CARMENCHANGKARMUN

collection of me and my work.

[carmenchangkarmun]

Good Vibes Presents Honne & Kodaline

This was my first project with Future Sound Asia officially as a full time staff member. This show was such a hit, that when we opened tickets for sale, it sold out so quickly that we decided to add another show!

Setup for this show is pretty simple, not too elaborate.

Being in from the beginning really helped me see a different aspect of production that I've always taken for granted. For this show, I was tasked to be the stage manager, but still work on the pre-production.

Always grateful for the crew working on our shows. Zunnun on FOH.

My favourite patch master, Jambu.

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For the first 2 nights, we have local singer-songwriter NYK, opening the show. 

On to the main act, Honne! 

Honne was incredible, the audience were blown away, and adrenaline was pumping! On to the next show, Kodaline!

Kodaline completely blew my mind, watching them play all the songs that I grew up with literally brought tears to my eyes. Definitely an experience of a lifetime, and a great honour to be able to help produce this show.

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Event: Good Vibes Presents Honne / Good Vibes Presents Kodaline

Role: Assistant Production Manager and Stage Manager

Website: www.goodvibespresents.com

Photo Credit: All Is Amazing

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[carmenchangkarmun]

なんでもないや - Mystical Mirage Cover

A project that I worked on earlier in the year, a cover of the end credit song from the movie, 君の名は, rearranged and performed by Mystical Mirage. The shoot span across 2 days, first day shooting all the indoor shots, and the second shooting the outdoor drone shots. 

The main videographer was Omar, with me as the DOP. The first few shots were to be shot in a dark room with a lot of close-ups of Ken and Aaron. The final shot of these takes would be in black and white.

The band shots were fun to shoot! Watching the boys rock out to the song over and over again, it was tiring for them, but all worth it in the end.

This top down drum shot was precarious to shoot! It involved Omar holding on to the Ronin while standing on a step ladder, with the other 4 boys holding on to Omar and the step ladder to prevent him from falling. The camera could’ve fallen on Jared at any time, but thank the Lord, it did not happen and we have this beautiful top down shot of Jared’s drumming.

The drone shots were done on a different day and the weather was extremely hot. In most of the scenes, you could see the sweat soaking through Ken’s shirt, be we persevered and got a rather good shot out of it.

All in all, the shoot was a success and all our hard work paid off. Here is the video in full on YouTube.

Video: Nandemonaiya - Mystical Mirage Cover Role: Director of Photography, Producer, Video Editor Work duration: Shoot - 2 days, Editing - 1 month YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/m2musicband Photo credit: Carmen Chang Photography

[carmenchangkarmun]

NJWA presents the TOUR KL

The second leg in the NJWA Malaysia Tour, this time in Ruang Shah Alam. Set in a decommissioned hot air balloon, with beautiful visuals by Motiofixo, NJWA performed a 15-song set that wowed the audience from start to finish.

NJWA performed to a strong 150-person audience, and captivated them from start to end.

It all started with a dream of hers, after scrolling through Instagram and seeing a video from Ruang and AKA Balloon about the indoor balloon igloo. With a little over a month to flesh it all out, we got Ruang and AKA Balloon onboard, with Motiofixo on the visuals and Gangsapura as a guest feature.

Beautiful visuals

NJWA playing the keyboards

Shakey.shakey in his eccentric persona

NJWA

Event: NJWA presents the TOUR KL Role: Tour Coordinator and Artist Manager Work duration: 1 month planning, 1 day show Website: www.njwamusic.com Photo credit: Amiu Baharudin

[carmenchangkarmun]

天空音樂節 Tian Kong Music Festival 2018

The first Chinese indie music festival, Tian Kong Music Festival was held at SJKT Ladang Blue Valley up in the cold highlands of Cameron. I was called in to stage manage for this show.

With big names in the Chinese indie scene, from No Party for Cao Dong, to Waa Wei, this festival had beautiful music playing from 12pm to 12am. 

Humidity, rain and strong winds were a big challenge throughout this festival. Equipments fail easily in wet weather, and the constant rain throughout the setup and show days were not helpful at all. Backed by a hardworking stage team, we pulled off the impossible and managed to keep the schedule fairly on track even with the rain.

