Panning

Thought I'd try my hand at panning today. The classic race car photos with the car in clear focus and everything else blurred is a good example of a panning shot. For these photos I used a shutter speed of 1/25, ISO 200 until the sun went down more and then I increased the ISO. These are all hand held, no tripod. Panning is moving the camera horizontally along with a moving object to show motion. So standing in place and turning evenly from left to right or vice versa along with the main focus going by. This time my main focus are bikes and runners.

I think this was my best bike panning photo of the day.

This one was not too bad...

and this one was pretty good also.

This skateboarder was good too, a little dark but sharp. I would love to hop on a skateboard and sail along like him but I know better. I have trouble with balance walking on an even surface!

Roller blades. I never thought Singapore would have such an active outdoor lifestyle since it is so hot and humid everyday but there are always plenty of people out and about.

There seems to be a race every weekend in Singapore, I can't believe what a big running community there is. The Pocari Sweat race was on this day. Here is the elite runner in the 5km race (I'm pretty sure it was the 5km and the first place runner at this point). Very happy with this photo. Some of these photos didn't get a lot of editing, only crop and adjust the exposure. Some of them have the Pixlr mimic HDR effect added. It didn't look great on all of them.

Pacers

Normally runners are photographed with a freeze frame (example: shutter speed of 1/1000 or faster) so they are in clear focus and you only get a fast split second capture for the photo. I think runners are harder to capture with panning because people bounce a bit when they run causing blur and everyone runs at different speeds and some are trying to pass other runners or unexpectedly slow down. Bikes were easier, they are smoother and faster. I'd say it was worth it, some of these are good. Its fun to try something different.

Synchronized pacers, check out those legs!

Pacers near Gardens by the Bay.

This is the flower dome for the Gardens by the Bay. See how the sidewalk is filled with racers and there is no space for the public? This race had an unusual start time; around 6pm. IMHO - Better to have these races early in the morning before the parks and gardens get crowded. Unfair to the people who trained for this timed competitive race and unfair to the people visiting the gardens.

Happy Friday!!!

Telok Blangah - Cooking Pot Bay

This week I was all consumed by a book I started, The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. It is so good I cannot put it down. I'm about 75% through and I would love to scream at the main character to get his life together!!! Thursday morning rolls around and I know I do not have any good photos for my blog and I really really  want to finish my book, ugh! But with 300 pages left it will have to wait. I decide to walk to the bus stop and take the first bus that comes along and jump off when I see something interesting. Bus 131 did not let me down. This bus goes to Telok Blangah, a neighborhood near Keppel Bay, south west of the CBD. I took almost 200 photos and I would say I am happy with about 20 of them. I think that is pretty good, not sure how it goes for pro photographers in general but I think 10% is good. None of them are what I would consider to be good enough to win any contests and I am really OK with that. What I like about these photos is that it captures a small part of Singapore that will always remind me of the reasons why I love it here. The HDBs, the neighborhood feel, the giant trees lining the streets, the temples and the fact that I can hop on a bus going just about anywhere and find something interesting and beautiful to photograph. Maybe its not always about the quality of the photo but just getting a thought or a feeling recorded. At least I like to think so since I am giving up on getting to be as good as a pro, instead I just want to have fun with it. Enjoy!

 Riding on the bus I have a Singapore Maps app with GPS so I can see where I am and whats coming up. The trains I have all figured out, very easy, but the buses are harder for me. I get so lost! This app is super helpful. I saw a park coming up on the route that I haven't seen yet and chose to get off there. Then we turned down this street that was so pretty with a colorful temple on the corner. I decided if the bus stopped close-ish I'd have to jump off and investigate., maybe save the park for another trip. Luckily the bus stopped just a few feet down the street. The Koon Seng Ting temple in Telok Blangah is an older temple in Singapore, completed in 1881. According to the web it became a home to orphaned and abandoned baby girls who were seen as less desirable than boys. 

I wanted to go up the steps to photograph but I'm always so concerned that I'll be taking photos of things that maybe it isn't so cool to photograph so I stayed outside. Most temples are fine with photos inside and out, I always ask first just to be sure. The HDB complex in the background has their flags out for National Day, August 9. Soon there will be flags all over town to celebrate the holiday.

The front gate of the temple with a view of the beautiful trees. Love the hanging lanterns, wonder if they light up at night?

Just behind the Koon Seng Ting Temple is the Ban Siew San Temple, a Buddhist temple dedicated to the Goddess of Mercy. 

 

Butterflies always make me smile!

Walking in the neighborhood, just past the temples, I came across another giant HDB complex with this covered walkway and flags for National Day. 

This apartment complex had some cool murals painted in the common areas on the ground level.

You wouldn't believe how the temperature changes when you get into some shade and have a nice breeze. This is as good as air conditioning. I was surprised no one was sitting here but it is a week day, lunchtime. I bet everyone is eating at the hawker center down the street or at work or school. 

