My 1st EVER Team Away Day that was FUN.

NOTE: Photographs inbound! TBU!

Me, looking like a psychopath.

As promised, this post is about my job and my workplace.

HOWEVER, I’ll talk about the team away day event that was held last Sunday at a beach at Tutong. =D

Thanks to this event, I had to return to Brunei on Saturday night after a day filled with errands, supply runs as well as a family dinner. =( As apprehensive as I was in sacrificing a precious weekend, I went to the event anyway (for the fear of being fired the next day if I hadnt).

The event started from 0830 and ended at about 1630.

I had to get up earlier though, since the drive from my place to the beach took about 45 minutes! I am surprised that I actually woke up considering the fact that I slept at midnight upon arrival in KB and had actually only arrived home at around 1030.

Upon arrival in KB, I too actually screwed up and accidentally allowed the landlord’s dog to run out of the compound and onto the streets. =(

As much as my landlord told me to just forget it and let him handle it, I felt bad. =( I too felt bad because he is actually the department head of my WHOLE department sub-section. =( There goes my promotion or conversion oppurtunities as they are all jettissoned out into outer space. =(((

Moving along now, I too decided then to bring my camera, after much argument with myself concerning how much ‘fun’ I could have shooting at an event that I wished I could just avoid. I too was worried about salt corrossion on my camera and lenses so it was quite a dillemma to me.

Still, I decided to bring my camera anyway. With my D70 and its Kit Lens plus a cheapo 70-300, I packed into my Lowepro bag as well as a spare batterry and off I went! Onto the great unknown and hopefully a good day.

I hadnt done any true photography in the past 13 months to be honest. I guess that the camera reminded me of the ghosts of the past, but I guess this was as good as anytime to just start again and rekindle my interest in photography. I’m glad to say that it truly did. =)

Anyhow, I then collected my friend from his house and we then began our journey. We both had actually hoped that it would rain that day seeing that the day before on Saturday, it was raining cats and dogs. Maybe the fates would grant us our wish and allow us to go home and sleep. =) My friend prayed especially hard since he had a major hang-over from the night before, pouring down insane amounts of whiskey as well as a multitude of beers into his system at some dude’s birthday party.

Luckily for us, the day in itself proved to be totally the opposite of what we both had expected. The whole team away day was also the first time I did a lot of new things that I am surprised that I never really did before.

When it came to photography, this was my first ever daylight shooting event as well as my first ever event in which I focused mostly on human subjects. I havent been fond of ’shooting’ people due to my given perception that most people do not want their picture to be taken but that day proved otherwise. I found an immense amount of psychopaths and clinically ins….er….I mean, ‘intriguing subjects’ that were keen to put on a show for the camera. =D

First shot of the day, a pre-cursor to even weirder images which means humans, not fishes.

This too marked the first time in which I actually had fun at the event, versus the other events in which I felt like I was a man on a mission in just getting the right ’shot’. I had tons of fun at the team event and can’t wait for the next one to be honest.

This also was the first time I shot only in JPEG and primarily used a telephoto (70mm-300mm f/8) lens for everything. This meant that there was a lot of backpedalling as well as trekking to far off vantage points but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Personally, it also felt a lot less intrusive but in someways extremely intrusive as well. =| However, there were probably only a few shots taken at 18mm (28mm) with my Nikkor 18-70 but that was mostly when I wanted to just get close to the participants during lunch time.

I personally feel that a lot of the pictures caught the fun and the personalities of the participants. Though technically these pictures are worthy of any awards and such but I honestly felt like I did capture the moments when it mattered, especially at the tug-of-war bit.

In many ways, the day at the beach proved to be the first of many things for me and the one thing I’ll probably not forget and probably wont do again was my 2 runs at the tug-of-war event. =/

I am sure I neednt say how THAT turned out. =(

Still, it was fun and I had a bunch of bald, Filipino psychopaths cheering me on so it was all good. =D

It was such a great day, albeit being turned into a human lobster but this was one of those few times in my life that I did actually feel like I was really a part of the team and not just some random aloof bastard who had the great misfortune of being placed there. I loved the event and I loved the participants. It was insane and I just went berserk. I shouted, I laughed my guts out, I ate like a madman, I then had the weirdest conversations I’ve had in a long time. I sweated and suffered under the sun with everyone else and never once did I ever feel that my spirit faltered, amongst the great team that was there that day.

I would also like to point out how multi-national the whole team is actually. The team in itself consists of mostly Malays, Filipinos, Thai folks and Indians. There were only 2 chinese guys, which included me, and a single Scottish man who seemed to have gotten lost in Asia for the past 25 years. All in all, there were about 30 or so of us crazy folk down at the beach terrorizing the general public. =D

Team cohesivity has never been so good and this is the first time I really saw a ‘team’ and not just a bunch of people who attended as if they were forced with a loaded gun to the head. Everyone truly went all out and in the end, everyone had a tremendous amount of fun.

Heck, we were all still laughing on Monday morning, reminiscing about the silly things that happened on the beach. Thank god someone actually video’d some of the proceedings and you can view those said videos below. I’ve got to say, the tug-of-war matches were kind of intense, to say the least. =)

I am happy! =) And I also found out how physically weak I am. =( I MUST BUFF UP FOR THE NEXT TEAM AWAY DAY!!!

In retrospect, I think there are about 10 photographic lessons that I can sum up from that day of non-stop shooting on the beach.

1. Lighting is important. No wait, let me rep-hrase that. VERY, VERY important!
2. Flash is a necessity on a hot day for the sole sake of flash fills.
3. Metering knowledge is essential. My metering was totally off but thank god that most of the pictures came out fine.
4. Telephoto lenses are amazing for events or candid shots, contrary to the much popular belief that shorter focal lengths are required for getting ‘up close and personal’ with the subject(s).
5. Shallow depth of fields make any picture look good. =D
6. Shooting from a lower angle as to take in the action from the participants view point.
7. Shooting JPEGs in bright days and reserving RAWs for night scenes.
8. Shooting at will and not be afraid to just take candid shots of people even though it isnt artistically ‘great’.
9. Over-exposure is a major problem on hot days but the higher apertures per shot somewhat makes up for that deficiency.
10. Have lots of fun and mingle with the subject as well as crowds one’s to photograph. This produces even more photographic oppurtunities for one to take, simply because when they see a dude with a SLR, they more or less ask for their photograph to be taken. =D

Oh yeah, one more thing I must add…

MAKE SURE YOU WEAR SUN BLOCK!!!

As much as it’ll probably sadden you to cover your SLR in goo, in which I was mostly concerned with, but the annoyance and the stares you get after being blasted satan-red afterwards isnt that much flattering. =(

Ah…

I wouldnt have guessed how different my life would be after coming here but then again, that’s what makes life fun right? All the surprises and the unexpected amounts of fun! =D

Hmmmm….I guess now it is time to get back to work now…. =(

I got to continue plugging my ’sampan’ before handing it off to my immediate superior. =(

=D

Riding into the apocalypse.