One Fine Day

Lip Seng

I won my first Photographic Society of America Gold Medal for the best slide of the show in Mexico International Salon in 1968. I started to do derivative works in 1967. Due to my knowledge in black white processing, I started to use lith film to create picture with dramatic visual impact. One of my favourite technique was to retain the colour of a subject (in this example, the yellow umbrella) while changing the rest of the image for dramatic effect. By montaging the lith film (obtained by contact printing in the dark room), I was able to create a bias relief effect when I mounted the two pieces of film slightly out of registration. I wish that I had Photoshop at that time. Now is much easier to achieve such an effect at a click of a mouse. You still need a well composed image first to execute the techniques though!

This image happens to be one of my 24 colour transparencies in a pictorial panel that gained the prestigious Fellowship of the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain (FRPS) in 1970. Watch out for more images from this FRPS panel later in my gallery.

(Courtesy of: The National Museum of Singapore Permanent Collection, National Heritage Board, 2008)

In A Singapore Market

Lip Seng

This was one of my very first acceptance in the Singapore International Salon in 1962. I used a Rolleiflex twin lens reflex camera fitted with Rolleikin to capture this image at the China Town market. Kodachrome film was used. This picture won the Silver Medal and US$100 cash (top award) in the New York World Fair “The World and Its Peoples” Kodak International Picture Contest in 1964. After 42 years , the image is still as brilliant as brand new, a testament to the longevity of good film (if kept properly).

(Courtesy of: The National Museum of Singapore Permanent Collection, National Heritage Board, 2008)

Iron and Steel Mill

Lip Seng


Today being a special day of a leap year (29.02.2004), I feature here an image which I captured in 1970. A few years later after this was taken, the image was used as the cover picture for a book entitled “Science and Technology for 2 Million” (published in 1975 by the Ministry of Science and Technology, Singapore). After 34 years, I still like this image very much. Perhaps, it is due to the mood, atmosphere and the colours that I have managed to aptly portray on the subject.

(Courtesy of: The National Museum of Singapore Permanent Collection, National Heritage Board, 2008)

(Technical data:Kodachrome Film, Format 135 (35 mm), Exakta Varex IIb with Sonnar 135 mm f/4 lens)