Night Photography Outing with Troy Paiva & friends

75 Loewen

© 2010 Martin Liew Photography

OK here I am, writing this blog about the night photography outing with Troy Paiva and friends. How do I begin? It was the most amazing, exciting and fun night outing I ever had. An unforgettable experience doing nocturnes with Troy!

Make the jump for the night adventure.

A Great Surprise!

October 11 2010, Monday was the greatest and exciting day for me. I went to work as usual , pretty refreshing after recovering from a cold. I checked my mail box and to my great surprise, I received an email from one of my favorite and greatest night photographers.

Make the jump to find out who is the night photographer.

A Walk in the Garden

© 2010 Martin Liew Photography.

I took a walk in Toa Payoh Garden this evening. It's been a long time since my last visit. I arrived at about 7:00 PM and the lamps were just lit on. I've passed by this Garden many times from work all the way to the Bus Interchange but didn't make effort to walk over.

Walk with me, if you will.

'Art of Dark Craft' - A Night Photography Talk Session @ SAM

Photographs © 2010 Martin Liew Photography

This month Singapore Art Museum presents Digital Nights @ SAM as part of the first edition of Digital Nights 2010, a grand showcase of visual and digital arts. Starting from 17th September to 26th September.

Good news is, I'll be giving a talk under their titled event,  'Art of Dark Craft', where I'll be sharing my photography work and experience, and perhaps some night photography tips & techniques. The talk will be held at the Chapel @ SAM on 24th September 2010, Friday night from 7:00PM to 9:00PM. It's a free event and open to public. If you are keen to learn night photography, do come down with your camera and tripod. Hope to see you guys there.

For more details on Digital Nights 2010, please click here.

Laser Pointer, a Light-painting Tool Part 2

Last week I got myself a new light-painting tool. I bought a green laser pointer for S$52 as a set in which it comes with a free AAA size battery and a diopter lens adaptor. The diopter lens adaptor is this smudgy opaque lens that distorts the laser beam and creates some wonderful effects when fix onto the laser pointer beam head. Jump right in to see some of the results.

"Scott, beam me in!"

Location Recce: Nissen huts

Last week I went for a location recce of these abandoned Nissen huts in the northern area. To my great disappointment, the whole vicinity is locked up and no entrance or whatsoever is possible.

Read more on the Nissen hut story.

A Night at the Railway Station

A couple of weeks ago, I went to KTM Railway Station a.k.a. Tanjong Pagar Railway Station. As news broke out about the closing down of the station and will be shifted to Woodlands, I paid a visit at the station for the first time in my time. I was there one Sunday morning, and got to make some photographs and at the same time, thinking about the possibilities of doing night photography there. You can view the day time photographs in monochrome here.

Make the jump to find out more on what I did for night photography.

Machine Gun Post @ Labrador Part 2

Tonight I want to show you some interesting nocturne fotos taken by my long-time friend, Randall. We have known each other for 13 years now. Randall works in the airline industry and he used to do film photography for leisure and fun. Therefore he has the basic knowledge of composition and exposure.

Recently he picked up photography again as digital photography has made it so much more convenient and more fun. He got himself a Canon 500D and a couples of lenses. As he is all juiced up with energy and enthusiasm, I got him to join me for an organized photography outing, organized by a friend of mine. From there we did some landscape and seascape photography. It's no surprise that Randall picks up quickly and learn fast.

Read on to find out more about the fotos Randall has made.

Machine Gun Post @ Labrador Part 1

I can't say how much relief and joy I had on 27 March 2010, Saturday night that I was able to find time for my nocturne photography and to make some good nocturne fotos. At the same time it was a great pleasure to have a long-time friend to join me for the night outing.

I've always wanted to do nocturnes in Labrador Park. It wasn't my first time there. In the previous week, I did a location recce and I found this machine gun post, which is one of the WWII relics in the park, as my main subject. Its concrete structure design is unique with worn-off textures. I would not talk about the history of this machine gun post here as I dun wanna bore you.

So read on to find out how I made the photographs as I explain and share the techniques used.

Clubmoss Trees Nocturne in 360 panorama

Here it is. This is the third nocturne 360-pano on Clubmoss trees that Wee and I made on last Saturday night. Just click on the image title to view the VR format.

Clubmoss Trees Nocturne in 360 panorama

What are Clubmoss trees? Make the jump to find out.

