About 2 weeks ago I was pleasantly surprised to find out the documentary series I hosted for Discovery Taiwan was nominated for Best Documentary Series at this years Asian TV Awards. Always up for an awards night anyway, so was very happy to be invited to join the Discovery table tonight.

This year it was held at the Shangri La Hotel, and they did a fantastic job with the menu – A lot of seafood and fish which was great! Only thing missing for me was juice! Entertainment included local funk hip hop group Sixx and an all girl dance group.

With Dominic Lau (E News Asia) and Joanne (LI TV Asia)

The best part as always was the chance to catch up with friends and make some new ones! Got to see Alaric Tay and Chua Enlai from the Noose (They won Best Comedy Program and were both runner up to Best Comedy Performance by an actor), Anthony Morse (His program – Hidden Cities on History was nominated for Best General Entertainment ) Dominic Lau & Oli Pettigrew (Both nominated for Best Entertainment Host), Henry Golding (His show was nominated for ), Jourdan Lee (Nominated for best Actor in a leading role), Linda Black (Co-host for the evening with her hubby Oli) and Rebecca Lim (Who was a Guest presenter on the evening). Click here to see all Asian TV Awards 2011 the nominations.

Also caught up with Kav, who worked on our documentary “Eye on Taiwan : The Search for Lost Happiness and the Search for Lost Fertility for Discovery. We got nominated for best Documentary Series which was awesome. Was was even more awesome, was we actually were runners up – scoring a “Highly Commended” Status. Congrats to the production team Samsara Films, Chandi Jayawickrama, Karina Holden, Kavitha, Joyce Huang, August, Umesh, the rest of the team and Discovery Networks!! Click here to see all the Asian TV Awards 2011 winners!

It was also fantastic to to meet many of the hardworking creatives and business heads behind the scenes.

Big thanks to Discovery Networks Asia Pacific for their kind invitation to join them and Congrats to Discovery for their 3 Wins!!! All in all a great night to celebrate Asian TV!

For more photos visit  Derrick’s Facebook page here

With Discovery Networks Asia Showing off their 3 Trophies for 2011

With Alaric Tay and Chua Enlai, The Noose Best Comedy Program Winners

With TV Host Henry Golding

Eye on Taiwan – Search for Lost Fertility – Best Documentary Series 2011 Runners Up!!! – Highly Commended:)

For more photos visit  Derrick’s Facebook page here

Credits: Executive Producer – Launch, Production – Vizuall Studio & Billy Yuen , Host – Steve Lai

LAUNCH 2 – Singapore’s Premier Exclusive Networking Event For the Film, TV and Media Industry from Derrick Siu on Vimeo.

With the added buzz building from the first LAUNCH in February at the Helipad, LAUNCH 2 landed with around 250 creatives coming together for one night of networking fun. LAUNCH 2 sported a new venue with an open air registration at Indochine’s Cocoon Bar + Supperclub at Clark Quay. The Vibe was happening from the moment attendees registered and walked the ‘Pink Carpet’ and got their photos snapped in front of the new look ‘Launch’ backdrop. Many were then caught chatting to camera with host Steve Lai, the new face of ESPN Star sports.

Once inside the excitement of creatives coming together for one night to connect was electric. It was a great night with many catching up with work colleagues and of course making new connections whilst enjoying the great atmosphere and music by the specially selected local musicians – Yelyn and Crystal, Frances Maria Lee & Marcus Lye (with Joshua Chew)

Loads of great Prizes were given away from all the wonderful sponsors who supported the event. Old friendships were rekindled, new friends were made, collaborations set in motion. It was as one stated an ‘epic’ evening enjoyed by all.

