His name is Graham. Graham seems to be a very cautious person. He sent me all the information we needed in details, like locations, time… including photos and screen shots from Google.  Graham even called me in advance to make sure all the photos he saw on my website www.hakinkin.com were really mine.  I told him: “Absolutely”!

Proposing must be really exciting and nervous. Even a careful person like Graham made some mistakes on location and time when emailing me; he said he must be too nervous. That sounded more interesting to me though.  I only saw the surprise proposals on TV and in movies. Never saw them in real life!

Finally Graham figured out a good date to do the proposal. It was chilly and windy day in Central Park and he was in the suit shivering waiting for her to arrive. I and my brother had to be there 45 mins earlier to make sure everything and…he will be OK.  We were so excited for the outcome.

It was supposed that she would arrive around 5h30 but due to that traffic time, she could not be on time. Graham said he hired a Limousine to take her here from work. And to make sure she would not be suspicious about what he was doing, he called her and made her mad on the phone. Ah, that’s pretty cute!

We had to wait nearly one hour in the cold. I caught the cold but Graham should be more freezing, because he only had the suit on, not to include the excitement would make you ten times colder. There’s a big tree there so me and my brother would “hide” in case she approaches near him later. We definitely did not want her to see what was coming.

Finally she arrived; the sun was already gone so the exposure was a bit off.  We moved behind the tree so she wouldn’t notice. She had a rose in her hand. I wonder if she really knew anything.

So here we go, the story would go by stop motions actually. I wanted to make sure that I caught everything. I promised Graham that he was in very good hands! These are just highlights!

Preparing for the important moments:

OOh, he’s really freezing.

Graham’s grandmother’s ring which will be used to propose. That was a surprise proposal, so of course this should be a surprise ring.

Let’s tell the story in STOP MOTION

I love the way she’s looking at him, such a look of loving and filling with happiness.

We decided to take the second set right in NYC. Hieu is an architect and he preferred building’s textures as background rather than just flowers and trees! Time was not a big concern anymore, but they still had to come pick us up. This time, I have two cameras and a different “assistant”.  There’s nothing I like about him but his handsomeness, hehe!

And what an irony!  We were supposed to have lighting in control since we had a whole day to fool around. But if the first set I had to deal with the over – exposure, this time, it was…raining. Seemed like will be raining for the whole day!

But rain always brought me joy!  We had joy, we had fun, we had season in the rain!

The shooting did not go well at the beginning; we had a little trouble in a public park. We found a little park that has a wonderful view to Manhattan side in Queens (as you will see on some photos below).  While we were taking photos there, some security guys approached and asked for shooting permission. We said the shooting was just for personal purpose, nothing commercial. I remembered we took some photos here some months ago without any troubles (you can go back and see entry #26). But since we had big cameras, the bride was so pretty and well – dressed – they said that needed permission. My handsome assistant asked: “So, you guy judge people based on their outfits and equipments?”. Seemed like a good one, they did not how to explain but said: “It’s the state’s law, you must follow”.  Anyway, we had some good photos already and we were ready to leave. That law was so weird and unreasonable, but those guards seemed to be over – reacted, as they followed us carefully to the car. Hannah decided to take one photo in front of her car and we thought it was nothing serious; we were out of the park anyway! All at once, these guys came up and showed their threat, as if we violated national’s security and should be cuffed soon. Well, I learnt, the law is actually not weird; it was just all about money!

That bothered me a bit. When taking photos, I need to be as most comfortable as I could, whatever interrupted my mood would destroy the rest of the shooting.  But no troubles after that then, in fact, even something so much more interesting happened, that filled up my inspiration again and the shooting went well! We still wasted sometimes to sit in the car to wait for the rain to stop!

My most favorite time was shooting at the Times Square.  There were so many hyper people around this place. They screamed and congratulated whenever the couple passing through. Hannah was exhausted of smiling and thanking. Some even were dancing with them in the middle of the street while I was taking photos. I tried as fast as I could to keep these moments!

Then Hieu said. He loved this set more than the other one, hahahaha!

How are the photos? You judge!

This was taken by my “assistant”.

We left for better place! Hah!

Waiting for the rain to stop!

The raid did not stop, so, well, played in the rain!

Isn’t she beautiful? No wonder they wanted to charge money at the park!

On Brooklyn Bridge, so many brides there, haha!

Taken by my assistant.

Times Square. We had a wonderful time here!

This should be an ad for Levi’s.

This shoot took the groom, the bride, the photographer and the…reflector (Nam) 10 hours driving, and we shot in very bad hours when the light was still too harsh. We were all exhausted, we all pretended to smile, hehehehe!

The couple has been married for some years but did not have time to take any wedding set. Hannah – the bride – who is now also my “most favorite” friend here, is such a beautiful young lady. But be careful, she is beautiful, that does not mean that you can take beautiful photos of her. Hieu – her husband had a deep sorrow of why her high – straight nose always looked so flat on any photos. So the reason is, people see her beautiful but they do not understand her best angles. I did some little research, and well, of course it was not a great challenge to me!

Quang – our mutual friend and a photography lover in Philadelphia gave us a suggestion of shooting location. He said Long Wood garden in Philly has always been a favorite place for couples, perhaps we should take a try, the place was expected to be around 2 hours driving from NYC. So, well, we decided to go there since we were too lazy to think of any places.  I asked Hieu and Hannah to pick me and my brother up from our place since they have a car and we did not know how to get to their place by train. They supposed to pick us up at around 7AM but Hieu got lost, and weekend roads had some changes. I did not know that he had to drive all the way backward to pick us up, because Philly is toward from their place. And it was one hour to grab us and one hour to drive back. So before we were really ready to be on the way, we lost 2 hours just to pick me and my bro up already!

Hieu had an allergy on that day, he seemed pretty tired, lacked of sleep, kept sneezing all the way. Aah, felt sorry  for the groom and the bride going on a shooting in such an uncomfortable mood.

That Garden was not 2 hours, it was 3 hours. So until we arrived there, it was over 1 o’clock, the worst time to take photos!

But we could not wait until the sun going to sleep, must leave around 5PM since there would be 5 more hours to drive home. I felt kinda regret for taking that much time just to be there! It was me who was to be in charge of the photo’s quality.  So, I must find my way to deal with the lighting! “That will be good experience for me”. I could take photos in the rain, I could do the same thing in the sun!

And we did have some great photos though I could not help some “washed – out” situations. It was a huge try of Hannah and Hieu, I knew everybody was exhausted, not to mention Hieu’s allergy and Hannah’s sensitive skin. That Longwood garden disappointed me a bit! It is beautiful, but I knew that we did not need to waste time and some little money to go this far to be there to take photos. There are more beautiful places around NYC too (if we were not lazy to take some looks). Well, but anyway, we had a chance to see a well known place!

We came home at 12 and they were at 1 AM. They were dead tired, but they trusted me and….they still wanted another shoot! And…they had! That will be part 2.

Well, I was not jealous with their kisses! Hahaha!

This is always my target: SIMPLE BUT BEAUTIFUL!