Aki and Ryota from Arvan

Alu8khan doing his thing

MJ

Headliners No Party for Cao Dong

Day 2′s headliner: Waa Wei

Event: Tian Kong Music Festival Role: Stage Manager Work duration: 5 days Website: www.tiankongmusicfestival.com Photo credit: Louis Sansodo & Tony Wong B

[carmenchangkarmun]

Good Vibes Festival 2018

Good Vibes Festival 2018 rolls around every year, and as usual, I am involved in the stage managing aspect of the festival. Taking on an additional role this year as the assistant production manager, the task of bringing the stage from ideas to reality fell into the hands of the main production manager, Russel and me.

Headlining the festival this year, we have Lorde and SZA, closely followed by Alt-J and Odezsa. It was a tough few months leading up to the festival, but we pulled it off and brought a great show for a solid 12,000 audience.

Backstage storage for flight cases. Flight cases are E V E R Y W H E R E.

Red Stage, the stage I am managing.

Audio patch.

With any production, the crew needs to be a solid team. From left, Daniel Subah (Monitor Engineer), Jambu (Patch Master) and YY (Assistant Stage Manager).

Backstage is always chaotic, with backline, risers, floor packages and flight cases everywhere. It is always a challenge looking for space to fit all these equipments.

When the show takes off at 3.30pm, the real work begins.

Louis the Child doing their thing.

Alt-J and their massive setup. It is not obvious in this picture, but Alt-J had a very heavy floor package and visuals. 7 sceptron on skates, 6 massive lighting towers and 7 blow-through LED panel towers to setup on stage in the 1-hour changeover between sets. With all stage, lighting and visual crews working together, the total changeover time took to complete their setup was 21 minutes, including all cabling.

Headliner for the festival, Lorde. It was great seeing her live, and even better having abled to manage the stage she performed on.

Overall, the event was a success, and I look forward to doing it again next year.

Event: Good Vibes Festival 2018 Role: Assistant Production Manager & Stage Manager of Red Stage Work duration: Pre-production - 1 month                          On site - 6 days Website: www.goodvibesfestival.com Photo Credit: All Is Amazing

[carmenchangkarmun]

ESL One Genting 2018

ESL One Genting! A great start to a new year, I returned to my role as the audio broadcast engineer for ESL One Genting. Held at the Arena of Stars, it is a cold few days at the peak of Genting Highlands.

16 world class teams play across 3 days to compete for the US$400,000 prize pool and trophy. And this is just a minor league tournament?!

Solid crowd all 3 days

ESL One Trophy

Winners: Newbee!

Event: ESL One Genting 2018 Role: Audio Broadcast Engineer Work duration: 7 days Website: ESL One Photo credit: ESL

[carmenchangkarmun]

Good Vibes Festival 2017

Good Vibes Festival 2017 is back again! Yet again, I have be reinstated as the stage manager, but this year, I handled Red Stage instead of Blue Stage. Armed with experiences from last year, I vowed to make this year a smoother year for the stage.

I wasn’t very familiar with this year’s lineup, save for Kodaline who I was dying to watch. Crossed all my fingers and toes to have them on my stage, but I guess I didn’t have enough appendages. Oh well. Phoenix turned out to be mind-blowing though!

Going in to this festival, I made sure I had all the patch ready, and planned all the mechanics of the changeovers as best as I could. Many international acts did not soundcheck this year, which was quite daunting, but we pulled it off and had no major difficulties.

ZHU

Lany

The Kooks

Phoenix

Red Stage and Blue Stage

Event: Good Vibes Festival 2017 Role: Stage Manager for Red Stage Work duration: 4 days Website: www.goodvibesfestival.com Photo credit: All Is Amazing

[carmenchangkarmun]

Good Vibes Festival 2016

My first “major” festival as a stage manager, Good Vibes Festival 2016 was a first of many. First time managing 2 stages at the same time, first time dealing with international artistes and their teams in person, first time heading a team of individuals with almost zero experience in large scale festivals and first time working past 20 hours straight.

The lineup for GVF16 was something I was quite excited about, seeing The 1975 on the list, accompanied by Two Door Cinema Club and The Temper Trap.

Setup for GVF16 was a hectic one. Most of us have little knowledge of running a festival, but with major efforts and cooperation from all teams, we pulled off a great show.

Red Stage and Blue Stage

Purity Ring

Blue Stage

Alina Baraz. Fun fact: Alina did not come for soundcheck. Nor did her band and whole team. It was the first time we pulled off a show with only a line check. Sounded fantastic!

Event: Good Vibes Festival 2016 Role: Stage Manager for Blue Stage Work duration: 5 days Website: www.goodvibesfestival.com Photo credit: All Is Amazing