Christmas Light Up Around Singapore...

A collection of Christmas decor' around Singapore shot this month...kinda disappointing at Orchard Road's light up. The Singapore River's 'autumn' feel red trees look outstanding at night. While Gardens by the Bay for the first time has a Christmas Market and a 'snow' dome. But the colours look like Deepavali! haha! 

My Creative Series with my Fav Doraemon!

Shooting wefies with buddy was the fun part ~ created some nice shots under the drizzle! 

Lanterns by the River @ Clarke Quay

It's been a month since I shot with dslr... with the upcoming Mid-Autumn Festival, a series of lanterns displays lit up the river-bank. I decided to pop down to Clarke Quay for dinner & photo-walk. I couldn't remember when was the last time i dine at Central & only discovered today that the food court had given way to a chinese herbal soup restaurant! After walking one round, I decided to try The Freshness Burger. It's quite empty despite being a sat evening. I ordered a Teriyaki burger with Onion Rings & an ice-lemon tea. The beef patty was small, however I found the burger tasty & its bun was very soft to the bite! The onion rings were rather unique, wif a soft batter... if u love them crispy, then this won't suit your taste-buds. Its texture is like MOS burger's fries. It's a tad pricey thou as the meal cost 8 bucks!

 

There's pandas lanterns added to the display too!

 

After filling my tummy, it's time to practice photography... I was lazy to lug my tripod along & decided to shoot free-hand! How times flies... I remembered using my new Fotopro tripod at this location for the lanterns shoot last year! This year, the organiser fenced up one end of the path, which used to allow access for a closer shot of the lanterns across the riverbank. I could only shoot from a distance & used the railings as support. I decided to practice panning & zoom burst!

Chinese New Year

Dragon Boat Festival

Chinese Valentine's Day (Qi Xi)

Winter Solstice (Dong Zhi) - where families gather to eat Tang Yuan

 

The whole area was flooding with people & I had to shoot fast... hence, not having a tripod was also a good idea! I focused on the floating lanterns which depict various Chinese festivals. I like the one depicting Dragon Boat Festival most! Thou I like Mid-Autumn Festival but I'm not a big fan of mooncakes! I prefer the savoury dumplings!

Cool streaks of lights!

 

I noticed many photographers lugging their dslr & tripods... some squeezed closed to the bridge for the panorama shot. I decided to shoot using 5 vertical shots & stitch them up. My foto buddy ~ Wei likes to shoot pano in such manner & I gotta test it out too! I was damm lucky as some of the lights on the bridge switched off right after i finished shooting!

I continued strolling over to the pubs area at Clarke Quay... I noticed sisha (turkish smoking pipes) outlets there. In the past, there were no such outlets here. At one of these places, there's a pretty dancer dancing & weaving thru' their customers. Interesting!
 

Next, I went to the fountain area to practice shooting at various shutter speed, both slow & fast... too bad, no spectacular shots during my experiment as I wanted to capture kids playing there. I returned to Central & bought myself a push-cart's Sweet Corn ice-cream with bread, yummy! The ice-cream seller enjoyed roaring business & luckily still have the flavour I wanted! A sweet ending to my photo-walk!

Mid-Autumn Festival @ Clarke Quay 。。。

It's Mid-Autumn ~ my fav chinese festival once again! I dated Wei to go fotoshoot at Clarke Quay. Too bad, ruby couldn't join us.... However, Wei's frens ~ James & LV joined us for the evening. We met up for dinner at Santouka & they agreed wif me that the pork cheeks ramen was yummy!  We chit chat for an hour there, while Wei shared her travel tales wif our new frens...

At 8pm, we proceeded to the river side & i decided to 開張 my shiny red Fotopro tripod! After more than a year's wait, i finally got it at a good deal during the Comex fair. It's carbon fibre & light-weight; suitable for my travel needs. LV joked that i could always use mid-autumn as my tripod's anniversary! Great idea! LoL

In the past, i usually did my mid-autumn's fotoshoot prior to the actual festival...this year is the 1st time shooting on actual day. There's nothing fantastic abt the decor as it's perpetually the same yearly... The fun kicks in when James suggested we try different shooting techniques, such as zoom focusing & panning. I like the effects of the zoom focusing on the dragon lantern + the effects on the colourful windows of MICA building! Cool!

