Gear
The better your camera, the faster you shoot to capture those moments.

Good Eye
For better composition(avoids loosing a limb from the shot) getting as tight as possible to reduce post-production.

Quick Reflexes
Especially important for group performances, different couples/dancers might perform different moves. This is tough as it is with only 1 dancer/couple.

Good understanding of the dance style
Knowing the dance style gives you a good comprehension of what to look out for, catching the great lines and this ties in to the musicality when the music hits a stop, generally the dancers will have accentuated movement or pose.

Great Musicality
Knowing the music allows you to foresee photo opportunities. Dancers often take advantage of musical flow, highs and lows of the piece to accompany their movements on the stage.

Great Positioning
This is probably one of the most essential of the lot. No amount of gear, quick reflexes, understanding of dance style or musicality will save you if you have a seat that is facing the dancers back. In most cases, it will be difficult to move during a performance so choose your seat wisely or you could well write off that shoot.

Boss: Oh, Min, I forgot to tell you, youre fired…

MinWye: Huh? *shivers going through my body* *awkward face comes on*

couple seconds later after my face goes all wrinkly…

Boss: and now youre re-hired…

MinWye: !!!

And actually, that was exactly what we did except it wasnt as corny as it first sounded, I actually came out enjoying and benefitting from the “dog”, “baby” and “cat” poses that relate to the different ways your body is positioned. By the end of the whole session, I was so relaxed that I actually fell asleep in a matter of seconds! Even the boring lectures at uni could never put me to sleep that fast!

Now, what could yoga possibly benefit my dancing? Well, not only will it increase my flexibility, it will also break the stress muscles accumulated from dancing and improve my posture while dancing. Not to mention, sometime in the future, I might be able to contend with Mary-Grace’s undeniably impossible spins:

Mary and Neil at the October Salsa Fest

by spinning in a pose like this!

Maybe I could spin in this pose one day

Till then, I will continue dreaming during yoga classes.

Rules: Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you.

and my list:

1. I spend alot of time dancing, classes on monday and tuesday nights, social dancing from thursday till sunday. My dance styles include LA style Salsa, Bachata and a little Zouk. My latest interest is West Coast Swing inspired by Jordon and Tatiana.
2. Im not embarrased about people knowing that I have watched all 6 seasons of Sex and the City or even all 7 seasons of Gilmore Girls. In fact, Rory(Alexis Bledel) is my favourite actress cause she is cute although I feel she can only play 1 type of character…Rory Gilmore.
3. I played Ice Hockey for a total of 4 years in a tropical country(Malaysia) which only has 2 seasons, summer and rainy seasons.
4. I am the black sheep of the family, I was sent to government Malay primary school(Kampung Tunku) whereas my younger brother and sister was sent to chinese primary school.
5. On that same note, I am also the only person on my mother’s family(cousins and rellies) side who does IT and have little creative ability. Everyone else in the family are either accountants or musicians.
6. 
7. One of my biggest worries when I started photography was that I would look like an Asian tourist or be labelled as a perv.
8. I have never been “ching chong chao”d or “ni hao”d(the most common words a drunk person would say to you if you were chinese) before while carrying my camera.
9. I am 20% deaf on my right side. I have always been labelled as deaf and now I have an excuse.
10. I am embarrased to admit that I play World of Warcraft and have setup parental controls on myself in fears that I will not be able to control myself again.
11. When World of Warcraft first came out, I would spend 8 hours a day playing the game(I was at uni and had the time) and accrued a total 60 days playing time, that means I played a total 1440hours and decided to quit and that lasted for 2 years before I started again, Im playing way less now and more on a casual basis now(with the help of parental control(I control my own parental control))
12. I currently have a full time job in a software company called CareerHub and run a web design/photography freelance business on the side.
13. I aim to be financial free and full time job free to focus on my business/s.
14. I love singing although Im horrible at it and resort to whistling while Im at work much to my colleagues demise.
15. I would live with my parents if I had the choice. Its cheaper and it enables me to be financially free sooner than later.
16. My biggest expenditure is food.
17. Ive been referred to by many names since young, Chan(my surname) during primary school, Min Wye during high school. During pre-university, my programming teacher gave me the name “Nathan” which i continued to use when I came to Australia, I introduced myself as Nathan because Min Wye was hard to remember and since then, I converted back to Min Wye for a short while and up till now, Min.
18. I will respond to all the names above, Min Wye, Nathan, Min, Chan.
19. My name is pronounced “Ming Wai”, there is an invisible ‘g’ and in most cases, people who know me by name pronounce my name as such “Min Wei”.
21. One day, I would like to have a family with 2 kids, a boy and girl.
22. My father passed away when I was 9 years old. My fondest memory of him was of him sitting in my brother and my room accompanying us to sleep. Although it was to make sure we go to sleep rather than stay up and play, the quiet time of him sitting against the wall while waiting for us to fall sleep is precious to me.
23. You could attribute my liking for dance, gilmore girls, sex and the city amongst other things to the fact that I grew up with my cousins who were all girls and raised by my Mom.
24. Even due to no23, I am very much straight and have never needed to question my sexuality. 
25. If you didnt notice or wondering, I skipped 20 on purpose so I only needed to think of 23 facts about me. Im sneaky like that.

Im also sneaky that if you are read through all 25, you are tagged to write 25 things about yourself. My justification is, if you took the time and effort to read all 25 things about me, I will want to read about you too.

Post the link in my comments or trackback to my site if you have done it. I would like to read it and possibly get to know my readers better =)

Does a big ego mean you rave non-stop about myself and place yourself above all others? Does it mean you put everyone into their own class in terms of skill and only dance with the people at the same level or better? Personally, I think having a ego means I dont even try to enjoy a dance with anyone I ask or who asks me.

