For this blog entry, we recollect one of the best days with a group of 12 volunteers joining us at Redhill. The participating volunteers were the staff of the Halogen Foundation, teamed together with students from CHIJ St Theresa’s Convent and Hwa Chong Institution. It was daunting, thinking how to coordinate 6 pairs of volunteers scattered in the neighbourhood, but we knew one thing for sure – that each of their participation will be unique with every resident they meet.

The volunteer experience at Singapore Snaps means a lot to us. We believe, for an individual who shares our vision and comes forward to work with us, every precious minute of their time counts. The best returns of volunteering will always be the learning and interaction in a social sphere where the public gathers to do good. Because of that, before we head out to the neighbourhoods to interact with the local residents, a warming-up briefing session with our volunteer team would be the key to a rewarding volunteer experience.

Each volunteer gets to introduce himself or herself in the quirkiest of ways – by recounting his or her first memory; the first thing you remember consciously. This is SG Snaps’ unique way in getting to know everyone better. This part of the session is always filled with comical moments that even the shyest volunteer would join the conversation and have a good laugh.

Simply because SG Snaps is one project which is interested in excavating memories, being acquainted with our volunteers means learning their memories too. First memories are significant to us, because it is intimate and it signifies the beginning of our consciousness as an individual. We also had the honour of some volunteers bringing their own photo albums to share with the group. Looking through old photographs is one definite way of knowing a person better.

Most certainly, the most important aspect of our briefing session is appreciating and handling the old photographs. We prepare our volunteers to receive the photographs in an array of formats – from the ones pasted into adhesive albums, to the ones inserted in sleeves or even piled up in loose sheets. SG Snaps team member and photographer Samantha Tio, shared with the student volunteers the technicalities of handling photographic prints. She also shared her views on why images created during the era of analog cameras are important and relevant to us even today.

The students started out with great energies, and with positive attitudes they had managed to encounter some amazing finds. During this particular door-to-door collection drive in Redhill, we found our first hand-coloured photographs. For many of the young participants, it was the first time seeing anything like that. Read more about studio portrait trends from the 1950s-80s in our previous post.

What was also remarkable about that photograph was the handwritten message on the back in Chinese characters in calligraphic style, dating and addressing the portrait to a beloved. The photograph was taken and developed in 1967, and was addressed to the sender’s aunt. We later noticed more photographs with such personal messages. It was a trend then, to give a copy of the photo with accompanying text to relatives and friends, just like a postcard.

One of our youngest volunteer, Edison recounts how he was so delighted when an elderly resident had invited his group into his house. He described the house to be filled with incredible antiques and the series of portraits that he had kindly contributed for the project seemed to be dated to the early 20th century.

Unfortunately not all the students managed to interest a resident to participate and contribute old photographs. Rejection is part of this learning process and it pushes us beyond of our comfort zones, humbling and motivating us continuously. We truly hope our volunteering students had learned beyond the textbooks, and benefited from their unconventional afternoon with Singapore Snaps.

Written by Samantha Tio

Edited by Tan Wei Keong

Photographs by Khee Shi Hui

To start, I was skype-chatting with a long-time friend, Daphne Ang, who was recently at the NUS Museum doing a research fellowship on portrait studios in Singapore from the late 19^th to early 20^th century. I had sadly missed the city tour that she had conducted here, but I was fortunate to chat with her remotely in London where she is pursuing her PhD in an extension of her research on the early commissioned portraits. Daphne also has a project called “Portraits of the Straits” that is very close to what SG Snaps aspires to unveil, but with a more scholarly angle. Together, Daphne and I had taken a look at some of the studio photographs from the SG Snaps collection and it turned out that majority of the images were dated beyond the 1940s into the 1990s, outside the scope of her research. So she psyched me up in investigate the photographs from post-independence era, in hope that I could conceivably create a chronological continuity for the studio portraits throughout the history of Singapore.

1. Studios moved from the city into the neighborhoods through the early to the late 20th century.

In Daphne’s research of the early photography studios, she wrote about how the pioneer studios ran by European photographers were first located at the heart of commerce – along High Street, Stamford Road and North Bridge Road. However in the 1890s, Chinese-operated photography studios began to flourish in the Chinese quarters of the city, like Koon Sun Photo Studio along South Bridge Road.

Koon Sun Photographer at 179 South Bridge Road in the early 20th century. Photo: National Archive of Singapore, Source: Lee Hin Ming

We found out, from the addresses printed on studio portraits collected by SG Snaps, that after the 1950s, locations of new photo studios had spread further out into the neighborhoods with the establishments of new towns in Singapore. It is common for the studios to be at the ground floor of public housing buildings, like the one in the image below.

Bride, groom, best man and bridesmaid pose outside a photo studio in the 1980s. Photo: National Archives of Singapore, Source: Ronni Pinsler

Understanding how the earliest studio portraits were commissioned by the more affluent community and thinking of photographs as tokens of identity, could this movement of photo studios into the neighborhoods signify the desire of a growing middle class to create representations of themselves?