With the added buzz building from the first LAUNCH in February at the Helipad, LAUNCH 2 landed with around 250 creatives coming together for one night of networking fun.   LAUNCH 2 sported a new venue with an open air registration at Indochine’s Cocoon Bar + Supperclub at Clark Quay.  The Vibe was happening from the moment attendees registered and walked the ‘Pink Carpet’ and got their photos snapped in front of the new look ‘Launch’ backdrop.  Many were then caught chatting to camera with host Steve Lai, the new face of ESPN Star sports.

“Thanks so much for last Thursday. It was a great, and very useful evening. I was most impressed with the turnout, well beyond my expectations. I came away with a stack of cards from people within the media industry

Ina Hammer

ExpatFaces Talent Agency

Thank you very much for the invitation! I must say it was great fun. Saw some familiar faces too which was great! Looking forward to launch 3!

Elliott Danker

Host, Compère | Events & Voiceovers

Thank you so much for staging such an excellent event. I know how much work goes into organizing something like that!

I enjoyed the evening and was able to catch up with some old friends, and make some new ones. And the web site data base is an excellent way to keep the connections and communications alive and expanding.“

Malcolm Young

Executive Producer

Launch 2 – AADB Membership Winners

After over a Month of preparing, organising and planning, I’m happy to say that LAUNCH 2 is taking shape and will be landing on Thursday 9th September 2010. There are a lot of new exciting developments I look forward to share in the days leading up to the big Event – So you don’t want to miss this!

The first LAUNCH in Feb 2010 was very well received with over 200 creatives from the Singapore Film, TV and Media Industry attending. Click here to read about the event on the Launch Block website. I was very happy to get all the great feedback when I recently made some calls to past attendees – I’ve included some of them in this blog post – see below:)

“LAUNCH was a very well conceived concept, and exceptionally executed.  Great venue, great atmosphere and a great opportunity for creatives and content producers to network.

I personally made some valuable contacts and look forward to the next one!”

Karen Johnston
Programming & Acquisitions Director,
Asia Pacific
NBC Universal

“Launch! is a networking event for our very own film, media and entertainment industry originating from the strong desire to create a thriving community that shares a common vision and passion.

Definitely worth supporting and hope to see it grow bigger over time!”

Kelvin Sng
Managing Director
Kelvin Sng Productions Pte Ltd (KSP)

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LAUNCH 2 is getting a make over and promises to be even bigger and better with many enhancements to make the networking evening more effective and just as importantly more FUN!

To get the latest updates on LAUNCH 2 developments including how to register for this Exclusive Film, TV & Media Networking Evening follow the LAUNCH BLOCK at Twitter, Facebook and of course at the website! www.TheLaunchBlock.com

If you have any suggestions or feedback especially any feedback you would like to be considered to make LAUNCH 2 even better, please feel free to post your comments below!!!

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“Launch provides a unique forum for Singapore’s acting community. It enables actors to meet with producers, educators and colleagues, allowing them to extend the reach  of their professional contacts. Expanding the cultural environment is the next step that will help Singapore to become a true world capital, and Launch gives those who are building the nation’s culture a place to grow.”

William C. Kovacsik
Assistant Arts Professor
NYU Tisch Asia

Beatz, Joshua Simon & Steph Micayle

Entertainment by Singapore’s only Beatbox A Capella Crew BEATZ went off as did the fantastic accoustic set performed by the very talented Joshua Simon and Steph Micayle.

Many new friendships and connections were made which hopefully will be a springboard for future collaborations and projects! Thank-you to all of you who supported the Evening and we look forward to seeing you at the next LAUNCH! Event.

Check out the Official Photos from LAUNCH Here.
The event was also covered by Lifestyle Asia , check out the photos here.

You can also checkout the facebook event page here

Don’t Forget to leave your comments and feedback below in the comments box !!!

For more information on The Launch and up coming activities, go to www.TheLaunchBlock.com and leave your details there

Thank-you to The LAUNCH Sponsors:

Official Designer: Blabbering Chilly Jilly – thanks for staying up till the wee hours of the morning and doing such a great work on the Launch Logo and Board design!

