Being a Photographer in Singapore
The first thing people ask when I tell them I’m trying to become a full time photographer is: “Why?” And it’s a fair question, after all I ask myself the very same thing all the time. Till this day I’ve struggled to put it succinctly in a way that properly conveys my love affair with photography and also my personal philosophy in life. Perhaps this blog entry is my attempt to do so.
Background:
So a little bit of context, my life path was relatively linear all through secondary school and up till the first year of junior college, I was a pretty easygoing, go-with-the-flow kinda guy and pretty much did what was expected of me at all times. It wasn’t until the later half of my first year of JC where I started contending with the reality of what I wanted to do in life. It was after a period of tough deliberation and reflection that I realised that traditional academia and its related industries would never truly satisfy me spiritually. I wanted something more, to pursue what fulfils me creatively and something that I could do for the rest of my life. This was an epiphany that was tinged with sadness as it meant giving up my love of the sciences and language to pursue an unconventional and less well-trodden path. The initial plan was to study design, I spent the next 3 years in a polytechnic learning everything about visual communications (including some photography too) and I actually rather enjoyed it. For the first time, I could envision working in a particular industry for the better part of my life. The work was enjoyable and I loved the way it engaged the more imaginative aspects of my brain. Being taught to channel my intrinsic creative energy towards a constructive objective guided by set principles was abundantly rewarding (and would pay dividends in the endeavours to come).
A much younger me in my old polytechnic classroom.
Getting hooked
Some time after graduating I was called up for National Service. A chance encounter and a snap decision to buy a second hand camera from a friend (a Canon 800D) was all it took for my obsession with photography to take hold. From the moment I bought it, I rarely put the camera down. I would often take long walks, making pictures of anything and everything that caught my eye, slowly developing the basics and laying the foundation for my future work. I also studied up on photographic theory, learning every technique, tip and trick I could to better my craft. It was only after encountering the work of other photographers like Sam Hurd, Garrett King and Liam Crawley, that my eyes were opened to what photography can be. More than just taking pictures, it is a very effective and versatile medium for artistic expression. It was similar to design in the way that it married technical knowledge, a structured principled methodology, and raw creative freedom. It was this very fact that gripped me the most and made me fall in love with the art of photography.
2 Truths, 1 Medium
Photography as a medium has the unique ability to balance two ostensibly opposing truths: The visual state of any object in a given scene (“objective truth”) and the photographer’s emotional and artistic interpretation of said scene (“subjective truth”). Us photographers understand this fact instinctively, often opting to edit our photos to convey what the scene felt like rather than what it looked like. We make calculated choices and employ photographic techniques in order to evoke certain feelings; all while attempting to meaningfully immortalise the scene in front of us.
All genres and disciplines of photography lie somewhere on a spectrum between these two great truths. For instance, photojournalism may lie closer to the “objective truth” end of the spectrum, with the aim of rendering the scene as accurately as possible (albeit with some creative liberties such as colour grading and composition). Meanwhile pre-wedding photos, creative portraiture, and fine art photography lie closer to the opposite end of the spectrum. Photographers in these disciplines are permitted (even encouraged) to employ a wide gamut of tools and techniques to construct more abstract, artistic imagery. To me, it almost borders on painting. Masters of this genre bend, twist, and control light whilst actively composing with intention to create what can only be described as works of art. Encountering this kind of photography was a revelation. It taught me to approach photography in an unorthodox manner and showed me what was truly possible with a camera. Till this day it remains one of the biggest reasons I picked photography as my medium of choice.
The Singapore of it all
I consider it quite a privilege to be a photographer in Singapore. I can only describe it as living in a dense conglomeration of sights, with areas of vastly contrasting aesthetics bleeding into one another. If you’ve ever walked a significant distance through the country you know what I mean. Within a 5km radius you could have lavish, ornate, expensive housing structures next to regular old public housing, next to a park, next to a business district. You’re pretty spoiled for choices when it comes to environments and backdrops for your photoshoots. But it’s also tough. Living in dense ol’ Singapore means that there are many photographers (very talented ones) that I have to compete with. It’s hard to find a unique voice and carve out your own slice of the pie. It’s probably the biggest struggle I’m faced with right now as I try to make this a full time endeavour, but perhaps that’s a story for another time…
