ABSTRACT
It was during the latter in which I first real ised a need for this book. As a photo grapher trained in Sociology (and not the other way around), I focussed on visu ally enga ging with the rituals, indi vidu als and arte facts of Bukit Brown, whilst Yew-Foong both spoke to our inform ants and photo graphed when he could. I carried the equip ment I would normally use on profes sional shoots, whilst Yew-Foong and other research assistants used smaller all-in-one cameras. In perfect light ing condi tions, our images had similar levels of sharp ness and detail – good samples of visual
data docu ment ing every day objects in a cemetery. The prob lems began to occur when we started photo graph ing in differ ent and often diffi cult condi tions. Grave exhuma tions were often carried out at night, with little arti fi cial light. Covered in primary trop ical rain forest, we were layered in a blanket of dark ness – and the only photo graphs (and some videos) that we could use as data became mine.
