SAMYANG

Bangkok – Chinatown Backstreets
Written by Cedric Arnold

Night-scape

XP 14mm F2.4

EOS 5D Mark III

F11

25 sec

100

Aperture
priority

-

14mm

Multi-segment

Bangkok is a city for extremes. It lends itself so many possible artistic interpretations.
As a photographer based in Bangkok for the past sixteen years I have documented the city in so many ways with every format
imaginable, from 4x5 film to 35mm 6x6, 6x9, Polaroid cameras, Lomo and Holga cameras, and of course digital.
No matter the format, I am always drawn to documenting the lives of people in this ever changing multi-layered city.
I often shoot portraits and documentary series here as well as short films.
My lenses of choice in the the full frame format are 50 & 35mm I rarely use anything else.

When I was given the opportunity to choose a single lens to document Bangkok for a whole project,
I certainly even surprised myself when I opted for the 14mm.
A lens I have only used once on a film set for just one day in my career!

Portrait

XP 14mm F2.4

EOS 5D Mark III

F3.5

1/50 sec

1250

Aperture
priority

-

14mm

Multi-segment

When I was given the opportunity to choose a single lens to document Bangkok for a whole project, I certainly even surprised myself when I opted for the 14mm. A lens I have only used once on a film set for just one day in my career!

I am not a landscape photographer, rarely shoot interiors commercially and generally hate barrel distortion, so this seemed like the worst choice possible to match my style of shooting, which is usually low light and night time photography with wide open lenses. But I wanted to challenge myself to something new so I could try to document this city I know so well in a way I had not tried before.

In Hollywood, the 14mm is often referred to as the Gilliam (named after Terry Gilliam) because of its distortion when used close-up and how it helps convey and enhance the weird atmosphere in his films, a classic example is the Bruce Willis and Brad Pitt scene in 12 Monkeys, where they are filmed from above and get close to the lens. I actually love Terry’s work and had the immense pleasure of photographing him (with a borrowed 17mm lens actually!) ten years ago.

But save for some weird and comical effects, like that fun shoot with Gilliam, I never really feel the need for anything wider than 24mm in pretty much all of my work.

Portrait

XP 14mm F2.4

EOS 5D Mark III

F2.5

1/20 sec

1250

Aperture
priority

-

14mm

Multi-segment

Portrait

XP 14mm F2.4

EOS 5D Mark III

F2.5

1/225 sec

1250

Manual

-

14mm

Multi-segment

So the challenge was on.

I live in an older part of Bangkok, along the river and adjacent to Chinatown. It’s an area that is changing fast, bustling and chaotic, a neon wonderland, with street food everywhere, it’s noisy, hot, steamy and everything is in your face. One would never imagine it when walking down the main roads and tourist spots of Chinatown amongst all this chaos, but in the backstreets, you’ll find some truly unique and often quite magical scenes, it’s like a trip back in time, quiet, strange, and fascinating. I go for walks very often with either a small video camera or a stills camera, avoiding the noisy main roads. I often end up having long conversations with locals, many are third generation vendors living in dilapidated 80 + year old traditional shop houses, local monks at temples and Chinese opera performers. Their way of life is under threat and for many the tradition will end when they retire. Their children are studying or have studied to be doctors engineers, bankers etc… And with fast changes in the neighbourhood many think that within 10 years they will probably have to move abandoning in some cases over 100 years of local family tradition.