Trees of Stone Nocturne in 360 panorama

Here's another excellent panorama work by Wee aka etegration. Click on the image title to view the VR format.

Trees of Stone nocturne in 360 panorama

What are Trees of Stone? Make the jump to find out.

Evolution Garden Nocturne in 360 panorama

Last night, I met up with Wee aka etegration, for another round of 360 panorama nocturne. We got to Singapore Botanic Garden's Evolution Garden. A nice quiet and dark place that's ideal for light-painting. Here's one of the 360-pano we did. Click on the image title to view the VR format.

Evolution Garden Nocturne in 360 panorama

In the 360-pano virtual reality view, you will see these colorful circular mushroom-like stones. These are called Stromatolites.

What are Stromatolites? Make the jump to find out more.

Fort Gate Nocturne in 360 panorama

On 22 November 2009, I received an email from a fellow photographer, who is best known for his 360 panorama photography work. He is known as Wee aka etegration. A cheerful and chatty young guy who's passionate about what he does best. His reputation in making 360 panorama images has preceded him in my case, in the last 2 years.

In his email, he expressed an interest to collaborate with me in doing nocturnes 360 panorama. I was intrigued at his idea and thought I should give it a try...

Laser Pointer, a Light-painting Tool

My laser pointer. © 2009 Martin Liew Photography.

I want to talk about one of the tools used in my nocturne photography i.e. laser pointer. It's a small lighting gadget and yet so useful. I came to discover its usage a few years back when I was doing nocturnes at a local botanic garden, in which they have a small park named Evolution Park. It's a man-made garden in the age of Jurassic with some man-made "dinosaurs" foot prints. As it's not as gigantic as the real monster size, I was thinking hard on how to bring out the shape of the foot-prints in color. That was when the laser pointer idea came to mind. I know it's not something new especially in light-painting and night photography, but it certainly helps me in my creative work which I'll show you shortly.

Laser pointers are battery-powered laser diode and are often used in educational and business presentations where pointing out details by hand is inconvenient. It comes in varies colors - red/red-orange, blue, green, yellow, violet.

As far as I know, we only can get red/red-orange and green colored ones in the local retail stores. Nonetheless, we can still order on the internet, but the prices are steep based on the power level, measured in milliwatts, mW. The power output can be as low as 1 mW and as high as a 125 mW. It would be a thrill to own a set of varied colored laser pointers. It serves like a small paint brush to do light-painting on more precise and specific area. Take one good example from the photograph I made, shown below.

Waiting Chair
© 2009 Martin Liew Photography

In this nocturne photograph, I applied the usual simple light-painting techniques. The room interior on the right side was lit up by a flashlight with a yellow colored cellophane paper. Next I used my LED torch light to light-paint the wall. As I set my digital camera White Balance to Tungsten, LED light induces a blue color cast which is not as vibrant as a true blue colored gel. Yes LED torch light is also another useful light-painting tool.

Lastly I used my laser pointer for the window panel. The great difficulty of using a laser pointer is the tremendously flicking shaking light due to our own natural hand shake, not to mention controling of the light beam direction. Not even people with steady hand power are able to hold still or light-paint in straight line. The greater the subject distance, the more difficult to light-paint as the area is getting smaller. Well, in this case the window panel is in straight symetrical lines, vertically and horizontally. The surface area is slim and narrower which poses great challenge. I did practice a few rounds before I press the shutter release. It takes practice to do a proper light-painting job using this small tool.

Here's another nocturne example I made using my laser pointer on the leaning door.

Red Leaning Door
© 2009 Martin Liew Photography.

I opened up the diopter on my laser pointer to have a wider light beam in rectangular shape, so I can light-paint on such bigger objects with large surface area. The subject distance is closer and controlling is a lot easier. But still, the light spilled and touched onto the wall.

So if you do many light-paintings, you can consider using a laser pointer for additional effects. I do find it very useful and certainly helps me in my creative process of nocturne photography. Thought you might be interested to know and try them out yourself.

NOCTURNES: The Art of Surrealistic Landscape Part 3

Excavator
© 2009 Martin Liew Photography

In my last weekend night photography outing, a new friend joined us for the first time in making some interesting night pictures. I took them back to the same old location I did for the past few weekends.

A minor and yet interesting incident happened. We were greeted by some young night dwellers who claimed they are also doing night photography in the same premises we were at. We found out later through a conversation with one of them that they came in 3 separate groups, going different directions in that location area. We saw many flashlight pops. Some of them do not look like photography hobbyists nor enthusiasts. We didn't talk much either but just to make known of our own presence.

