A Day in the Life of a Cityscape Photography Enthusiast

This is a post to go through my typical weekday life as a cityscape photography enthusiast (plus a parent and 9-to-5 worker). Let’s get started. 🚀

6:00 A.M.

Getting up, as our son goes to school. In fact, I’ve made it a habit to go with him (four stops by bus) and walk back (around 25 minutes) to kick off the day with some light exercise. On the way back, I usually spot a few familiar community cats, so I feed them, and take photos. Here are a couple of favorite captures. 😍

My morning routine friend. 🐈

8:30 A.M.

Starting my work at home. I’m a full-time employee of a local company, and have been working remotely from home for the past 10+ years.

Before COVID, telling neighbors I worked from home often got me skeptical looks — probably thinking I was jobless and just making excuses. 🤣 These days, working from home isn’t too uncommon, so I no longer get those reactions!

I’m home alone during the day (my wife works in an office) until our son returns from school in the afternoon. It’s always a joy chatting with him while working, which brightens up my rather boring workday. 😅 Around that time, I also check gaisma.com for sunset and dusk timings to prep for the evening shoot.

5:30 P.M.

Work’s done. I’m usually drained by then 😫 but this is when my “me time” starts! As long as the sky is clear enough, I pack my gear and head out to shoot! To get to the Singapore CBD, it takes 30 minutes by MRT (metro) and a bit of walking.

Fun fact: Singapore’s earliest and latest sunsets are around 6:50 p.m. and 7:20 p.m. respectively, so I can shoot at blue hour all year round, which is a huge advantage of living here! If I were in Tokyo, where sunset can be as early as 4:30 p.m. in winter, I’d miss weekday shoots for three to four months. 😭

6:30 P.M.

After deciding where to shoot from, I chill for a bit until approximately 15 minutes before sunset. Then I set up my tripod, finalize the composition, and take a few test shots.

One quirky bit of trivia about how I shoot: once I’ve set a composition, I don’t change it. I stick to one frame for the entire evening. This comes from my belief that there’s only one perfect timing under the fast-darkening blue hour sky to capture the best possible shot. So if I want to try a different angle or direction, I just come back another day. 😅

7:00 P.M.

Approaching the sunset time (7:10 p.m. on this day). Although my main aim is to shoot a single long exposure photo under the blue hour sky (typically around 10 to 5 minutes before the end of dusk), I sometimes try to shoot another long exposure photo around the sunset time using a 10 stop ND (neutral density) filter for an experiment.

Singapore Skyline from Esplanade at 22mm, f/11, 171 secs, ISO 100. At the sunset time, the shutter speed doesn’t come down slow enough (1/6 second for this shot), so using a 10 stop ND filter to extend the shutter speed to 171 seconds.

7:20 P.M.

Now the magic happens. ✨ As the sky darkens and the bluish hue deepens in the final 10 minutes of dusk, I watch the blue hour sky intensifying and the shutter speed naturally getting longer, until I decide to begin a long exposure — this time using a 6-stop ND filter. This is what I got on the day.

Singapore Skyline from Esplanade at 22mm, f/5.6, 256 secs, ISO 100. This is the moment I waited for all evening! Shot 10 minutes before the end of dusk.

And that’s a typical day in the life of a cityscape photography enthusiast. Not every outing ends with a perfect photo (due to ugly clouds rolling in, reflections falling flat, etc.), but the joy of being out with my camera and watching the city transform under the blue hour sky? That never gets old. 😀

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About the Author: LASTLIGHTS.NET is a passion project of Joey J, a Singapore-based Japanese photographer primarily shooting cityscape photography with long exposure at blue hour. Visit his Photo Gallery (40 most favourite photos taken) or download his free eBook, Getting Started with Long Exposure Photography .