The Hakka Cemetery

I wanted to visit this place for a very long time : a cemetery enclosed in a housing block is the west of Singapore city center.

Hakka, are a Chinese population originating from the eastern part of Hunan, you can read more on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hakka_people. They form about 8% of the Chinese population of Singapore.

The cemetery is home to about 3000 graves, below which urns of ashes are buried. Unlucky for me the place was closed when I reached there after a 40 minutes bus ride. I could still make a few shots, but there seems to be some very interesting views to catch so I will try to go back at a better time.

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  Tiong Bahru Qi Tian Gong Temple

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  The old station

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  Hock Teck See Temple

The Ying Fo Fui Kun cemetery as it is known, is part of a heritage trail that looks promising, I will dig into that in the near future. You can find further reading here https://lionraw.com/2014/03/18/the-hakka-cemetery/

Today’s pictures where taken on Ilford Pan F 50ISO film with the Hasselblad 500cm and 80mm F2.8. They were processed soon after in Caffenol using the batch I prepared last week, then scanned with the Epson v800. I had 3 shots left when leaving the cemetery, so I head back in town. I made a first stop at Tiong Bahru at QiTian Gong temple. It s the 100’s birthday of the temple this year and it has been renovated, but due to the Covid there are no celebrations this year. You can find pictures of past ceremonies there :

https://waex99photo.wordpress.com/2016/09/17/tiong-bahru-qi-tian-gong-temple/

or

https://waex99photo.wordpress.com/2016/09/17/tiong-bahru-qi-tian-gong-temple/

After this I head to the old railway station which is under work (no idea what is suppose to happen to it in the future) and finally to the small Hock Teck See Temple, a small Taoist temple surrounded by construction sites.

I hope you enjoyed the reading …

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Touring Singapore Chinatown with the 500CM

During the last outings of the Leica User Group Singapore (LUGS) of 2019, I had the good idea to carry the Hasselblad 500CM loaded with my favorite film: the Rollei Retro 80s

The new court of justice

Oil drum used to burn offerings

People’s Park Complex

A remains of the year of the horse

LUGS friend chimping

At the hawker center

Launderette

The Chess players

The Chess players

The Chess players

The Chess players

I love the range of grays and the profound black that this film can produce. This is not all art but a nice walk with friends at a time when this was possible. I put the full roll, no censorship and some edition in Lightroom. Film was was processed at the usual lab (Ruby Photo) and scanned at home of Epson v800.

 

Another roll of Cinestill 800

A couple years back I participate in the kick starter campaign for the launch o the CineStill 800 medium format film. I ended up (with a slight delay) with a nice T shirt ( (I spare you the picture for the time being) and a few rolls old the said film.

I have already shot a few rolls and I must think of going through the reminder before they expire. The Hassie also did not get much action this year so I loaded a roll when I went to the Leica User Group Singapore outing to the Red Hill market area.

Above is the best shot of the roll. This lady sing sings the market for the greatest pleasure of the people around. The film was rated at 640 ISO, the day was a bit overcast but most shots were done about F11 1/250.

This is the seventh month of the Chinese year and it is the time were the dead visit the world of the livings and displays of religious artifacts as above are common over Singapore, to please them and let them go back in peace.

We also took a tour of the Red Hill close estate, a public housing estate set for redevelopment.

I did not manage to shot the whole 12 frames in  the morning, so I went last week in Chinatown to finish the roll on the lantern festival. I shot the remaining frames at F4 1/60s.

The above is quite OK, the below is not. It is seems a bit difficult for me to measure the light for this kind of scene.

Shot with Hasselblad 500CM, Planar 80mmF2.8 lens, and a tripod fr the last two shots.

The film was scanned with Silverfast and Epson v800, with bit of white balance and contrast and exposure adjustment in Lightroom.

Carnaval de Nice – Nice – France

Carnaval de Nice

Last month I went to the “Carnaval de Nice” with the Hassie and the second roll of Rollei Digibase CR200.

Carnaval de Nice

Nice is just 30 km from my hometown of Cannes, but this is just the second time in my life (about 48 years) that I go there. I have an excuse because I have been away since 1985. I went with my son Noé who also made some nice pics with his Coolpix.

Carnaval de Nice

Not so easy to catch action with the Hasselblad, I was also not very well positioned so there is a bit of back-light. I still think this film is great; the colors are very realistic and it is quite relaxed regarding exposition.

Carnaval de Nice

Carnaval de Nice

Carnaval de Nice

 

Camera::Hasselblad 500CM, Planar 80mmF2.8
Film::Rollei Digibase CR200

Digital can wait

Yes, digital can wait! My 500 and so pictures from Indonesia taken with the D700 will have to hang around a temporary folder for a while : I collected 2 rolls of films from the shop Monday and I am amazed. How can these 24 shots, painfully taken over a couple of weeks which costs me nearly 1 EUR each please me so much? Well I don’t know really. Probably because of the pain and the cost. Nothing perfect here just 24 shots most of which I have no shame to show; pretty good hit ratio compare to the D world.

Paradox of the day: I had to use a bit of lightroom magic to make film looks nearly as good as digital!

Camera: Hasselblad 500CM, Planar 80mm F2.8
Film: Kodak Portra 400 NC
Scanning: EPSON V500, Lightroom 3, PSP Elements 4