SnapIt!! (19 July 2014 - Lower Seletar Reservoir)

Yes, FINALLY!! That's my expression yesterday after I had finally managed to get a decent sunrise shots at Lower Seletar Reservoir.

It was my 3rd morning there in the past 1 month. I always wanted to capture beautiful sunrise there. However, due to unpredictable weather, I always came back with "nothing". Well, it is not exactly nothing. I always came back with other type of shots which I am happy with.

First morning I was there, I was greeted with passing rain with large rain cloud in the sky. Here's the result.

Although there is no sunrise, I love this shot very much. The situation forced me to get most out of it. The light trails from the MRT, leading line from the wooden jetty, star burst from the street lights and the rain clouds all come together as one pleasing composition. Definitely one of my favourites photo so far.

Not happy with the results, I went back there again. This time, there was no rain. But... Yes, it was cloudy. I have taken the shot at the fishing jetty from my previous visit. So this time I skipped that and went straight to the other location. I met a young fellow photographer who had arrived there much earlier. As morning blue hour is short, I quickly set up my gear and started shooting. It was so dark that even with viewfinder, it was so difficult to focus. Finally, I managed to get a few test shots and adjusted the composition. Here's the result.

Best time to shoot in the early morning is about 10-15 minutes before the sun rose. You will find the sky is blue with red glow on the horizon. With your naked eyes, the red glow is not prominent. However, you will see a big different if let your camera exposed for longer time. The above shot was a 30s exposure shot. The cloud moved during the 30s and created a nice smooth effect. As the sun rose higher above the horizon, part of the sky will lose its blue colour.

I went back again for the 3rd time. This time, it was partially cloudy. The light was beautiful. I arrived there earlier and managed to take few shots. One of them is when the sky was still pretty much blue.

The water water was calm. No wind blowing. That's why the boats looks sharp and not blurry. My tripod was set up very low and close to the subject. Be careful when going to this place. There were lots of leeches and mosquitoes. Bring your bug sprays!!

When the sun rose higher, you would see the horizon glowing red. And the part of the sky where the sun would appear turned white. In this case, it was to the far left on the above photo. The clouds turned magenta red. This would not last long. As soon as the sun appeared above the horizon, your shutter speed should be faster to avoid blown up sky. I used my GND filter covering the top left corner of the frame which helped to bring back the details of the sky. Here's the result. As the sun rose higher, the sky lost the colour saturation. So for this type of shot, please take the photo as quickly as possible before the sun is too high. Here's the result!!

I will definitely come back sometime at the end of the year when the sun will appear in the middle of the frame. That would make an interesting shot. For the time being, I am pretty much done with this place.

My long term sunrise/sunset project update for the month of July 2014 was published. I would not be posting any photos till end of this month. Stay tune for more updates!! Next we are heading to beaches.

I can see the world better through the viewfinder

Due to pressure from parents, peers and the society to do well in school. We must focus on learning physics, mathematics and science. We were forced to learn things we were not sure we would need it. That is our education system. If we graduated from school with excellent results, we will get a good job, live a good life, live a happy life. IS THAT SO? My answer is NO. What about yours?

Have you ever wondered how you can use calculus in your job? or When can we apply Einstein famous E=MC² at your work? Think about it.

We were all born with talents in sports, musics, arts, etc. As we grew up, we slowly lost those because we were told to learn physics, mathematics, science. We were told that we wont have good life if we were to study arts, music and sports. And with that, we all walk to the same road. School. School. School. Find a job. Work. Work. Work. And work till the day we die. The worst is that we cant find the reason why we work other than money to survive.

Have you ever had this thinking in your mind?

"I wish I joined my school soccer team, I might be in my country's national team now."

"I wish I joined my school music club, I might a great musician now."

I guaranteed you have at least one of such thoughts in your life.

If you did, it's good. It means that it was not too late for you to give that a try. I was lucky enough that my parents gave me all the freedom to choose what I wanted to do. We were always told that our future is in our own hand. What they can give us is financial and moral support. With that, the only one last obstacle I have is FEAR in my heart.