I wonder if the residents did the murals or who did them? There was no information that I could find.

You can see the covered walkway I photographed in the background with the red tiled roof, flags aren't visible here.

Bike storage and a pay phone...haven't seen one of those in a long time. I didn't notice it until I was editing my photos. 

This is the apartment complex just outside the first floor murals. The bin is for burning offerings, usually paper offerings. 

This is the street the apartments were on. Such a pretty tree lined street. Across the street, just out of view, is a hawker center with cooked food and fresh food, markets, clinics, hair salons, bakery and home hardware. These HDB communities seem to have everything you need close by. 

Some residents waiting at the bus stop.

Telok Blangah in Malay translates to Cooking Pot Bay. Named because of the shape of the island resembling a cooking pot and also a "b langa" is a cooking pot made of clay in South India.

OK, I don't know why but I love seeing the laundry hanging to dry. 

Hang it while its sunny, you never know when a storm will pop up.

When we first moved here we were out looking at apartments and our realtor asked if this view of laundry bothered me. I said no, of course not. Its laundry, why would it bother me? I guess some expats do not want to see it. She also said that sometimes it isn't so great to hang your laundry outside because someone on a higher floor could hang out their mop heads to dry and guess where that drips...yuck!

Happy Friday!!!

Signs and a Butterfly Re-do

I posted last year on signs and I have been collecting more photos since then. Enjoy!

Awww, how sweet!

I couldn't agree more. Cake for dinner is not a bad idea.

LOL!

I don't know, seemed interesting to me at the time. Not so much today.

Too scared of the monkeys to go back here.

Not sure I'd like that flavor.

I went back to my butterfly photo taken at Hort Park a few weeks ago. I read an article online that suggesting making your photos darker to bring out more detail. They described it as doing the same thing artists do with paint, adding black to make the color more dramatic. Thought I'd give it a try. I wasn't super satisfied with the original butterfly photo.

  

First photo is the butterfly photo from my Hort Park post, second photo is the same but darker and a closer crop. What do you think? I like how the branch with the buds shows up more in the darker photo, the other might be a bit too light but now the darker might be a bit too dark. I love editing photos though and I could seriously play with this photo for a long time.

 

 The Pixlr glamour glow filter.

Black and White. Gorgeous.

Happy Friday!!!

A Quick Trip to Little India

This week seemed to fly by. When Thursday came around and I still didn't have anything for Photo Friday I knew a quick trip to Little India would do the trick. 

Inside Tekka Market. I really didn't mean to take this photo and keep it. I was just checking my camera settings and when I got home I realized it was actually pretty good. Funny how sometimes that works out.

Vegetable stand and mini mart. Very colorful. Every time I go to Little India I am starving, even if I just ate a huge meal. 

Eggplant, daikon radish and gourds. Sometimes I just want to buy them all because they are so pretty.

Her sari is pretty!

Cat napping in a cool shady alley. 

Dried chilies and anchovies.

Another beautiful sari. Love the green.

Happy Friday!!!

Fountain of Wealth

Suntec City is a five building complex of offices and retail all connected at basement level where there are tons of dining options with a view of the giant Fountain of Wealth in the center. I decided to go one evening for photos. Enjoy!

View of the Fountain of Wealth from the third floor open air garden restaurant seating.

And at street level, a cute family checking out the fountain.

Another family at the fountain.

The water is changing, different jets at different times. No music but the lights change colors slowly. 

A different perspective. The dark tall buildings in the background are two of the five Suntec City buildings that surround the fountain. The five buildings represents the fingers and thumb of a left hand and the fountain is the palm. Water is the symbol of life and wealth in Chinese culture and water flowing inwards represents riches pouring in. 

You can see the basement level in the background under the light blue glass railing.

In 1998 it was in the Guinness Book of World Records as the largest fountain in the world. The circular ring has a circumference of 66 meters and it is 13.8 meters high. The base area is 1,683 square meters and it is made of silicon bronze.

Not sure what I was thinking, fountains are not the most exciting to photograph. I tried to get different viewpoints to make it more interesting.

They used to have laser shows with live music here and laser message dedications but I would guess that was before Marina Bay opened. No laser show tonight.

No coins get tossed into the fountain. Wonder if people do that in Asia? Do people still do that in the US? Anywhere? 

It was difficult to get a good shot of the buildings and the fountain. I tried to get as low to the ground as I could but still shoot over the glass railing surrounding the fountain. It didn't turn out so well but I worked hard at it so I wanted to include this photo. I took all of these night photos handheld without a tripod in P mode with 800 ISO. Seemed to work well.

Decided to go back during the day and try to get the Suntec City buildings in the background. The first two to three floors and the basement levels are all shopping and dining. 

It's always a hot day and this day was no exception. No one anywhere in the photo except for in the one shady spot.

Playing with the shutter speed mode, slowing it down to blur the taxi and the water.

Thank you Starbucks for the balcony with a great view of the fountain. 

Happy Friday!!!