The last roll of film in 2010 or a look of Fujicolor Superia X-Tra 400

Not much to say except showing some pics that I like from the roll. They are scanned directly from film, no further post-processing beside adding borders and signature.

This is the 1st shot in the roll. There was something poetic about the scene at that time that triggered me to find my camera and come back for this pic.

Taken when it was raining. Guess this is when the flower looks best.

Like the composition, but maybe it is not enough. This test of dynamic range shows that film is still not as good as my eyes :P. I saw a blue sky with clouds behind :)

Little corner of Europe in Singapore :)

A night scene - not bad for a hand-held shot, isn't it? Quite pleased with the tonality and color (balance).

Do you think they will turn off the surveillance camera after the last train? (taken in Pioneer MRT station)

Overall, I think the color of X-Tra 400 is not as deep (saturated) as that of Superia 200, but not too significant. Plus, more comfortable shooting at ISO400.

FYI, here are the posts for other films that I have tried

• Fujifilm Superia 200
• Kodak T-Max 400 (BW)

Analox

Christmas Project

Today (which is not the day that this post is published) is a pretty good day to write a blog about Christmas. The weather is nice and cool. It feels a little bit more like Christmas and sets your mood right in.

About a month ago, we talked about what we wanted to do, photography wise, for Christmas because, you know, "It's the most wonderful time of the year", after all :). Last year, we did some creative bokeh stuff which was really cool (I must thank whoever invented that). This year, as we're trying to finish our Paris photo book before the year ends (wait for it ;), we thought we wouldn't have much time to do anything complicated. But we were wrong.

It started with a simple idea to take photos of Christmas trees in a few popular places in Singapore.
"Sounds good?"
"Yeah, but what's so special about it?"
"Hmm, you want something special? Ah, let's create them in HDR. It'll be perfect for
Christmas lights." (this is in case you don't know what HDR is)
"Maybe we should create some panorama or vertorama photos as well to capture the whole scene since our lenses aren't wide enough." (this is for panorama/vertorama )
"Perfect!"
So off we went. The HDR and panorama/vertorama turned out pretty exciting. We even stepped it up a notch to combine them in one single photo, a HDRama if you will :).

Enough said. Here are the photos from us. We wish you a very Merry Christmas.

Marina Square, Singapore 2010

ION Orchard, Singapore 2010

Singapura Plaza, Singapore 2010

Singapura Plaza, Singapore 2010

Paragon, Singapore 2010

Takashimaya - Ngee Ann City, Singapore, 2010

Tang Plaza (Orchard), Singapore 2010

VivoCity, Singapore 2010

VivoCity, Singapore 2010

Wheelock Place, Singapore 2010

Takashimaya - Ngee Ann City, Singapore 2010

Admiré & Analox

Serendipity

I thought I'm so into street photography but I'm rather confused by the term itself now. Should it be defined by the HOW - not "manufactured", "taken in the public place" (streets) or by the WHAT - be "a reflection of the photographer's mind" (snapshot, "indecisive/ decisive" moments)? Should it be more of aesthetic values or purely celebrate "the moment it clicks" (of course, it is best when you have both)? I don't really know the answer.

A good street photograph may be seen just as a normal snapshot in one eye .Who cares about the fleeing moment of the street scene if it does not matter as much as a picture of a familiar face. "What is your message in the photo?" - "I don't know. Sometimes it is just my emotion captured by the scene". "So what..."

Paris (2010)

Rome (2009)

I celebrate serendipity - "the lucky tendency to find interesting or valuable things by chance". One may frown upon the word "lucky" here, but it is about the outcome, not refers to your technicality or things like that. As I wander on the street (be it in a countryside or a city), things happen, and my mood, my reaction or curiosity triggers the camera. No pressure. You have a freedom of mind (and action). Sometimes interesting scene is captured and it becomes a snapshot of my own mind. It will recall the most of my experience when I look at it a week, a month or a year later.

Paris (2010)

Offenbach (2010)

I discover this website http://www.street-photographers.com/ recently. They has a Flickr group here. You submit your photos. Then whether it is shown (accepted) depends on the admins. Admittedly, I don't understand many of the work approved (aka, "what is the message", "it doesn't look very nice to me"), but I enjoy trying to be in their shoes at the moment...

