Various Adulations About Life, Screencapped

Food Photoshoot for Urban Living Magazine

Sea Green Cafe has delightful decor and delicious food. I was photographer for the afternoon, and here are some shots:

Eggplant Parmigiana

Nutella-filled French Toast

Shrimp and Rice

Tablea Cheesecake

Vegetable Lumpia

Okra with Red Curry Paste

photos: Jad Montenegro-Amor
review: Cheekie Albay
Sea Green Cafe and Lifestyle Shop | Marfori Circumferential Road

Event Diary: Love, Loss, and Libido {LitOrgy 2013}

February 16th was the night of LitOrgy’s annual event, hosted by The Davao Writer’s Guild, involving poetry reading, performance art, monologues, and this year… a band performance (by us!).

Wrap documenting the goings-on

Chuck Fournier playing his electronica setlist

Spoken word accompanied by music

Spoken word accompanied by dance

I read one of my memoirs before my band came onstage

John Bengan reads a story called Bad Heart

My band performs 3 of our originals from both 1st and 2nd EP

Mandy takes video

An appreciative, intent crowd composed of writers

After the event, goofing off with Marky

Bagane showing a rare smile

Film crew and us

My outfit was… stellar.

MtG everywhere!

The organizers Karla, Allen, Julian and Chi.

LitOrgy’s Love, Loss and Libido was definitely a different sort of event, a little more subtlety, a little more reading between the lines than a regular gig. I enjoyed it thoroughly. Props to the organizers for pulling it off successfully. I’m looking forward to next year’s!

xx Jad

Photo Diary: All The Little Extras {Cebu}

Cebu over the holidays was a flurry of relatives, family dinners, crazed gift shopping and not much else. But there were some extras, like meeting up with friends and the occasional night walk. Looking at these photos now, I realize that even when the world moves faster than you want it to, you can always make it stand still with a photograph.

The rest of my photo diaries here.

Photo Diary: It’s That Time of Year

“It’s that time of year,
Leave all our hopelessnesses aside (if just for a little while)
Tears stop right here,
I know we’ve all had a bumpy ride (I’m secretly on your side).”

~Imogen Heap, For Now

{photos taken in our house in Cebu, Noche Buena 2012}

Mita (short for Mamita, what we call The Boy’s mom) always decorates the best Christmas trees, so I snapped a few shots around the house for her before we opened the presents at midnight.

Here’s wishing you a Merry Christmas, a Happy New Year, and holidays filled with family, food and love.

♥ Jad

Photo Diary: Dawn Wedding

My good friend Joshua decided to get married on 12/12/12, at sunrise, by the sea. I wasn’t the official photographer, but I brought along my:

• Canon EOS 550D
• manual Pentax 50mm F/1.4 fitted with a PK to EOS adapter

I wasn’t really thinking too much about my setup, since I wouldn’t be able to move around much during the wedding anyway. I took most of my shots from my seat in the entourage, and left the real wedding shots to their official photographer. That left me available to take more “creative” shots since I wasn’t restricted by having to get every detail of the ceremony. :)

Thoughts on taking sunrise photos AND portraits at the same time while using a manual prime lens: … why do I like torturing myself!

Lates, Jad

Photo Diary: Trying out Product Photography

So The Boy takes a look at some of my photos in my hat shop and tells me, “You should try product photography, you’re good at it.”

I initially had my reservations since usually photographers tell you you need several hundred dollars’ worth of equipment to get started, but I thought I’d give it a try using natural light.

I used:

• Canon 550D
• 1 big sheet of poster paper bent so it’s the background and surface at the same time, placed on a table near a window with a transparent white curtain at 8 am
• 1 pop-up flash diffuser in translucent white
• 1 18-55mm kit lens
• 10 minutes of editing with Photoshop (cropping, adjusting levels and white balance only where needed, no clone-stamping or major editing)

I’m pretty pleased with the results!

[edit: 2:23 PM]

Took some more shots in the afternoon:

I’m very happy with the outcome I got on my first try. My next investment is probably going to be an external flash and some lights! But since The Boy and I just bought a widescreen LED TV, we’re pretty broke for a couple of months, haha. Still, I’m looking forward to more photo adventures!

[more photography posts here.]