It has been 10 months now from the time I met photography. It was one of the right decision I made in life. In the past, I was never like to be photographed. I have no interest in photography at all. It was until my pre-wedding photo shoots. That was the time I really see how beautiful this world is. Something that is so beautiful and yet we did not notice it even we passed-by it everyday. The beautiful light coming from the sun. Beautiful cloud in the sky. Have you ever noticed those?

Since then I started to be able to appreciate things around me. For example, when I walked out to the street, I would glance at the sky, looking at the beautiful clouds. I noticed different patterns of cloud in the sky. I would expect different pattern of cloud after a rainy day. The magnificent view took away all the stress and worries in my mind.

Have you ever tried to watch the sun rises in the early morning? If you have not, please try it. The healing effect of the early sun light was so great that I would wake up much much earlier during the weekend to capture that beautiful light. Since then, I really enjoyed capturing the sun, both sunrise and sunset. Slow down our mind, let it have a good rest, treat it with healing light from the sun. Give ourselves sometimes. Appreciate all people and things around us. Be aware of their existence. And you will find that life is SO MUCH MORE than just school and work.

Things would look much more beautiful if we stop and take our time to appreciate it. It is the same as our life. The fast face of modern life has speeded our life. When we lose control, we would crash and fall apart.

So, give it a try. Tomorrow morning when you come out of your house, look at the sky, look for a beautiful cloud formation, take a deep breath, and start your day. Let me know if you have a great day!!

SnapIt!! (Jun 2014)

It has been some time ago since my last post in this blog. I had been really busy with work and many other things that happened in the month of June 2014.

8 June 2014

As usual, my shooting time is always during the weekend. Similar to my other weekends, this time I visited Lower Seletar Reservoir. I knew it was one of the best place in Singapore to enjoy sunrise. However, I was not too sure about sunset here. Here's the shot taken right after the sunset. Enjoy!! One thing to note when visiting this place is remember to bring your mosquito repellent. We identified few locations for sunset and determined that we will come back for good sunrise shots.

Lower Seletar Reservoir

14 June 2014

This weekend I did not have my time to do my sunrise and sunset shots. My aunts and nephews were visiting Singapore and we took them around. This time we visited S.E.A. Aquarium at RWS. For this visit, I decided to leave my wide angle 10-22mm lens at home. Lighting in the aquarium are poor; and with the limitation of the f-stop of the lens and lack of image stabilisation, it will be difficult to shoot without tripod. And with the limitation of the shutter speed at reasonably low ISO, it is not possible to freeze the movement of the sea creatures. Instead, I brought my 18-55mm kits lens which I have not been using for sometime.

It turned out to be a good decision made. I managed to keep the ISO at max 1600. Here's some of the shots I like.

Hermit Crab

Jellyfish

Fish World

Lobster

22 June 2014

After missing sunrise/sunset shots previous week, I decided to visit Lower Seletar Reservoir again. This time, it was for the sunrise. When we reached the location, the sky looked dark and was about to rain. I never lost hope and kept waiting. We visited the locations we identified earlier. But at 6.45am, we had yet to see sun light on the horizon. 

We decided to go back to the fishing jetty near the entrance to the park. My camera was set up, facing the position where we were expecting for the sun to come out. At 6:55am, we had yet to see the sun and the sky was getting darker and darker. This was the time I gave up on the sunrise. I decided to look at the other directions and I was shocked by the magnificent view. Dark clouds were gathering and the sky was blue. I turned to my camera and trying to find best composition. I was facing the MRT track and I thought it would be interesting to include the light trail from the MRT in the shot. I waited for a while for the MRT to be in the middle of the track and frame the shot. It was 6 seconds shot which was long enough to get a nice light trail. Here's the result and I was very happy with it. Lesson learnt here is "Never pack your gear and leave too early. Always look at the surrounding. You will find something interesting."

Thunderstorm

29 June 2014

I was down with pain from a wart on my right foot for 3 days. I almost gave up on my planned trip to Legoland due to the pain. And I almost disappoint people I promised to have fun with.

On the 4th day, things getting better. I decided to give it a try. I made the decision to go even though I could still feel the pain. Thanks God I made the right decision. I had so much fun although I was limping the whole trip.

That morning, I packed up my gears with some cleaning cloth and blower. I brought both my lens and decided to leave my tripod at home. I was not expecting to shoot sunrise/sunset or low light. Here are some of the architecture shots I took.