Many of my work are rejected. Some of them are actually my "all-time" favs. The photos shown in this post are some that got through. It is not about "being approved/ accepted", but it is good to hear your voice echoed. (haha, my writing sucks)

Paris (2009)

Saigon (2010)

Singapore (2010)

Related post:

• Street photography
• Rome, Italy: Note 1
  

Analox

A walk around Orchard Road...

We had a walk around Orchard road last Saturday to see the decorations here this year.

Photos taken by my Canon Point-n-Shoot A710, in Black n White preset, ISO800, Shutter-priority mode. Simple and fast, just take pictures of what is interesting to me. Pretty much about curiosity and reaction, no message particularly, I guess.

This is about "Man and Women"...

A short summary about tourists in Singapore: shopping in Orchard road, hop-on bus, airlines, cable-cars in Sentosa, tradition costume, etc. Strangely, the bus is quite empty...

Some abstract display in a shopping mall

Advertisement boards in Orchard...

I know Christmas's decoration is around every corners. More to come with work in color by Admiré in the next post...

Analox

Chinese Garden, Singapore 2010 (Part 1)

6.58am: Before the dawn

7.06am: Sunrise

7.24am: The rising sun

Analox & Admiré

Grayscale

One of the reasons I go back to film photography is to make BnW pictures on film, for real :)

I'm much inspired by those black and white (BnW) pictures from the past. There are some "mysterious" qualities in the photos: the tonality, the dynamic range and the film grain that are so pleasing to see. Reproducing such quality in digital photos has been a quest that I'm trying and has not yet "felt" it...

My first roll of BnW film, a Kodak T-Max 400, was mainly dedicated for some portraits of Phuong (Admiré). We spent one hour in the "studio" in our house, with a window light and one reflector. After sending the film to Fotohub lab for developing, I was really nervous about the outcome. Her birthday is coming and I don't want to disappoint her with all bad pictures... So when the lab called and told me that the photos were ready, my heart went fast and I ran immediately there.

Here are the results.

Somehow this one in the roll becomes one of my favorites, together with the first photo. Taken on a night we were going out. Not technically good at all, but...

Analox

Ps: I think T-Max 400 is quite contrasty. Noted.

First time @ Canon Photomarathon 2010

Well well well, it was only yesterday but I gotta write something while it's still hot. Yes, it was our first time at the Canon Photomarathon. After so many times missing the chance to join, we finally had a day running around from 9am to 6pm taking photos, going back for submission and then going out taking photos again. At the end of the day, our legs felt like falling off. Here's a snap of what happened.

We got 3 hours to do everything for each theme: go out, take photos, come back, and submit the best photo straight from the camera. It sounded easy but the MC warned us that we needed like 1-1.5 hour for the queue. So you've got to get the idea, go to the place, take a nice photo and get back really fast or you'll be late for the next theme. There were 3 of them in total to make you busy all day. Lunch time was not in consideration.

9am: Theme 1 "Clarity"

The first thing we said was that these Canon guys might be inspired by the big haze covering the island the last couple of days (j/k). We thought that everybody might jump into that as well so we decided not to go there. We kind of like the idea of shooting through Analox's glasses and kept looking for some good objects to shoot. We shoot some water drops as well but they weren't so nice. Eventually, here's what we got. I like the idea of multiple layers of glasses in these photos.

By Analox

By Admiré

12pm: Theme 2: "Faith"

It was hard to think of something out of the box for this theme. While queuing to submit the first theme's photos, we quickly decided that we would go to a religious place and see what we could get. We went to Kampong Glam but didn't find much inspiration there. The mosque was closed for visitor when we reached. We thought it would be easier to take photos at temple as praying was usually in open area but we both didn't know any temple nearby and it was almost 1.30pm, so we went to St Joseph's Church.

In the end, we had something to represent the idea of blending 'faith in normal life'

By Analox

By Admiré

3pm: Theme 3: "Charge"

Well, we really needed to re-charge at 3pm when energy level was at red alert. We decided not to go anywhere far from Suntec city so that we wouldn't be too tired to get back and submit the photos before 6.05pm, the final deadline. Many ideas came to mind but most of them were thrown out of the window because of feasibility. These were more or less from the idea of 'electronic charge' from our low energy minds :)).

By Analox

By Admiré

As many other competitions, there could only be a few winners. And, as many other participants who didn't win, we didn't totally agree with the judges' choice =)). Some of the winning photos were really good but some weren't quite so. Anyway, you could have your own idea by taking a look at some of the winning photos here

Congratulations to all the winners and participants. It was a fun day. Hope to see you next time!

24 Oct 2010
Admiré