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A true way to celebrate victory
Pastor Min gave an illustration about coach Tony Dungy during tonight’s message. He talked about how it was admirable for Coach Dungy to acknowledge that being a Christian Coach was more important that being the first African-American to make it to Superbowl. Ironically when I got home, I had an email sitting in my mailbox from my client (who happens to be a friend of Tony Dungy) asking me to post a photo of Coach Dungy on his website. I thought the photo captured the essence of what Pastor Min talked about and wanted to share it with you.
Caption: Indianapolis Colts, praying and thanking God after the Super Bowl. Coach Tony Dungy in center. 
“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.” – Colossians 3:23-24
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Weaving through slippery road and 3.5 hours of bumper to bumper traffic, I finally made it to the much anticipated photo conference hosted by two of the best photographers in the industry in Joe Buissink and Marcus Bell. They were generous to share their tips, tricks, workflow, advice with all of us. I even took the opportunity to take them out for lunch (surprising no one else offered them) so I got to even spend a whole hour with them one on one picking their brains with questions (I hope they didn’t think I was too annoying!). They were just wonderful guys and very down to earth regardless of their success and I was glad that I could open myself to them. They had lot of encouraging things to share and I’ll definitely apply these things to my business.
But out of all the things that they shared, one of the most important lesson that I learned from them wasn’t from something that they shared – and that lesson was PASSION. They didn’t have to talk about it – it was so evident in their tone of voice, body language, enthusiasm and in their work. I think passion is one of the most admirable characteristic in a person and I truly believe it is what got them to be where they are. And this is what I would share with others: Be passionate about what you do but stay humble. I intend to follow these two rules and we’ll see where the Lord will take me with this photo business.
Here are some photos from the seminar:
There were over 80 other photographers from the Chicagoland area all trying to learn from Joe. Joe is a high-end celebrity photographer. He has covered hundreds of celebrity weddings and photoshoots including Jennifer Lopez, Christina Aguilera, Jennifer Garth, Leanne Rimes, Jessica Simpson, Kelsey Grammer, Hillary Swank, Steven Spielberg, and more.
Can you FEEL the passion? 
I met a fellow asian photographer name Stacey. He’s a cool guy and we got along right away. He’s got some great work.
Here’s a picture Stacey took of Joe and I – Joe gets sponsored by Apple so he gets all the cool toys from them for free – No Fair!
I asked Joe to take this photo of me and Marcus – just so I can say that I have a photo taken by Joe – and look how it turned out! Ha ha, I had a good laugh – I guess even the best goofs up sometimes.
The second one turned out much better. 
All in all, it was a trip well spent. Anyone out there going to Chris Tomlin’s concert in Hoffman Estates this saturday? If so, please say hi. I’ll be there shooting for the band.
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