Posts Tagged ‘cosplay’
Anime on Display (AOD) is a yearly event that takes places in San Francisco. It’s a smaller local Japanese Animation convention compared to FAnime or WonderCon, but still draws an impressive crowd. Held this year at the beautiful Hotel Kabuki, we at Bui Photography was fortunate enough to receive media passes courtesy of AOD and you can see some samples of what we got below. You can also view all the photos in our gallery here. Thank you to all the wonderful and amazing cosplayers who we photographed!
Some people have wondered why we didn’t take any shots inside the beautiful Hotel Kabuki and the gorgeous garden they have inside is because we saw and knew there would be lots of other photographers photographing in those locations and we always pride ourselves on the challenge of doing things differently, so we selected parts around Japantown. You can also see behind-the-scene photos on our Facebook page here and here.
Here’s a behind-the-scenes video that you can also find on our Facebook page:
Tags: Anime on Display, AOD, AODSF.org, Bekalou, cosplay, event, Hotel Kabuki, Naxul, San Francisco, Yukai Shinobi
Posted in Event Photography, Photo Shoots |
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Having never heard of this Japanese manga: NANA, I did some research online by reading the Wikipedia entry and even reading a few chapters of the English translated manga to get some insight. Nadia and Steff taking some pity on me, explained their respective characters:
It’s about two rival bands, one is a punk band and the other is a rock band. Nana [Osakai] and Layla “Reira” Serizawa (Nadia) are the respective vocalists. Shinichi “Shin” Okazaki is a bassist from Nana’s band. He kept the fact that he was underage a secret from everyone, and was actually sleeping around with women for money. When he met Reira, it started out to be like that, but they ended up falling in love. One of the things that these two have in common is that they’re half Caucasian and have had a hard time with it when they were younger. They were always hiding their relationship though, due to their age difference and their band’s reputation.
Certainly sounds interesting. Sounds like if they were Facebook buddies, their relationship status would be “It’s complicated.”
Tags: Anime, Anti-Ai-Chan, cosplay, Eric Lee, Fort Point, Layla Serizawa, Nadia, NANA, Pho3nix, Reira, Rendy Lai, San Francisco, Shin, Shinichi Okazaki, Steff
Posted in Photo Shoots, Portraits |
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It’s been awhile since we’ve last done an update on the blog as we’ve been busy in the meantime, but I’ll be putting up a series of new blog posts.
The first one is a photo shoot of the lovely ladies of United Underworld. The last time we had a chance to photograph the group was at the 2009 WonderCon event. You can see pictures of the photo shoot here and resulted in this shot that I really like:
Click in to see more.
Tags: Anime, Batgirl, CatWoman, Comic-Con, cosplay, Eric Lee, Harley Quinn, Rendy Lai, United Underworld, WonderCon
Posted in Photo Shoots, Portraits |
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This past Saturday we had the opportunity to come out to Sacramento to attend the cosplay event Sac-Anime event at the Radisson Hotel at 500 Leisure Lane, Sacramento, CA. Despite the blistering heat of what felt like a desert (Weather.com observed that day as 104°F), many cosplayers came out, some in very elaborate costumes. We did our best to stay cool and avoid heat exhaustion while trying to get some good pictures.
It was a great event, we had lots of fun. Read more and see pictures inside from Sac-Anime.
Tags: Anime, cosplay, Cosplay.com, Sac-Anime, SacAnime
Posted in Event Photography |
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The Norcal Summer and Spring Gathering are two separate events that both take place once a year. These gatherings are opportunities for cosplayers and photographers to get some nice photo shoots in an environment that is more relaxing, easy going, with a more pleasing setting that otherwise would be possible during convention events such as FAnime. So on Saturday, August 15, Eric, Lynn, Lynn’s cousin Joe, Elbert, Elbert’s brother, and I all joined up with a bunch of other photographers and cosplayers at Kelley Park in the Arbor picnic area for a fun filled day of eating, mingling, and photographing; of course we were doing the latter mostly. I do want to take a moment to thank the organizers of this event: KittyKatChi, Shinobi Yukari, and OscarC. Without their hard-work and dedication, this event would not have been possible.
The selection of Kelley Park in San Jose was an excellent choice for venue. Those who were at this year’s Spring gathering will remember it was held at Hakone Gardens which was also a great choice. Kudos to Oscar for always choosing excellent venues. It has ample parking, vast lands with plenty of foliage, lots of picturesque settings, an old town setting, and a Japanese Tea Garden; couldn’t possible ask for more back-drops. The weather was nice and warm and fortunately there were plenty of areas with lots of shade so we can avoid being sunburned and/or sweating profusely.
Tags: Anime, Arbor, Becca Louise, Bekalou, Bleach, cosplay, Cosplay.com, Eric Lee, Facebook, Kelley Park, KittyCatChi, Lynn Truong, Oscar Cwajbaum, OscarC, Rogue, Shinobi Yukari, Syaoran, Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, Ulquiorra, X-Men
Posted in Event Photography |
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More often than not, as a photographer, I rarely find myself in front of the lens. It’s not that I avoid being photographed, it’s just hard to be a photographer when you spend more time in front of the lens than behind.