Gig Diary: EP Launch RECAP

So our EP launch happened last June 23, 2012 at our HIPHOUSE hangout in SouthSpot Studios, and I think it wouldn’t be too far off a conclusion to say that it was AWESOME!

All the cd’s sold out 10 minutes before our set. I was so happy that I made a THANK YOU VIDEO here.

So anyway, I’m posting a lot of photos, mostly mine, and towards the end some taken by friends/photos I was tagged in.

I love my job, and I have the most amazing friends in the world.

Kara and Pol setting up the lights

I was looking at the sound system setup and it was beautiful.

We put a vintage ad for an antique typewriter on our drumset. :)

Photo Diary: Nostalgia

Mandy and I spent a day together being girls.  My husband and her boyfriend were both busy for the day, so we were left to our own devices.

We went to the Blogger’s Sale, stayed for an hour, bought some stuff, and fled to a nearby mall to have merienda because the heat was so oppressive.

We had an impromptu idea for a photo shoot because Mandy mentioned that even though she’s been modeling for a while, she never really feels comfortable posing in front of strangers, with a bucket of makeup troweled on.

So I asked her, “Why not have one with me, just being yourself?”

Perry’s Birthday

My good friend Perry turned a year older earlier this week, and he had a small, intimate party at his house, which is anything but small, lol. We had a grand time exploring their ancestral manse which had 3 floors, a gigantic staircase, and a real chandelier from the 20’s that still held candlesticks instead of electric lights.

Outfit Post: Writer’s Block, Guitar Woes

I wanted a change from my usual garage photos, so:

Doc Marten boots, vintage print skirt, top from Next, Hawaiian Hill glasses,and I bought that necklace from one of those stalls on the street that sell clay necklaces on leather cords, from a man with colorful dreadlocks.

Outfit Post : HipHouse | Sunday Graphic Sunday

Just a quick post about the outfit I wore. I felt weird including details about my outfit on the Hiphouse entry, lol!

Doc Martens, Butthole Surfers/STP Graphic Tee, thrifted plaid skirt, yellow slouchie, DIY ribcage necklace

I was going for a 90’s vibe. <3

When The Boy and I got to the empty loft we usually use for HipHouse events, it was closed because Bagsy had the key and he was still on his way.

So we took refuge in Benito’s Cafe in Legaspi Suites while waiting for him, which has the best fucking chocolate smoothie in the entire universe. And sandwiches. Seriously, order their Bittersweet Chocolate Smoothie. Made of dark chocolate. It. is. DIVINE.

You need it in your life. (not in your healthy diet, but in your LIFE, ok)

Also I like it there because there’s a tab to surf in for orders above PhP300.

The Boy did not expect his sandwich to take up an entire plate. I had to help him finish it. It was easy to for me to help him. Cos I have a kind, giving, sweet, soul.

There are also books donated by members of a Book Club that frequents this Cafe. In the books you see little notes like “Please take care of this book. I really loved it when it belonged to me. Hope you enjoy it!”.

It made reading the copy of Como Agua Para Tsokolate that much more enjoyable when I took it off the Benito Cafe shelf.

Also, their decor is my sort of awesome.

“Don’t English Me, I’m PANIC!”

So that’s it for my short outfit post and why I love that little-known coffee shop in Legaspi Suites. The Boy and I used to have breakfast there (when we’re not in Selera) when he was still staying in this hotel to visit me when he flew in from Cebu. The staff already know us but they’re genuinely nice people so you’ll never feel awkward or out of place. Just comfortable, surrounded by books, wi-fi, and delicious food.

Chocolates Make You Smarter (true story),
Jad

Team Manila Opening: Davao Branch | SM Annex, Ecoland

Team Manila opens their first store outside Luzon in Davao City. Inside the store are one of a kind, witty merchandise infused with that tongue-in-cheek humor and pinoy flavor that Team Manila has become famous for. Check out their display of amazing film cameras, lomo cameras, and other photography accessories as well!

Co-owners Jowee Alviar and Mon Punzalan along with the Team Manila Crew were there to usher in their creative work into Davao consciousness. Despite their success, these creative powerhouses are down-to-earth, funny, full of energy, and supportive of the art movement. They even participated in the last Hiphouse event, which definitely inspired a lot of young artists looking to do art professionally. You can definitely see why their joint endeavor has over 63,000 subscribers on Facebook alone, and growing!