Anyway it was yet another fruitful night outing with new nocturne pictures made and to share. I didn't make many pictures that night but able to get 3 pictures that I like very much. Excavator is one of them. It was made towards the dawn hour and we were trying to make different angle shots before day breaks.

I've noticed there are some restoration and construction progress in that location area, as the abandoned buildings are converted into offices. So the work has speed up a little. I feel like going back on the next full moon night but not sure what will happened then. Just gotta do it.

If you want to stay tuned to my latest night photography progress here, do subscribe to my blog via email or RSS. Liekwise you can visit my website to view all the nocturnes I had made. Thank you.

NOCTURNES : The Art of Surrealistic Landscape Part 2

Quiet Corridor
© 2009 Martin Liew Photography

Quiet Corridor is one of the new set of nocturnes I made last week. On my previous night trips, I have covered 2 abandoned buildings in one of the areas and as the daylight started to break, I wasn't able to make any more photographs in this other abandoned building, just right opposite. I was so sure that there are many good opportunities for good nocturnes to be made.

I was right. And with the help of my friend who tagged along with me on that night, we discussed about the mixture of colored gels and which lighting method to use. For this nocturne photograph, both lighting techniques are applied. Let me explain how this photograph was made.

The first light-painting with a 1-million candle light power searchlight, covered with a lavender colored gel, was applied on each pillar on the right side, which also spill some light over onto the left-side wall. This helps to eliminate the dark shadow area, revealing more details and textures.

Next, I walked over to the left side of the staircase and using a green colored gel on my flashlight, I popped twice onto the stairs. Thereafter, I walked all the way to the end of the corridor and keep myself out of sight from the camera. With my searchlight, I switched it on and shone yellow light onto the ceiliing for about 10 seconds. That's it! Total exposure timing is 172seconds.

I really love these 3 colors as they match so well together. Basic color matches play an important part in nocturne photography and just like art paintings, it's the photographer who (as the painter) decides what color to match and to use colors to convey emotional message or express certain feeling, in their work.

To view more of my nocturnes, a new set of nocturne photographs are uploaded in my website.

The Beauty of Night Sounds

Last night (23 May 2009), I stayed up for the whole night doing some really good nocturne photography in the north area, with a friend of mine. Not only was I making light-painting photographs, I was making some good black & white night photographs with my TLR camera as well.

As I have always love the night atmosphere with its tranquility, I too experienced the most beautiful sound of the night i.e. the cricket sound. The sound really adds up to the atmospheric mood in the quiet night especially when you are alone. There's this sense of peace, though I'm busy in the process of seeing, composing, thinking, planning for the light-painting. It's just so fabulous and mesmerizing, at least to me.

I got myself a digital voice recorder 3 months ago and have used it for recording seminar talks and to record essential detailed data information during all my night photography outings. Data information that includes location, camera settings, techniques I used, etc. So at that moment it occurred to me that I can use it to record the night sounds and the idea of putting up the recorded sounds in my night blog site just popped out. The sound would make my blog site more interesting and alive. Hopefully readers who visit my night blog site will be able to feel more present as they read and see my night photographs.

So here it is. I embedded one of the sounds I recorded on my blog site. If it distracts you, you can turn the player off which is located right at the bottom right section of my blog site.

NOCTURNES : The Art of Surrealistic Landscape

Abandoned House
© 2009 Martin Liew Photography

Finally, I've come up with the right title for my nocturne photography work, NOCTURNES: The Art of Surrealistic Landscape.

The photograph above was made on 9 May, Saturday night with a couple of friends. Each of us took a different vantage point and I did all the light paintings. Pity we couldn't stay longer, so I decided to go back on my own on the following Tuesday, 12 May right after work.

I found myself getting gutsier and bolder than ever, traveling all the way up to the north area after work to make some good nocturne photographs, all alone in this dark quiet place. I really had a good time exploring the location and certainly enjoyed the quiet night atmosphere. Well, I didn't stay long, say for about one and a half hours.

I made a point and effort to go back on the following Saturday and stayed there until dawn. It was fabulous doing nocturnes in that place. You can view more nocturne images directly at my website here.

Stay tuned for more night and nocturnes photographs here at my blog site, OR you can subscribe to my blog via email or RSS, by selecting yr choice in the column, First Time Here?.

Thank you for reading.