Lego City

Twin Towers

Most of the shots I took during the trip was portraits. Being a tripod man, portrait photography is always a challenge for me. I rarely had chance to do portrait photography and the trip gave me lots of opportunities to improve. To capture a nice composition through the viewfinder is much more challenging than using live view mode. Looking forward to the next trip. I will try different things. May need to read up more on travel photography. Excited!!

SnapIt!! (10 May 2014 - Tg Rhu Riverside & Chinatown)

Same as before, my weekends are shooting time. Last week, we visited Tanjung Rhu riverside for sunrise and hopefully great panorama shot. The place was very far, and we need to change train a few times. Leaving us much lesser time to shoot before the sun is out. This weekend, we tried again. Yes, still no luck. We will be back there some other time when sunrise is around 7.15am.

Anyway, we reached the location about 6:35am. Get to the location and set up my gear, we were ready to shoot about 6:45am. There was still time before the sun is out, but the sky was quite bright. Technically we could not move to other location once we were there. Yes, I could not get what I wanted to shoot. :((

After sun was up, we move around to explore other good spots. As I was walking, I kept looking back at the sun. Then I stopped at this particular location and enjoyed the view of the sun. It was so uplifting. It brought energy to this exhausted body from work. I set my tripod to frame the scene perfectly as I wanted it to be. This type of shot can be easily taken handheld. Here's the shot. Enjoy!!

Uplifting

We found different good spots and will be back some other times.

In the afternoon, we decided to head to Chinatown to shoot the Buddha Tooth Relic Temple. I always wanted to shoot this temple long time ago. I was waiting for the right time. As Vesak day will be coming in 2 more days, we decided to check it out if there would be anything special there. And yes, we made the right decision. The weather was right, the timing was right. We reached the location at about 6:15pm. We have plenty of time exploring the area and preparing for the shot.

We initially planned to shoot the temple from the HDB house next to it. We went to the 10th floor and realised that it was too high. So we decided to move to level 9. We shot a series of photo and experimenting with different angle. I have chosen the following one for 2 reasons. Less distracting elements and dramatic view. I have not upload this to my Flickr account. So, Enjoy!! 

Buddha Tooth Relic (Blue Hour)

As the sky getting dark, we decided to leave. When we exited the first floor lift, I had a clear view of the temple and the pavement's curve leading my view towards the temple. I saw a big patch of white cloud in the sky. It was lit by the moon light. I set up my tripod, adjusting my position and camera setting. The next thing I saw from my camera's LCD screen was WOW!! I was excited and we took few shots before too many people came to the area. Here's the shot. Enjoy!!

Buddha Tooth Relic

SnapIt!! (Updates from 29 Mar - 26 Apr 2014)

I have been very busy recently with works for the last couple of weeks, leaving me not much time and energy to post in the blog. Although I still made an effort to shoot at least once during the weekend. Here's some of the story and updates from all the photos I have taken so far. Mostly are sunrise and sunset shoots.

29 March 2014

My Dream

Star Merlion

I have planned where and when I wanted to shoot that Saturday. My wife was not feeling well and not be able to join me in the morning. But I determined to go out and shoot. And yes, I am glad I made the right decision. Two shots above are the results. And yes, I was back in time for breakfast with her. :)

I have seen many times that people often gave up our dream just because their close friends or buddies did not have the same dream. I feel that one's happiness shall be determined by his/her own action, not others. The first shot "My Dream" was inspired by my feeling that morning. I was taking the photos alone. So, I have to run back and forth between my camera and my seating position. I set the camera on 10s timer. While I was running back and forth, I saw the street light through the hole on the statue. That's where I got the idea for my second shot "Star Merlion". I have visited this place before, but I had never seen any light shining on the Merlion statue. Therefore, it is worth visiting the place you have visited. Because you can always find something different.

