May | 2014 | Life in the Wee Hours

Last Saturday, we attended a photography workshop by Bob Lee and Canon and he shared some tricks to capturing great photos of kids. It was a humourous session filled with beautiful, heartwarming pictures of his family and it made me want to take better photos of my kids.

sharing by Bob Lee

These are some points Bob covered:

A – Angle
B – Bokeh
C – Continuous mode
D – Distance/ Detail
E – Exposure

It really set me thinking about the type of photos I usually take and how I can try to improve them. He mentioned something about how the photo should make people want to know more about it. I think my photos tend to be quite straightforward, predictable and matter-of-fact, nothing much to know more about!

After his sharing, I tried to take some photos of the kids. Adam was making a mosaic picture and Anya was baking. I think I still need lots of practise to break out of my usual photo-taking habits. Thank you, Canon for organising the session!

Adam

working on his mosaic craft

making and decorating cupcakes

having fun

trying to capture her expression of concentration

a shot from the fondant’s point of view

We headed upstairs to the second floor for more fun. I love the whimsical ‘Rouleaux’ by Anastassia Elias. Inspired by the theme of ‘What I Want to be When I Grow Up’, the artist created miniature dioramas in toilet rolls using just manicure scissors and tweezers. Really amazing!

Kids can attempt to make one on their own by colouring, cutting and sticking a template. It’s a great activity but I had to ask the facilitators to sharpen the colour pencils because they were all blunt or the lead had broken off. I also think it would be good to have stepping stools for kids to look at the ones that are higher up. I took photos of the ones out of Anya’s reach and showed them to her on my camera.

Rouleaux by Anastassia Elias

what’s inside?

amazing little dioramas in toilet rolls

making her own

‘Word Out’ by NUS Division of Industrial Design is a fun game where you literally have to spell out a word with body language. I wish I had something like this at home so I can get the kids to learn spelling AND exercise at the same time!

Word Out

spelling out a word

Our favourite section was ‘Sculpture Scribble’ by Spanish group Guixot de 8. Using materials from a recycling and composting site, they recreate works by famous 20th century artists into interactive installations that encourage play. We spent quite a bit of time here trying to achieve the objective of each sculpture. Maybe I would have been better at Physics in school if we had these sculptures to bring the various laws of Physics to life.