Singapore Skyline At Dawn

I am never quite a early morning person, but my friend Jed who came over to visit wanted to do a nice skyline shot after I showed him what I got earlier this year. From past experience, the best time to get a good skyline shot with near-perfect reflections is in the early morning. Besides, it’s the monsoon season again, and it’s been raining in the late afternoons for the past few days, ruining the chances of a good evening shot. So Jed, Boon Hwee and myself decided to head over to the outdoor theatre at the Esplanade to get shots of the Singapore Skyline last Saturday morning.

I took my first shot at 6:13am. The water is reasonably still on this day, giving the nice reflections that we were after.

Soon came first light and dawn starts to break. From this moment on, the light is changing very rapidly. Not wanting to miss the action over at the Marina Bay Sands Integrated Resort, I setup my second camera, a Panasonic LX3 on a Joby Gorillapod Original clamped to the cable supporting the roof of the outdoor theatre, as I had done on previous shoots. The last time I shot it, it’s still partially under construction but today, it’s finally completed.

Just for kicks and to see how well the much touted iPhone 4S would perform as a camera, I took a handheld shot of the same scene on it. I gotta say I am pretty impressed.

Yes, the Panasonic had richer colours, but I think overall it performed darn well. Part of the loss of colours might be due to the iPhone doing auto white balancing, which tends to flatten subtle colours slightly.

As the sun begins to rise, we started to notice pink streaks of clouds appearing in the sky. The scene before us is a sight to behold. Plus, despite the fact that the Merlion has begun to sprout water now, the water surface has remained very still. I guess the effects of the Merlion’s water will take a while to get to this side of the bay.

This is my best shot of the Singapore Skyline to date. Waking up in the morning and making the trip down has been worth it.