The Social Kitchen at Orchard YMCA

Today I am posting a few shots salvaged from a friendly “reportage” we did with a group of friends last week for The Social Kitchen at Orchard YMCA, in Singapore.

The Social Kitchen, is the Cafe located on 4th floor of the YMCA. It is a social enterprise that provides employment to disadvantaged individuals. The intention was to give them a few pictures to put on their website.

I must say I did not perform very well, and I am bit ashamed of it. I pleased myself in my choice of gear, but the result is not really usable by our friends at Social Kitchen. Luckily some more conscientious photogs were there.

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I brought the Leica M6 with Summilux 50 v2 loaded with Ilford Delta 400. Above are the shots processed in Caffenol, my eights roll and the worst so far I must say. Very nice opportunity to shoot in a kitchen, but also quite difficult as the place is small and was packed with 3 staff and 4 photogs.

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I also carried the Hasselblad 500CM loaded with Cinestill 500. There are only 3 “good” shots on 12, I don’t use the blad so often these days, so I mixed up mix and max aperture, and the first 6 shots were blank. The Cinestill roll was shot at ISO640 as usual, and all shots were done at 1/60 F2.8.

It’s nice to have fun, delivering good and usable pictures is another matter.

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Kodak Ultramax 400 – Oh no I did it again (Took the M4 and VC 21 on the road again)

SMU

We are entering the rainy season in Singapore now, and film rolls are not easy to finish. So the roll of Kodak Ultramax 400 I loaded in the Leica M4 took a little time to finish. Particularly with a F4 lens and less light, not all opportunities are good,

At the crossroad

I very rarely shot the Ultramax before, it is a quite cheap film you can still buy in supermarkets in France. My friend Felix, gave me a roll last time I met him, and he get a quantity of them for the same reason.

Peninsula shopping center

The Leica M4 has no meter so I used my new Sekonic handheld light meter. All in it is doing quite a good job.

Coleman street

The Ultramax end up being quite a different beast compare to the Portra 400. The grain is more accentuated, the colors get a bit more pink / green hue, the film I got from the lab was a bit more curly, but I am not sure it affected the scanning (with Epson v800).

Tiong Bahru

The 21mm gave good results again, thanks to the viewfinder again I think. The vertical shots of cross roads gave what I called “dynamic” in my last post; I think they would benefit in being shot a bit lower, like wait level…

The party is over

… but OK hand metering, range-finding (or pre-focusing or hyper focusing) and view finding are already a lot of actions for a single shot.

Bincho

A choir

With the 21mm the subject is often too far as above, unless you come really close to unsuspected subject …

Fun for everybody

… for everybody’s fun.

Carlsberg for free

Or willing models as above.

The Instax team

Or you meet the Fuji Instax team (I did not enter the discussion about Fuji vs Kodak with them).

Fancy fair

I also had the opportunity to take a few shots at night in a fancy fair and I must say the result is quite pleasant. A bit Saturated, but it looks the film reacted well to artificial light.

Fancy fair

Indonesian model

Interesting story here, aspirant photographer and aspiring make up artists from Indonesia using their friend as a model.

 

SMU : Looping the loop

A  few weeks after the first shot back  at the SMU (Singapore Management University).

The culprit! 

In case you directly jumped here: all shots on Kodak Ultramax 400 (not expired), with Voigtlander 21mm F4, VC viewfinder 21-25mm on Leica M4.

Design Week-end – Singapore

10 to 22nd of March was the Singapore Design Week, and during the week-ends were some Design trails, taking visitors through Design landmarks in the city-state.

We join the trail on the last Sunday,and had a first stop around our house at the Lloyds Inn, a recently renovated boutique hotel around the corner from where we live. The inside of the hotel is out-of-bounds but the garden and outside architecture is worth a look.

In a small portion of the garden is a kind or art installation, good opportunity for a close up with the Hassie.

The trail is quite well organized and a minibus was bringing visitors from one place to the next. This being sunday a couple of places were closed unfortunately. We head next to the Working Capitol on Keong Saik Road, near Chinatown. This is a very nice classic building converted into a shared working space for individual entrepreneurs and start-ups.

A bit more close up action on a showcased jewelry stand

Out final stop was up Pearl Hill, on what’ snow called number 195, but was called “the upper barracks” from the time it was housing the Sikh officers of the colonial police (I imagine the non officers were in the lower barracks). This is also a beautiful colonial era building, but which nowadays is more or less left to its own dereliction. Very close to the city center it would make a beautiful area for art display or as the Working Capitol for housing start-ups.

We met a very nice young couple doing calligraphy to the greatest joy of my son.
Al pictures taken with the trusty Hasselblad 500Cm and the 80mmF2.8. Some pictures (interior) with Kodak Tri-x 400, others with Ilford PAN 50.

 

References:
The Working Capitol
Design Singapore Council
Lloyd’s Inn

A Chinese Thanksgiving – Singapore

There was a Chinese Thanksgiving in front of Ngee Ann City on Orchard road in Singapore. That was a good occasion for the test roll of the The Leica IIIc which is back from the shop with a new curtain.

 

 

These are small sculptures on a boat, I am not too sure (how Singaporean) of the meaning.

 

Uncle watching the musians

 

Old people folding joss paper to be burned later in offering to the ancestors. I asked once about the significance of the folding and was told it is to make it easier to burn. But there may be another meaning.

 

Camera:Leica IIIc
Lens: Summitar 50mmF2
Film:Kodak trix 400ISO

The return of the Hi-Matic (2)

So the Minolta Hi-Matic 7s, is out of the box. I find out a suitable Duracell battery in my magic cupboard and a roll of TMax from the fridge and off we go. As I said elsewhere I am not a mass shouter, I picked up photography in the old days of film when we were taking one shot at a time because well it costs. I don’t care too much about the cost nowadays but still I kept the habit, so unless there is a special event it takes me a few weeks to shoot a full roll of film. This is something I like with the Hasselblad or 120 film cameras in general, 12 shots per film is pretty good for a week end if nothing special happens. Hey also remember that this is not digital so ISO is fixed; there’s just so much time in the day where you can use your camera. Back to the cost, 1 TMax = 8 SGD, processing 6.5 SGD, 4 bus rides to the shop 3 SGD = 17.5 SGD for a roll so 50 cents per shot; 4 shots per EURO.

We are the rrobots

A Robot in a toy store (N’gee Ann City, Orchard Road, Singapore), shot wide open (F1.8) probably 1/30s handheld

Shark Aid 2012

There is always something happening on Orchard Road, that day it was the Shark Aid 2012 campaign to save sharks from Shark Fin soup

Walter by Dwan Ng

This is WALTER: A Big Bunny by artist Dawn Ng, in front of SAM (Singapore Art Museum)

Low Kee Hong and Jeremiah Choy,

Singapore Arts festival 2012 presentation in Kinokuniya bookstore by Low Kee Hong and Jeremiah Choy, interesting and funny.

Shot wide open F1.8 at 1/30s handheld, a bit blurry… duh!

Ok that was funny, but I’m not  sure my practice of photography have made a big leap forward. I think I have to get rid of the leather case whose strap comes in the middle when framing vertically,  also the  shutter-release button is not that soft, you have to press it with some strength before it actually fire, causing some shake; very unlike my Leica M4.