your clients. It's almost like being a realtor, and putting your photo on your business cards. This way, not only can you read what's on my mind, but you can "see" me too!

What else, what else...? Oh, the second round of NFL playoffs were on this past weekend, and I'm glad that the CowGIRLS lost to the Giants.

Okay, that's it. I'll post the link once it's up.

Till then, have a great day and week!

Saturday, January 12, 2008

A New Year's post!

Okay, in all honesty, I tried to post earlier than this, but for some weird reason, Blogspot was acting up with my photo uploads! So, with my new year's resolution of continuing my procrastination, I figure I'd wait until now to finally get around to posting (Note the new thing that the kids are doing nowadays, it's called SARCASM).

Before I can get to posting new stuff, I'd like to post a few photos from the holidays.


This is my good buddy Aaron T and I at the Rosebowl game watching the greatest college football team beat the hell out of another "Small" 10 team, Illonois.
Final score 52-17. Oh yeah, it was a close game - NOT!


Christmas day with the Del Rosario clan. This is what holidays are all about, family and great food!


This is me with Helen's nephews and niece who were visiting from Hawaii. I know you can't tell, but we're on the parking tram at Disneyland the day before they left. That little cutie shying away from the camera is Hailee. The other two boys are Justin (middle) and Casey (right).


Here's Hailee in front of Sleeping Beauty's castle - what a little sweetie!

Okay, so this is far from being really up-to-date, but I really wanted to post some photos from the last few weeks. I'm going to make it a point to blog more often this year, what with a few weddings coming up, and of course, a lot of great "life" stuff!

Hope you guys are all doing well and stick to those resolutions!