August 13, 2013
7pm
I attended the Red Carpet at Regal E-Walk Stadium 13 for the New York premiere of THE GRANDMASTER. It is a Chinese movie directed by Wong Kar Wai. It features Chinese superstar Tony Leung and Ziyi Zhang.
I was represent as Asian Fusion Magazine. The photographer spot was predetermined. I got the spot all the way at left. Well, this was expected. All the big medias were at the center spot. All the way to the left does not means it is all that bad. It has its unique advantage for taking picture of the entire scene. You will see what I mean later.
The red carpet starts at 7pm. I arrived at 6:10. and other photographers were already there. It literally need to be like one and half to two hours earlier for photographing red carpet. Event photographer is not an easy job. Most people include myself was thinking event photography is the easiest type of photography. Because it does not require much camera skill and lighting skill as other type of photography would require. You just use on-camera flash standing still and shoot. Simple, right? But indeed to get a good photo, it is much hard than people think.
I know for Chinese media, the most important people to take photo for obviously are the three Chinese superstar, Tony Leung, Ziyi Zhang and Wong Kar Wai. OMG, when each of them came, all the Chinese media scream out, and all the flash burst out. It was crazy.
There were also many famous American celebrities attended the red carpet such as Jason Wu, Vivienne Tam, Smmuel L and many more. They might be more well-known than these three Chinese stars at America. but for Chinese media, they just do not have the same influence. From what I observed, American photographer pay equal attention to each celebrity guest came. at least not to a degree like Chinese photographer did. Well, we can not help it. They are just too famous in China.
Most time celebrity was looking at photographer in the center. Luckily I was still be able to grab a few shots that they were looking at my camera. As long as I have a few shots for Tony Leung and Ziyi Zhang, my mission is accomplished.
Ziyi Zhang looks really great. I am not fan of her. I barely pay attention to her news or even her movie. Actually I do not remember that I ever watched one movie of her. But she gives me very good impression tonight. She looks very radiant, sunshiny. I think whoever see her would feel like wow a nice girl!.
This is what I am talking about. You can see the whole scene of the event. I was using unique fisheye lens. This is my weapon lens to bring to events. It can makes your photo unique than other photographers. It capture the energy and the atmosphere of the event. You would not be able to capture this if you were standing in the center spot. This could be only captured by me. haha. So if I think this way, I should be proud, right?
Some photo for other guests.
Jason Wu. Actually the gown on Ziyi Zhang is designed by Jason Wu. Cool, right?
Vivienne Tam and Angela Simmons
Kelly Choi
Kelsey Chow
It was a great event. Very exciting and also tiring. I am a tiny boy. Holding my heavy camera for about one hour strain my arm so much.
And I am really too passive. It need to be aggressive to be a great event photographer. You need to fight for your spot. You need to shout out for grabbing celebrity’s attention.
I look forward to photography the next event.
