High School Visual Arts PTA Sponsored Academic Visitors in Residence Program 2018/19

Throughout the school year Singapore American School had the pleasure to host a number of visiting artists within the high school visual art suite. Over one hundred students from digital photography, advanced digital photography, photography service club, and the islander yearbook had the special opportunity to learn from these professionals to gain authentic photography experiences.

SGPassionate Images instructors Lawrence Ang and Larry Haydn provided the high school service photo club, islander yearbook students, the digital and advanced digital photography classes workshops in sports photography, macro photography, and special lighting effects throughout the first and second semester of the school year. 

Lawrence Ang supporting a student during one of the macro workshops
Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Larry Haydn providing lighting support to a student
Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Macro photography workshop

Here are a few excerpts from student blog posts from the conclusion of the workshops:

Alexus Buechel

This Image was of a red scrubby brush. I love how cool the bristles look up close.

This image was of a sponge up really close. I thought that the color and sponge texture was really fun.

What aspect of taking Macro shots did you find to be the most challenging or difficult?

For me, the most challenging aspect of taking macro shots was getting the photo to focus. I had a really hard time getting the objects into the place where they were clear in the image. It took a lot of time and so many shots to get pictures that weren't completely blurred out. This problem started to go away as I became more acquainted with using the new lens. The more photos I took the better the clarity got. Yay!

What aspect of taking Macro shots did you find to be the most enjoyable or fulfilling?

The most enjoyable aspect was seeing the different textures and small bits of color in the things I took pictures of that you can't really see with the naked eye. The sponge, for example, had awesome bits of color on the surface, and the surface of the sponge looked totally different and cool up close.

Archit Srivastava

What aspect of taking Macro shots did you find to be the most enjoyable or fulfilling?

On the second day of this workshop, we got to use large macro lenses. In using these lenses we were getting a picture that shows more texture in the image; it also helps focus on the subject by blurring the background - kind of like having a larger aperture (like f4) but instead, you put the aperture on a setting like f12 and let the lens do the work. I also worked on lighting and trying out different angles of light.

Peer feedback from Keya Agrawal:

I think you did a really good job capturing photos bigger than life size for macro photography. I love the third photo of day 2 because of how it fills the frame completely. I also really liked how sharp and clear your images were, and that you had no camera shake. I also think you did a good job eliminating possible faults when it comes to taking macro photos. One suggestion I have is to try the stacking technique for photos like the last two ones for day 2. With this, you can ensure that everything is in focus and that you have greater detail. Overall, I think you did a really good job capturing macro photography as a whole and I love your photos!

Special lighting effects workshop

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Here are a few excerpts from student blog posts from the conclusion of the workshops:

Ashwin Gopalan

"In this picture, I used the glass ball to distort the building in the background, and I think it added a really interesting and unique element to the otherwise simple image. The fish eye effect makes the image seem almost 'trippy' and abstract for the viewer, as when the look at the orb, the building seems to be bulging out towards them, yet when they look at the background, it's simply a normal building. I like how although the ball distorts the subject, it still maintains the symmetry of the building within its distorted image. If there's one thing I would change, however, it would be the presence of my hand as I think it takes up a little too much of the image."

Benjamin Carrillo

"This photo is by far one of my favorites, I managed to get a great quality photo by slowing down the shutter while using the flash to get a clear image with motion blur. It is very interesting with the lights creating a unique squiggle and the blur coming from the movement of him. All these blurs and he is still crisp and clear."

Jay Sain

"The image is from the first day of the workshop and implements shadows from a point light. The lighting remains constant using the hard lighting to produce such shadows, however it is the approach to the image that adds complexity. I felt that the image was actually complex to begin with; the framing of the photo incorporated the rule of thirds which brought the shape of the figure and hard shadows to life. Despite this, I still believed that color was crucial and another level of variation would help better the photo as the color was uniform throughout. So I decided to add an RGB split (or rather red and cyan split) on a black and white layer in Photoshop. This not only introduced new colors but also added a sense of abstraction, which brought out the shadows of the image."

Studio portrait lighting workshop

Leonard Goh of Srishti Digilife and commercial photographer, Alex Ow, provided the digital photography students a three day studio portrait lighting workshop during the first semester. Leonard and Alex supported the students in providing technical support in studio lighting equipment and tips in working with subjects on a photoshoot.

Leonard Goh providing a demonstration using editing and studio lighting techniques in portrait photography.
Image courtesy of Zul Monsor 

Alex Ow explaining various studio lighting situations in a studio portrait shoot
Image courtesy of Zul Monsor 

Hands on practice in a studio portrait shoot

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Image courtesy of Zul Monsor

Here are a few excerpts from student blog posts from the conclusion of the workshops:

Shreyas Shukla

There's darkness hidden in everyone, but also light.

"I really liked how this picture turned out because I was experimenting with the lights not knowing it would produce good quality photos. I specifically liked this picture because of the light highlights one side and my friend Grey said: "It looks like I'm in a Nike ad". And adding the black and white filter made the picture have a deeper meaning. I didn't do much editing because I like the picture of how it was. However, I did increase the brightness so the left side would be more clear but that's it."

