Surreal Nilai 3

Photographed this Afghan carpet dealer walking behind a giant banner stuck to a wall in Nilai 3. It is a bizarre, surreal town in the middle of nowhere, and a shutterbug’s dream place. You kind of half expect a tumbleweed to roll into view any time. There are more carpet and plastic flower shops in tiny Nilai 3, than anywhere in the world.

Originally, I composed this shot as a 16:9 wide image on the Olympus OM-D. The man was framed in the center. Didn’t expect it to work cropped down to a square format for Instagram. Hey! What do I know? It does. The text kind of retained its meaning too. So you never know until you try. Corner vignetting (filter) works in Instagram because it creates the illusion that the film or camera sensor was square to begin with. For foreign viewers, the words mean “Our promotion, Crazy, He (Who Is Fast) Profits!

Surreal Nilai 3

Moon Landing

Houston, we have a problem. There may not be enough space to walk on the moon. I was driving near the Sri Gombak Mosque yesterday when I spotted a bird on the crescent above the dome. By the time I parked and walked around for an ideal angle, there were no more birds. So I waited for about 30 minutes and 5 of them flew in. A little patience is usually required for a moon landing shot 🙂

Mission Control: First I desaturated the picture (made it black and white). Then I inverted the colours to turn it into a negative image. This made the white sky became black. I then added a yellow hue. Finally, a lens flare was added to simulate the sun, as seen in space.

Moon Landing

St Anne’s Feast

Solemn worshippers stream into church during the annual St Anne’s Feast in Bukit Mertajam. I set the camera’s shutter speed to 3 seconds, clicked and zoomed quickly during the brief exposure. This created an unusual and fascinating picture of the devotees walking with candles towards the altar. The Church of St. Anne started life as a little chapel in 1846. Hundreds of thousands of Catholics and tourists congregate at the festival site near Penang each year.

St Anne's Feast