5 Apr 2014

Convergence

That week, I did not have specific photo I wanted to create. So, we were just exploring the places we have visited before and finding new spots for the shoot. The photo "Convergence" was taken on top of the Marina Bay Shopping building. Initially, we were there to find spots for some night shoots. It was in the hot afternoon without any shelter. As we were walking from one end to the other, I spotted this beautiful structure with unique patterns. It seemed like all the lines from the steel wire, wooden walkway, and from the shelters are coming toward the centre. I quickly set my tripod very low on the ground to get the dramatic view of the wooden walkway and frame this shot. As I was facing the bright setting sun, it was really a challenge. Finally, I got the composition I wanted which looked almost symmetrical on both sides.

6 Apr 2014

Twin Star

This is definitely one of my favourite place for photography. I still remembered, my first shot 6 months back when I first learning photography. Comparing to that shot, I have seen how much I have improved for the last 6 months. This shot was taken in the hot afternoon, the sun was glaring but the sky was blue. Very beautiful and I admitted I seldom see this kind of sunset. When I reached the location, the sun was still quite high. The moment I saw that, I was trying to position myself so that I could get the sun light shining through one of the pagoda's door. I managed to take a couple of shots, but composition was not good. So, I leave it for the next visit. As the sun went down further, I spotted this spot where the sun was between the two pagoda. After I composed the scene, I waited a while more for the sun to be near the horizon to get the rays on the edge of the bridge.

12 Apr 2014

Amigurumi

This was the weekend I did not go out for shoot. The weather was wet and I was too tired to go out for shoot. So, we decided to work on creative photography. We shot in a totally dark room with only the candle light to lit the doll. Doll is made by my wife. Very happy with the result. Enjoy!!

19 Apr 2014

Two Sides

One Morning

As I always say, go back to those places you have visited before. You will be surprised with what you found. This is another example. I have visited Merlion Park before, but that morning was special. There water was so calm as there were hardly any wind blowing. Moreover, the Merlion statue did not spray out water from the mouth. That created a very calm water which was perfect for creating reflection images.

The first shot "Two Sides" is the sunrise shot before we can see the sun itself. The lights illuminated on sky was beautiful. I always love the strong orange tone of sunrise. As the sun is higher and higher, the sky getting clearer and boring. So, the best time to take sunrise photo is between blue hour and before the sun appears in the horizon. 

Another tips when shooting sunrise or sunset is "look at the scene behind you". The reason is that when the sun is getting higher, the light illuminates the other part of the sky. And that was the result of the second shot "One Morning". This is an unusual view of the Merlion. That morning, may be due to some of the work that was going on there, the statue did not spray out any water resulting in a very calm water around the area. I managed to take 5-6 vertical format photos of the scene and stitched them in Photoshop. That's the result. Enjoy!!

20 Apr 2014

Coastal Sunset

It has been awhile since I last shot coastal sunset/sunrise. This particular shot was taken at East Coast Park. We have been there before, but due to poor weather we did not get any decent sunset shot. The weather that afternoon was good. Partly cloudy with orange sunset colour in the sky. That was my first attempt to capture smooth wave next to beautiful sunset. From my observation, shutter speed below 1.3 seconds would give a nice flow of water but not smooth. It also depends on the speed of the wave. In order to get shutter speed more that 2 seconds when the sun is still hight, we need ND filters. As I have none of those filters, my limit was 1.6 seconds before the sun light disappear. I would say it is a decent shot for the first attempt.

26 Apr 2014

Fullerton Bay Sunrise

I have been in this place at night for few occasions this year. Because there are always people walking around the area, it is very difficult to get a shot where noone in it. That was my goal. So, I decided to give this place a visit in the morning. All the excitement I had previously was crushed when I reached the location. No light from the building and walkway. As the light in the sky change so fast during the sunset/sunrise, I need to be quick before I lost the best light. After trying few different shots, I decided to leave with disappointment. When I was walking pass this area, I stopped for awhile. I looked at the surrounding 360degree and asked myself a question "How does it look like if I took a 360degree panorama picture from this spot?"

I spontaneously turn my eyes to the sunrise at Marina Bay. YES! There was still fairly amount of orange light in the area. Quickly I set up my tripod, adjusted my composition and shot. In total I shot 20 vertical format photos of the surrounding and stitched them in Photoshop. HOLA! That's the result! I am very happy with it and would like to try this again at different places. Stay tune!

Lesson learnt is "Expect the unexpected because the unexpected is FUN!"