Frank Relle Nightscapes Photography

Recently I came across this night photographer's work on COLOR, a magazine on collection of fine photography. His name is Frank Relle.

Frank Relle (b. 1976) is a photographer born and based in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the recipient of numerous awards including a 2007 International Photography Award and the Photo Lucida Critical Mass top 50 photographers.His work is represented in major public and private collections, including the Smithsonian Museum of American History, the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston. His photographs have been printed in the New Yorker, the Southern Review and the Oxford American magazines.

Relle continues to document the changing architecture of New Orleans and is working to share his images with an international audience hoping to inspire people around the world to help rebuild the city of New Orleans with the integrity she deserves.

To see Frank Relle's photography work, visit his website here and to understand Frank's photography work, you can read his 60-second interview blog article here.

My Nocturnes Again

Well, here I am again. Back on to my night photography blog after a year of absence. I'm back again this time for another series of my nocturnes. Here are the 4 nocturnes I did on 2 separate nights. The first 3 shots were made last October and the last shot was made last night, all at the same location.

It was thrilling and full of excitement as I once again did it for this shot. And I thought to myself that I should go back and make some more nocturnes photographs. Well, I do have another location in mind that I want to explore, but based on my outing experience last night, my 2 camera batteries power just not enough to carry on making pictures for as long as 3 to 4 hours. I need to get 5 more spare batteries.

So if you have and want to sell off yr camera batteries, please do let me know. I'm using a Nikon D70s so it's the Li-on battery pack, EN-EL3a.

Some information on the photograph made:

This light-painting photograph was made with my Nikon D70s on Tamron 17-35mm f/2.8 lens, set at the smallest aperture @ f/22 on 'B' mode, for long exposure timing of about 3mins 30secs. Five colored filter gels are used - Blue, Yellow, Green, Lavender and Violet. WB is set to Incandescent (or Tungsten). Photograph is recorded on digital RAW.

The star burst effect on the extreme right frame is caused by the road side lamp, with which closing down to the smallest aperture will have this result. The 2 stripes of light trails are caused by the MRT trains coming and going from the MRT station nearby, on the top and passing by vehicles, on the bottom.

© 2009 Martin Liew Photography.
All nocturne photographs are solely under copyrights of Martin Liew.

My Nocturnes

It's been 5 months now since my last night photography outing at Pulau Ubin last November. A couple of weeks ago I realised I still got a roll of Kodak slide film right inside my FM10 since the last night outing with a couple of friends at the Singapore Btanic Garden. Dated back October 2007. Well obviously the film color should have been deteriorated but what the heck. Since I'm doing nocturnes, this isn't a major issue to me.

So I decided to do some good nocturnes again. What you see here are the latest photographs I made. Pleasant viewing.

Cacti
© 2007 Martin Liew Photography

Trees of Stone
© 2008 Martin Liew Photography

Trees of Stone
© 2008 Martin Liew Photography

The following 2 nocturne images are results of re-make. I re-made them because I did not get it right in the past attempts. With the right amount of light-painting control and of course, the camera setting, I got it what I wanted.

"Red Hot Volcanoes"
© 2007 Martin Liew Photography

"Purple Volcanoes"
© 2007 Martin Liew Photography

Nocturne Photography @ Pulau Ubin

I organized a night/nocturne photography outing last Saturday, 24 Nov 2007 in Pulau Ubin. It was a small group of 6, including myself. It was fun and every participant get to do the light-paintings. It was a full moon night and some of the images are illuminated by the moon light, which created such effect as if it was taken during dawn or dusk.

Here are my nocturne images. Pleasant viewing.

Mamam Beach

Rubber Trees

Floral Nocturne 生命之歌

Ubin Taxi

Ubin Taxi
© 2007 Martin Liew Photography

All photographs are made with Tamron 17-35mm lens on Nikon D70s. All photographs are made on the spot with strong power torchlights on 5 colored gels, except Floral Nocturne - light-painted with a LED torchlight.

Ethereal Days by Chris Conrad

In August 2007 issue of Black & White Photography magazine (UK), I read an article on Chris Conrad's portfolio, Ethereal Days, in which the magazine featured some of his most amazing and stunning night photographs taken on the area around Moab, USA.

Chris started a portfolio on the fleeting pools of water that exist in the redrock canyons after rainstorms, he began the Oases series.

"I was searching for a different take on the area around Moab, looking for a way to capture the fleeting ephermeral views that appear and pass so quickly. The Oases series then led me into the night photos, and the Ethereal Days series began."