The panning technique was tougher to master as we tried to pan the bum-boats moving across the river... I didn't quite succeed in doing nice ones.  Then, James suggested that we try panning on the people walking at the underpass beneath us.... Wei & I tried playing wif our cams & consulted our 'shifu' accordingly, haha!  The haze & humid weather made us sweat like mad....

Next, we strolled down the river side towards the main bridge. James shot a nice image of the water reflections & encouraged us to try it too! It was fun! All of us produced different results & Wei used her new 70-200mm Canon lens...the results was fabulous! As we walked to the bridge, I went to explore new angles...while doing so, i spotted a group of Chinese students playing sparkles... This certainly enhanced the festive spirit & i took candid shots of them!

We walked on & stopped for some time, doing our respective shots. Wei & LV shot the round lunar Moon wif their zoom lenses!  I only got my kit lens wif me so i decided to find other subjects to shoot. Subsequently, we went to watch ppl playing wif the remote kites which created a nice touch of colours to the night sky! We ended the evening by viewing some lanterns exhibits made from recycled materials...

Overall, it's a great 2011 Mid-Autumn, being different from previous years becos of the new frens found & able to celebrate wif my buddy! ^o^

Sg River Festival @ Clarke Quay

Since i read about the Singapore River Festival in the papers, I decided to chk out its schedule to practice photography. This round, i had Denise wif me, who juz bought a Canon 550D wif 135mm lens, cool manz! We met up at Central & dine at TCC... while there, i checked out her new gizmo, keke! Now, i've 2 buddies who joined in my league of dslr & i could play wif their different models ^o^  Wow, her free tripod was a gd deal, really solid thou albeit heavy for gals.

Near 7.30pm, we headed out to the entrance of Central & saw some performers in wet suits spraying water & having photoshoots wif people who flocked around. A quick glance around, i noticed many photo enthusiasts armed wif their powerful lens & gears, like all out to battle! Ahem, i only have a standard kit lens & a modest 1000D body but that won't deter my objective at honing my skills!  At 7.30pm sharp, we heard an announcement that the AIR show would be commencing soon... however denise & me could only squeeze behind all the tall guys armed wif dslrs....grrr... i had to turn on my Live view instead & despite tip-toeing, it was challenging! As I was taller than denise, i utilised her zoom lens & think we could manage some shots but it was tiring to tip-toe & steadying my right arm wif her heavy cam.

The AIR performance was spectacular & i got an idea of wat to expect, so when the announcement informed that there would be a 2nd show at 10pm, we decided to hang around... Immediately after AIR, there was the bum-boats parade, wif bum-boats decked out in 'clogs' to 'old newspapers prints'. Meanwhile, we strolled on the bridge & i shared wif denise some photography tips. While we were on the bridge's pathway, i discovered a low angle which i like alot & got denise's help to shoot me wif the ''Singapore River Festival'' huge balloon! Denise had not even done much shots & she already lamented tired! She juz dropped herself on the ground to snap for me, haha! Yeah, dun tink photography r juz for oldies, it zap alot of stamina esp when u lug a 2kg load around! All the more, i believe i need to pursue this passion while i still have the energy.

We strolled along the river-front & decided to locate a good viewing spot 1hr in advance! Since i do not have a long-range zoom, i need to be as close to the action as possible... so i decided to station ourselves at this barricade area, where i could capture action on both left & right sides. There's only 1 space available for tripod, so i let denise set-up hers instead of using mine since her cam is heavy. Not used to her tripod & we struggled abit to set-up, whilst doing this, i tink the guy next to us noticed... He was also waiting for the perf wif his powerful cam mounted on a monopod. He nicely told us that we should 'park' the tripod's 2 legs against the barricade & taught us how to select a solid tripod. After tis fiddling, there's 45mins more to 10pm & denise felt it's a long wait... yeah, my reply was it's a test of patience & i dun mind for some nice shots.  To past time, i decided to take shots of denise's bored looks & asked her to snap me too... this is called self-entertainment, haha!

Finally at 10pm sharp, we could watch the performance without blockage... now is a test of my steadiness, cos i had to shoot free-hand, half-squat at times & trying hard to avoid the dazzling spot lights flare! The guy next to me was considerate enuf to on & off turn around to ensure i got my chance to take pics, cos he's tall & would block my angle... hmm, actually quite hard to bump into such a considerate guy :)  I also checked how denise was coping as she fumbled wif her cam's settings... At that point, i really wished her zoom lens was mine,haha! Cos i could only capture @ up to 55mm! It was good that i watched the 7.30pm show, cos now i know at which directions the performers would 'fly' across the river! Really need to be fast in pressing the shutter to capture the moments!  At the end of the half hour show, I had sweated gallons but all was worth it when i captured some 'moments' i wanted!

twin-stunts

Performer wif sparkles & burst of fireworks above us during finale!