Official Photographer: Joe Hani and team from XKuisit Photography

XKuisit

And a Special thanks to everyone who helped make the event possible

Brainstorming – Simon Yin, Bobby Khanna, Karen Teo and many others for helping with brainstorming the brand Name and website.

Support – Kelvin Sng, Chris Lee & Laura Kee

Advisors – Nic Chee @ Sinema Academy, Caine Teo – Ape Communications for event advice. Marcus Foo.

Design – Joshua Simon – for helping create the original LAUNCH Graphic and VIP Invitations

Printing – Barry Seah from TLS- Performance for all his help and assistance in making the printing happen despite the problems we faced!

Spreading the Word – Jason Chan & Wendy Ho from AADB, , All the Wordies – Laura Kee, Jacklyn Kuah, Simon Wong, Tushar, Steve Lai, Jae Leung, Ethan Tan, Ethan Chia, Waikit, Mike Kwah and Ray Loh

Media – City News for covering the event – Thanks to Theresa,  Rubez and Michael.

Setting Up - Laura Kee, Jacklyn Kuah, Waikit Kun, Tushar Ismail, Steve Lai, Farid.

Registration – Laura Kee and Jacklyn Kuah for their amazing effort at the registration desk and organising the printing of the name tags. Alan Tan for his great assistance and Tushar Ismail and Ethan Chia for filling in after.

Event Facilitation – Simon Wong, Steve Lai, Tushar Ismail, Farid, Mike Kwah,Laura Kee, Jacklyn Kuah

Entertainment: Thanks to Jeff Lim for managing the Sound and of course the perfomers – BEATZ (Mr. Z, Chrisso, Fallenangel & Queen K) and Joshua Simon and Steph Micayle and the EMCEE for the evening – Adrian Rodrigues

Additional Photography: Thanks to Timothy Boey from Lifestyle Asia

Venue: Helipad – thank-you to Addamm, Hannah, Kenneth and all the staff for making it a pleasure to work with

Feedback – And thank-you to the many many people I chatted with asking for your thoughts and ideas about putting on the LAUNCH event, your feedback was invaluable in helping make the event what it was!

ABOUT LAUNCH:

Launch began as an idea in late 2009. After arriving in Singapore looking for work as a host and actor, Derrick was fortunate to have worked with many great cast and crew on various productions and events. Realising that most people in the industry are too busy and rarely get the chance to interact with each other outside the work environment, the idea to organise a mixer and bring creatives together for a chance to not only catch up socially with past work colleagues, but also to expand possibilities of future work by meeting and making new contacts in the industry. After some research, the idea became a work in motion and the concept of LAUNCH was born on Jan 15th 2010.

As an extension of LAUNCH – Singapore’s Premier Networking Event for the Film, TV and Media Industry, TheLaunchBlock.com was established and aims to exist as a platform for creatives to connect, collaborate and create! Become a member and Be Part of the Launch movement today!

I have to say before finally settling on a date, I communicated with many many people, to find out the feasiblity of putting on such an event in Singapore.  There were many different opinions – many supporters and also many naysayers.  So it has definitely been very exciting seeing the buzz grow for this event and gratifying to know that the event is being very well supported and that there are already over 20 Production companies attending, as well as many established artists, agencies, actors and directors.   Its shaping up to be a great evening.

Besides the design, and ticketing system and letting people know about the event, I’ve also been very busy organising printing of materials and some other finishing touches to ensure the evening has a quality touch will report on these after the event:).

I’m also very grateful for a group of friends who have been very supportive and have assisted me with getting the word out! Thank-you to each of you!!

Almost everything has been organised and I can’t wait for everybody to have a fantastic enjoyable evening in good company with the prospect of forging some new bonds and the beginnings of some great creative works!  If you still would like to attend you can click on this link to register and save $5 by using the Coupon Code “Launch2010″

Hope to see you there!

Derrick