2. The props and backgrounds evolved to reflect the times.

Early studio portraits were very elaborate in dressing the set and the sitters. In the Chinese tradition of portrait-making, photographs were composed quite similarly to the paintings.  The level of intent placed in picturing the sitter and his/her status was so careful, to the extent that adornments signifying status will be drawn on its absence.

Early portrait of a Chinese matriarch, possibly not taken in Singapore, with jade bangles and rings drawn directly onto the print. Photo: Lee Fook Weng

A studio portrait of a Chinese lady with a gold jewellery and jade pendant drawn on to the photographic print. Photo: Evelyn Tan

Though commissioned studio portraits had evolved to be less decorative and simpler over the years, the props used reflected its current trend.

Two ladies having fun during a shooting session with an electric guitar and microphone. Photo: Lim Poh Kwuan

A lady wearing a kebaya posing with a radio and telephone. Photo: Seow Shin Horng

Props and backgrounds aside, the fashion of the times makes too for a standout statement.

Photo: Mabel Sim

3. The advent of the air-conditioner.

In hot and humid Singapore, it became an important consideration for the customers whether a photo studio has air-conditioning, or not. Who would want to be sweating at the once-in-a-lifetime photo session? Thus, many photo-studios emphasised and promoted their air-conditioned studios at the corner of their prints to win over customers and to keep up with competition.

Wedding couple in a studio with an air-condition system called the “Cool-lit”. Photo: Lee Fook Weng

With the growing popularity of western gowns and suits for wedding portraits, an air-conditioned studio were more ideal and popular for photographs compared to the sweltering heat of the outdoors.

A portrait taken at the Golden Studio that had air-condition facilities. Photo: Lee Ah Dah

4. Transitioning from black-and-white to coloured prints.

During the days of black-and-white photography, colours envisioned by the photographers were colored by hand onto either the glass plate of the negative or onto the print itself.

Hand-coloured portrait. Photo: Lee Fook Weng

Hand-coloured photograph of a boy. Photo: Wong Meng

In the 1970s, colour photography became available and made a swift entrance into the output of photo-studios in Singapore. The demand for colour images was high. Towards the 1980s, the black-and-white photographs were only reserved for passport photos. According to Mr. Ang Mong Kee, a photo-studio owner along Henderson Road in the 1980s, it was common for photo studios to bring color negatives to an external lab as the color-photo developing machines were too expensive for small independent studios. The black-and-white photographs were, however, processed on-site at the studio.

Color photo of a family. Photo Lim Mui Tiang

Looking through the photographs during our collection drive, many contributors agreed with us that the quality of black-and-white photographs endure the test of time better than the coloured ones. We found many of the colour photographs, though newer than the black-and-white’s, had entered into advance stages of deterioration. Like in the photo above, the strongest pigment left behind is the red, resulting in a pinkish tint to the photograph.

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Understanding the procedures of analog photography has definitely allowed me to appreciate better the level of workmanship gone into mastering the craft of studio portraits. It is extremely challenging to make a good studio shot, and I have developed a new level of respect for our pioneer photographers. In regards to the photographs collected to be emblems of aspirations of a community in that era, they have given us much insight into how identity continues to be shaped in the way we present our own image as tokens of history.

Written by Samantha Tio
Edited by Tan Wei Keong

Credits to Lim Sok Tin.

Credits to Lim Sok Tin.

Credits to Lim Sok Tin.

“Dark Room Photoshoppers”, as we shall call them, worked with actual film negatives and chemicals. Coupled with precise timing, Dark Room Photoshoppers manipulated the conventional film development process and came up with experimental effects that they applied to the negatives of their more daring customers.

Again, I was speaking with Jerome of thelongnwindingroad.wordpress.com, picking his brain for insights on these whimsical “frames” printed in the photographs, and we’re guessing that these frames were custom designs and each studio had their own set of designs.

Back in the day, photo studios were not as common as they became in the 1990s. Going to a photo studio was eventful and owning one was a big deal! Photo studios used to brand their studio names and contact details on all the photographs that they developed for customers.

Some studios embossed their studio logo onto the photograph.

Some simple stamped the back of the photograph.

Some times, the way they brand the photographs can actually damage the image. In this example, the pink stamp on the back of the image caused this to happen to the photograph, over time (see below).

Photo credits to Chang Chia Wei.

These are just some of the examples of amazing trends in photography in Singapore, during the 1960s-70s. I really wish we could find more of these treasures, as they represent a time that no longer exists, in Singapore, and in other countries where digital photography is prevalent.

If you have a photograph like this at home, please share them with us by telling us your story and any bits of history that the image inspires. You can do so by posting a as a comment, or emailing to us at we@SgSnaps.com