Nyah Tewani

"While there were a lot of challenges in this project, I also believe that there were a lot of successes. Moving onto the studio portraits, I would have to say that my biggest success was my friends allowing me to put glitter all over their faces (seriously). I think that I achieved the exact effect I wanted to the tee. The glitter added a whole new element to the portrait which I was extremely happy about. I also loved the way that I placed the light, that allowed me to capture the right side of their faces being dark and the more glittery side being illuminated. I am extremely proud of these photos. Within the editing process for these photos, the most major edit I really had to do was darken the background. The fabric created creases, which I was able to take out and that really helped with the overall effect of the photo."

Macro Image Workshop

Macro image Workshop 

Final 6 images over the workshop with Mr. Haydn:

I went out to the bicycle stands to capture this image of the gears on one bike.
It was a challenge to keep my hand steady to get this shot.

This is a picture of a sponge captured in the classroom.
It looks so abstract and detailed up close.

This is a paint brush taken in the classroom.
I used a similar paper color to lay the brush on to bring out the highlights of white in the object.

This is a small ornament that I was able to fill the frame with in the classroom. 

Another small key captured in the classroom that the blue paper was the final choice.
The focal area was placed on the middle of the key.

This is a detailed image of a flower in the science block. I really like the details captured of the little bugs.

What aspect of taking Macro shots did you find to be the most challenging or difficult? Explain why.
I found getting the right point in focus the most challenging since everything was so small and closeby and we were also on manual focus (which I was not used to). In the end, a lot of trial and error and precise camera movements did get me the right focus point in one of the ten or so images I would shoot from a single angle. However, I don't think it is a difficult skill to master--I just didn't have enough practice, so I got a lot better at finding the right focus point over the course of the workshop.

Also, using the Helicon Focus software for stacking was very tedious and took me a while to figure out...but I eventually did find the perfect setting by trial and error.

What aspect of taking Macro shots did you find to be the most enjoyable or fulfilling? Explain why.
By far, the most enjoyable/fulfilling part of this project was to be able to finally stack photos taken at different focus points, Firstly, it was extremely difficult and tedious to take around 30-40 photos at one angle at by slightly changing the focus point every time. Next, the Mac Photoshop would always seem to lag/crash whenever I tried to stack photos, so I was really bummed that it didn't work out. However, I actually used this software called Helicon Focus on my own computer which was able to stack the images--this also took a while as I had to experiment with a bunch of settings, do a lot waiting, and install a couple drivers to get the perfect stacked image. Even then, my images weren't very good for stacking, but I thought it was a great first attempt and that I will only get better. I quite liked them.

I also honestly found one of the most enjoyable/fulfilling part of the project to actually just look at the photos themselves. Usually, when I take photos close-up all the details are blurred out and it's not very nice, but I love how these Macro lenses allow me to see the smallest details from such a close distance. It gave me a nice change of lens and a different way to look at taking photos and photography.

Feedback:

Feedback from Saachi: I really the composition of each image. For example the first day of the close up workshop, the angle of the gears are really interesting. I love how you can see the different layers of the gears from big to small. I think something that you could think about is maybe the sharpness of the image or reducing the ISO. For example the first picture of the macro photography, the background is a little noisy but it's not necessary.

Feedback from Lydia: The one photo of macro photography I like the most is the sponge, you really went deep into the sponge and captured the individual lines that make up the sponge, as well as some colours that got stuck, it provided some really good contrast and spiced up the image a bit. Something you can maybe work on is putting the subject a little closer to the camera, such as the picture of the paintbrush, I feel like you could be able to capture the essence of the bristles more, even if it loses focus on some parts, I think it will still look really cool. Overall, I love your use of angles in your photos and even without editing, your colours are pretty outstanding.


Feedback from Pronoy : I like the aesthetic of all of your images but my favourite photo of all is the honeycomb. It truly shows the essence of macro photography because you made the honey comb seem almost life like. I liked the details in this image and also the colours in the photo which made it pop. Overall, I feel that all of your images are outstanding.


Feedback Reflection: I agree with a lot of the constructive criticism that I got through my feedback process. I think that something I need to work on on a large scale is making my images less noisy and more sharp. I think that the reason that this was the case in this project was that I did not get the chance to try and edit out the images through photoshop, so they are all still RAW files. I also think that Lydia was right in saying that I could have gotten a little bit closer to my subject. I was scared to get way too close to my subject because I wanted to get as much of it in focus as I could, but I think that if I would have gotten a little bit closer, it would have been both sharper and provided a lot more detail. I think Pronoy was right in saying that my photo of the sponge was the one that was taken the best. It was taken from such a short distance that it does not even look like a sponge and resembles honeycomb.


Final Reflection: Over the past couple of days we have been working with Larry to learn about close up and macro photography. On the first day, I struggled with catching close up photos because I wanted to go much closer than my lens allowed me. My strengths usually lie in nature photography but I only managed to take a nice photo of something mechanical. One the second day we worked with macro photography. Compared to close up, I definitely think that I did I lot better. I do, however, need to work on shooting without grain. I think that this problem could have been fixed if I edited the photos, however the photos above are all unedited. I particularly enjoyed the third day of the workshop where we worked with stacking photos to make one very clear photo. I took the risk of shooting outside in nature which I knew was going to be difficult because the plant would move. That being said, I am very happy with the way the image turned out after putting it through Helicon focus. I was originally going to attach other stacked image, but when I rendered it, it came out more blurry than I would have liked and therefore not included it into the presentation.