"As a photographer always says, great photographs come from years of experimenting, and with many various approaches," wrote Danny Kwan, a local freelance photographer, on his website, and similarly, his 21-years experience behind the lens has brought him to where he is now - the winner of the 9th SAFRA Photographer of the Year competition.

He surpassed 138 other competitors during the evaluation phase, judged by five renowned photographers from SAFRA Photography Club, The Photography Society of Singapore and Boon Lay Community Club Photographic Club.

With the judging held about two months ago, the prize presentation was held on Mar 27 at SAFRA Mount Faber with LTC (NS) Gregory Chan, PBM, Chairman of SAFRA Mount Faber Executive Committee, as the guest-of-honour.

This year, the organising committee from the SAFRA Photography Club initiated a new judging concept, whereas each competitor was judged by four print shots (with different techniques) instead of the original one print shot.

Danny's winning images were inspired by the theme "motion versus tranquility".

His quest to improve his photography had begun by chance, when Danny caught sight of an International Photography exhibition at Raffles City Tower. The various black and white photographs there spurred him to find out more about the essence of photography.

Thus, he took up a monochrome photography course.

Danny recalled his first experience in a darkroom as "extremely excitable", especially when he experienced the ‘magic' of the clean-white photography paper slowly turning into a picture with the help of the developer solution. The elation he felt then inspired him to experiment with the different darkroom techniques, such as multi exposure and high contrast.

Since then, Danny has been into film photography and, later, digital photography, which he picked up after being introduced to Adobe Photoshop. SAFRA Photography Club (SAFRAPC) has also become a platform for him to improve and flaunt his talent.

So what makes this writer continue exploring photography?

The SAFRAPC member shared some wise words, "Persistent reflects new concept and perspective in the art of photography, [and this] keeps me "non-stop" in pursuing my interest in photography."

Other winners of 9th SAFRA Photographer of the Year competition:

Merit
Low Soon Leong (SAFRAPC member)
Tan Choon Wee (SAFRAPC member)
Leow Kah Chuan (Guest)
Tay Sui Kok (SAFRA member)
Gina Ng (SAFRAPC member)

Consolation
Lester Koh Meng Hua (SAFRAPC member)
Steven Tor (SAFRAPC member)
How Seow Hong (Guest)
Teo Yong Kang (Guest)
Michael Ee (SAFRAPC member)

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