In one of those few cases, my good friend Dr. Tibor Duliskovich, happened to get some snaps of Eric, Oscar, Elbert, and myself “working”. It’s sometimes interesting to see behind the camera and see some of us photographers operate.
Tags: 2009 FAnime Con, Anime, behind the scenes, cosplay, Elbert Lee, Eric Lee, FAnime 2009, Oscar Cwajbaum, San Jose McEnery Convention Center, Tibor Duliskovich
Posted in General News |
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Because of my sister’s graduation from San Francisco State University (SFSU), I didn’t attend FAnime on Saturday. But Sunday turned out to be quite a good turn out. Thugs started getting pretty busy around 11 AM and was non-stop hustle and bustle.
Like many other photographers, we at Bui Photography had a number of private photo shoots lined up. In total for Sunday, we did 4 scheduled photo shoots with 3 more random unscheduled photo shoots. For those who are interested in just seeing the pics, click here. To read more and see pics from the photo shoots, click in.
Tags: 2009 FAnime, Anime, Bubydub, Chun-Li, cosplay, FAnime, FAnime Convention, Fate/Stay night, KittyCatChi, LauraC, LunarLoop, Matsumoto Rangiku, MissNintendo, Renji Abarai, Saber, San Jose Convention Center, San Jose McEnery Convention Center, Shinobi Yukari, Tsunasa Resevoir Chronicles
Posted in Event Photography, Photojournalism, Portraits, Random Photography |
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The 2009 FAnime is now upon us. I attended FAnime on Friday after lunch time and things got busy quite quickly. Despite being a Friday, turnout was quite high. I also did a number of photo shoots with KittyCatChi (non-cosplay shoot), MissNintendo, CherryTeaGirl5, Hikaru-Jan and Rena-Girl. You can view all the pictures from the photo shoot including just random shots here. Click in to read more and see my favorite shots.
Tags: 2009 FAnime Con, Anime, CherryTeaGirl5, cosplay, FAnime, Hikaru-Jan, KittyCatChi, MissNintendo, Rena-Girl, San Jose McEnery
Posted in Event Photography, Photojournalism, Portraits |
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FAnime is the largest Japanese Animation convention here in Northern California. Held annually since 1994, FAnime has steadily grown in attendance and drew a crowd of almost 15,000 last year which was also the first year I attended FAnime. The largest convention in Northern California kicks off on Thursday and does not stop until Monday afternoon of Memorial Weekend, people literally sleep there, just check out the schedule if you don’t believe me.
This year is slated to be even bigger and better and will be the fifth year at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center. This year will be a little different for Bui Photography. We’ve just received our press pass information and also Canon has been kind enough to loan me some very nice equipment to use for this event (and my sister’s graduation). They sent me a Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III and the much fabled portrait lens: the Canon EF 200mm f/2L IS USM. This will give me a great opportunity to test out Canon’s 
flagship professional SLR and one of their best “L” lenses (Be on the lookout for our review on the camera and lens in the very near future). We’re also be doing some private photo shoots with many very popular forum stars from Cosplay.com as well as standard photojournalist coverage of the event. You can see last year’s pics in our Events gallery. We’re going to be there all day on Friday and Sunday, if you are interested in shooting with us or keeping us company, you’re more than welcome to. You can call me at 408-209-3424 or shoot me an email at info[at]buiphotography.com.
So if you are looking for something to do this weekend and/or into the Japanese animation culture, then come out and checkout FAnime 2009. Details of the event as follows:
San Jose McEnery Convention Center
150 W. San Carlos St.
San Jose, CA 95113
Thursday, May 22 to Monday, May 25
http://fanime.com
Tags: Anime, cosplay, FAnime, FAnime 2009, San Jose Convention Center, San Jose McEnery Convention Center
Posted in Event Photography, Photojournalism |
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Having attending the previous two years (2007 and 2008), this year’s Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival was definitely not one for us to miss. If you want to skip right to the pictures, feel free to by clicking here. This year’s Grand Marshal was no other than Star Trek actor, George Takei. This year’s Cherry Blossom Queen was Eri Tagaya.
Before attending the actual festivities, we at Bui Photography usually attend the cosplay juding contest in front of San Francisco City Hall in the morning. Limited to only 100 participants, the cosplayers who have registered with Japan Video & Media line up to be judged on the following rubics: impression (10 points), craftsmanship (10 points), and details (10 points). Afterwards, everyone makes their way to Japantown and get ready for the floats.
This year was quite hot. In the morning, the temperature was already at around mid-70’s and by afternoon, it was well into the 80’s. I feel sorry for some of the cosplayers who wear full body costumes. All in all, it was quite fun.
See everyone at FAnime!
Samples, see the rest here:
Tags: Anime, cosplay, japantown, NCCBF, Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival
Posted in Event Photography, Photojournalism |
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