A cool finale wif fireworks 'spilling' on the bridge!

KTV & Sat Nite Out @ CQ 。。。

Clara & I had enrolled ourselves in a free seminar held at Novotel Hotel. The seminar started at 1pm sharp, but barely 10mins into the seminar, i already felt bored as i found that the speaker couldn't hold my attention.  After about half an hour, an inconsiderate uncle's hp rang & dunno why this person dun feel pai sei at all, as everyone stared at him.... the best was he sat at our row! This selfish soul's mobile rang not only once & he even chatted inside, without the common sense of stepping out to finish his conversation. Really a disgrace to s'poreans ah! Then, the auntie who sat beside this uncle asked him to turn off his mobile, haha! 

By now, we were no longer in the mood to continue listening to the talk, so i suggested to Clara to pop over to Partyworld next door @ Liang Court. It's been at least 1.5 mths since i last had KTV! I was down wif flu & cough for the past weeks...now recover lo, of course gotta go KTV to relief my addiction, keke! It's a one stone kill 3 birds idea ~ since clara needed to eat lunch, we had heavy bags & tripod, plus we had planned to take nite shots here! All kinds of reasons to supplement my wish to KTV rite? Wahaha!

Off we headed to Partyworld and I even managed to exchange my obiang membership card for the new card! Great, no longer need carry that 'mama-san' lookalike card, hehe! It's been a long time since i visited this outlet... Just as I wanted to sing the 1st song, both the wireless mics were low batt!  Had to get the staff to change batteries & adjust the echo. Somehow i dun enjoy the sound using the wireless mics....seems not sensitive enuf & the volume not too consistent. 

Our dedication was a few pages (wat's new rite?) and Clara had her usual dose of korean pop, while i was fed on my canto & mando pop.... I had more of the not so new songs, as those juz added on I dunno.... and those new songs from Rainie & Show Luo were too new to appear yet! Both of us like 林峰 canto songs so we dedicated quite a few of his hit songs! I was veri busy singing as Clara only like to watch MVs & eat the snacks! Amazingly, I was still feeling energetic after singing for 3.5hours, till the air-con suddenly got colder towards the end!  I sang Color's 《哭出来》& 《M Right》, 真的好high哦！I also enjoyed another guys' duet 《同一个遗憾》by Wilbur Pan & Blue J. Towards the end of the session, 唱到最high的是萧闳仁的《我没有错》!

We adjoined to Subway for dinner after our singing session.... give me a mic anytime & i won't feel hungry while singing....but now I do! After dinner, I told Clara we would return to the same areas that I took pics on monday cos I had analysed & did some homework after that batch of photos.  From my research, I gathered that I should switch off my image stabiliser while cam is mounted on a tripod & if flash is being utilised, we should pause 1 sec longer. With these in mind, I returned to the areas to test again. This time the route was opposite from that day, as we walked from Liang Court. We had some warm up shots at the foot of the bridge, then proceeded to the fountain, back to the top of bridge & outside Central.

The shots taken at the fountain were best.  By coincidence, we had many candid shots there as we were chatting while the timer countdown! haha! The candid shots were nice ^o^  Over at the bridge, the lighting conditions had changed from my last session. There were CNY decor flowers flaunting the lamp-posts on both sides, adding a red tint to our photos! Being a weekend today, there were many passers-by around too. We only managed an all-clear pic when the crowd went to watch a performance on the bridge.  Lastly, at the river-front, i needed to plan how we should stand to block off the numerous 'heads' in our frame. I dared her to do funny actions since she find our poses boring, but she dared not due to the crowd around! haha! Anyway, Clara was enjoying the photo session as we reviewed each photo in our high mood! 

After an hour of photo session, we were both warm & tired... I tot of the best way to round up our sat nite ~ to share a scoop of Azabu Sabo ice-cream & dip our Subway cookies in it! Brillant idea rite? We enjoyed our double berries ice-cream wif cookies & that certainly helped to cool us off! Our timing were so good that the fireworks started to dazzle the skies juz as we finished our ice-cream! Today is definately memorable & we truely enjoyed ourselves!