The technical difficulties involved in night reflections are myriad, and Chris' technique requires him to find the subject and set up the camera early, anticipating the path of the moon and stars. Pre-exposing the scenes to build some shadow detail, he uses a combination of polarizer and red filters - also adding split neutral density filters - to hold density down in the sky portion of the negative during this first exposure. After darkness falls, he opens the shutter again to catch the stars and moon trails, often leaving it open for up to eight hours.

Chris' Equipment:

• A Techihara 5x4in is Chris' main camera, with his favorite lens being a Nikkor 75mm.
• A Rodenstock 135mm is his back-up lens, for those times when the Nikkor is too wide.
• A Pentax Digital spotmeter allows him to figure out the difficult exposures involved in night work.
• His film is Ilford FP4 Plus, abd occasionally HP5 Plus, for the extra speed.
• His developer of course is Kodal HC-110.
• Another camera often used is his Pentax 67II with 45mm lens, loaded with either Kodak TMAX or Ilford FP4 Plus.
• For pure digital work, he use Canon EOS 20D with 16-35mm lens.
• For printing, his paper of choice is Moab Entrada Ntural, using either a Septone or a QuadtoneRIP program. The paper is run through either an Epson 2300 or an Epson 7600 printer.

To view Chris Conrad's photographs, please click here.
Here's the 5-minutes video on "Ethereal Days".

Closing Ceremony of National Stadium

30 June 2007 Saturday was the day Singaporean witnessed the closing ceremony of our National Stadium. I was supposed to go back there for some re-make of photographs I did in early June. Well I guess it's too late for me now. That evening, I received a call from a friend, who happened to have an extra complmentary ticket to the closing ceremony event. It was a last-minute call but I gladly accepted the offer.

I arrived late at around 8:45pm at the West Entrance area. Traffic was kinda heavy in that area and there were many poeple around. Most came for the friendly soccer match between Singapore and Australia soccer team. it was half-time break. During this time, I took a few pictures. Honestly all are boring photographs and i didn't bother to use my flashlight. Eventually my pictures turned out with big bokeh and camera-shaky effects, like this one below.

Frankly speaking, never before did I go for our country's national day celebration at the National Stadium. It was my very first time attending to the event at the stadium. As the soccer match getting more higher climax, soccer fans or supporters shouted and screamed and cheered for their home team. Of course there was the Kallang Wave.

After the match, there was a short stadium history and our past soccer glory stories, hosted by Brian Richmond and Glenn Ong. Yes it was telecasted live on Channel 5. Next the short fireworks display which wasn't nice at all, visually.

The party starts, with our native rock band, Kruger, took on the stage. The band kick-started with the first song, Vertigo (original song by U2) with John Molina as the lead vocalist. I wanted to take the band pictures but I was told that I have to pay $10 to enter the soccer field area where the party was held. I decided not to and bid farewell to my friend. As I walked out of the stadium by the west entrance I purposely walked along the perimeter of the stadium towards the east entrance area. Many people were leaving too. I was mingling around just to look out for any photographic opportunities.

There were ice-cream men selling ice-cream and drinks. So I took a couple of shots and though this isn't the best shot, it's merely a snapshot (above) which I think has this strong sense/sight of activities outside the stadium. Thereafter I left for home.

Night @ The National Stadium

Talking about making pictures of our National Stadium, it all started with news of the stadium demolition for a brand new design. The stadium will be officially closed own on 30 June 2007, Saturday. A closing ceremony will be held there to mark this historical event.

News broke out since last September. I went there with a fellow night photographer, Selina. We did make a few pictures but we didn't stay long. It was like our first trial and when I got back my negatives, they turn out great. I told myself I have to go back there to make many more photos of the stadium. And I did. But today I'm not able to upload those photos here as I didn't get them scanned. I will and upload them as soon as it's ready.

It was after about 6 months later, I went back with 2 other photographers who are keen in night photography. (I'll try to feature their work here soon.) I took a roll of Fuiji color negative film, Superia 400 on a Nikon FM10. Yes I did mention before that taking night pictures with color negatives isn't as good as taking it with slide film, be it in 135 or 120 format. But I was willingly to try it out, even without filter lens. Anyway I have in mind of converting all color pictures into black & white. 

So here they are.

Bridge to Stadium

Ticket Booth

Stairs to West Entrance

The West Entrance