After dancing for about a year, I started getting compliments about my dancing, mainly about how fast I have improved over the past couple of months. This feeling of satisfaction is great but unfortunately, it gets to my head. Is this the root of an ego?

Sometimes, I feel like I am on the journey to being “big-headed”, so please feel free to bonk me on my head to knock me back into shape if I get to that stage(also an indication that youve been reading my blog)

ps: not too hard ok?

Now that you are all confused, let me explain =)

While dancing with Julie last weekend, our discussion led me to believe that if dance styles were cakes, those would be what their cake counterparts will be.

Zouk, Cheese Cake, I LOVE cheesecake, especially blueberry cheesecake with a biscuit base. However, you cant eat too much cheesecake! its too rich and should be taken in moderation. In similar fashion, I love zouk! but I dont enjoy dancing it too much and like to dance it in moderation, perhaps 2-3 times a night. In case you have no idea what Zouk is(video below by Kadu and Larissa from Rio Rythmics):-

Salsa, chocolate cake. You can never have enough chocolate cake and its always sweet and consistent tasting. Honestly, I dont like chocolate cake as much as cheesecake but I sure cant stop eating it. Similarly, Salsa is forever consistent and I get a kick out of it everytime and I cant stop no matter how hard I try. Salsa Video(shamelessly plugging myself >.< honestly cant compare to the other 2 videos ):

Bachata, Tiramisu. I only eat this once in a blue moon and it is very hard to find Tiramisu that tastes fantastic. Not only is it rare to find good tasting Tiramisu, it is also very personal and the taste differs from person to person. In the same way, Bachata is in most cases played every 5-10 songs(that is considered infrequent) but when it is played, I will only dance it with someone I have danced with before because to me, Bachata is very personal and passionate, something I could not do with a total stranger. Heres why(video):-

Suffice to say, I love cake, and I also love dancing.Here is my list again

Zouk = Cheese Cake
Salsa = Chocolate Cake
Bachata = Tiramisu

What is the cake to your dance style?

My comparisons of dance styles to cakes are my personal opinion. These are not uniform in the dance scene.

The routine was choreographed by Col Crane and Ginette Poulin who did a fantastic job putting together music, theme and not forgetting spending many hours figuring out the whole routine. Based on Pepe La Peu, the Looney Tunes french skunk who repeatedly mistakes a cat with a stripe on her back as a female skunk, we doned our French Barrets, cheesy mustaches and french breads, I dont think anyone noticed that I was an Asian guy trying to pass off as a French dude.

After having danced for a bout a year now and usually shooting dance performances behind the camera, it was quite an experience and change of pace to be performing not only in front of such a big crowd at the Brisbane Latin Christmas party, but also in front of the cameras. Now I know what its like to have someone shooting your every move, its exhilarating! Possibly due to the insane amount of adrenaline pumping into my blood from the nervousness and cheering, which lasted through the night.

Tim, made such a big effort to attend the event I performed at and even took a video of my performance! The video speaks better than my words so watch on =)

What do you think? :p

Thankfully, I wasnt directly affected by the storms other than getting drenched in the rain, attempting to dry my clothes(on what seemed liked a perfectly sunny day) out during the rain and experiencing my closest encounter with lightning on the way back from work on a train, seeing a lightning bolt strike a tree along a road near Roma Street railway station(unfortunately I didnt have my camera handy and dont have lightning speed reflexes)

Others werent so lucky and amongst the minor disasters include:-
-Overnight power shortage.
-Property Damage.
-A major highway(which alot of people take to work) gets closed down due to flood pump malfunction.

I have attached a video taken by a certain David Bowden(whom I see regularly at dance), through Hamish’s facebook.

Its a taster of what happened down in The Gap and I dont think David was affected since he managed to produce the video, meaning that he has electricity and internet! Not to mention, he has such a great sense of humour and  was able to make a joke marketing plug joke at the end! Actually, I dont know which it is, what I do know is, I actually did go to the URL. Do wait till the end, its really worth a good laugh in light of recent events!

ps – Queensland, the “sunshine state” should have its title stripped after the past weeks weather =( It should be more like, Queensland, Melbourne no. 2(cause crappy weather…” is the number 1 thing everyone who goes there for holidays say)

I have been alone in the office for a couple of weeks and just today, we have been returned to being full staffed. before I go any further, the title is not self-explanatory….I have not seen or been bitten by a foot fetish vampire from Hong Kong. However, Sam might have.

Remnants of being blood sucked.

Thats pretty gross…i know =/ but I have to alert the world of a potential vampire who has a fetish for feet. The story goes like this, while Sam was in Hong Kong, he was bitten by a mysterious entity which left two puncture marks on his feet.

After returning from Hong Kong, the area around the bite mark started to grow and no doctors could identify the problem! Luckily, Sam is still alive and the swelling as reduced and the doctors are still clueless.

The only explanation? A vampire with a foot fetish….from Hong Kong.

Min Wye’s whereabouts
On a totally different note, I admit that I have been mysteriously missing for the past couple of days from my blog and that is the result of having to practice for 2 performances. If you want to see it, you will have to either attend the gala. Details:-

Dress Code:
Cocktail Attire (short, elegant dress for her & suit jacket for him)

Where:
Marymac Community Centre Ballroom
616 Ipswich Rd, Annerley QLD 4103, Australia

When:
Friday 14th November 2008, 7:00pm to 1:00am
Floor shows at 9:30pm
Social dancing 10:00pm-1:00am

Tickets:
$65.00
Entry includes canapés served from 7:30-9:00pm and
1 complimentary drink upon arrival.

Or you could wait till I post the videos on my blog I still have 2 more sets of performance photos to put up from the October Salsa Fest, watch out for those.