I Photographed Thailand With A £5 Camera

I’m a professional photographer and people are always asking me about equipment rather than about technique and exposure. So on a recent trip to Thailand, I set myself a project to prove photography really isn’t all about expensive equipment and with a bit of thought anyone can get great images with whatever equipment they have.

I bought a compact digital camera for £5 from Emmaus (a charity helping the homeless). The only stipulation I had was that the camera had to have a degree of control over the exposure. After taking the first few shots I realized that the camera, which was quite old, was struggling with anything other than sunlight. It was giving me a very long exposure and when you used a higher ISO to combat this, to make the camera more light sensitive, it was very grainy. One way around this is to use flash but I really didn’t like the results this gave. So I decided to use these limitations to my benefit by using blur, grain, and long exposure as part of the image. This long exposure blur is often called Kinetic Photography.

I’m pleased with the results, they are definitely very different from the images I would have gotten with my expensive Nikon DSLR, but in many ways, I think they are better.

More info: timsimpsonphotography.co.uk

#1 Floating Bungalows

#2 Khao Sok National Park

#3 2 Stops Under Exposed

#4 Big Buddha Afer A Downpour

#5 View From The Beach Bar

#6 Long Exposure Panning

#7 The Andaman Sea

#8 Sunrise

#9 Mr Heng, Tattoos

#10 Hannah And Yaz In Bangkok

#11 A Fire On The Beach

#12 The Palace

#13 At The Temple

#14 Looking Down Onto The Market

#15 Scooter Spares Shop

#16 Negative Space

#17 At The Beach Bar

#18 Things Look Better In Three’s

#19 High Iso Abstract

#20 Elbows Out At The Traffic Lights

#21 Tuk Tuk

#22 Temple

#23 This Gave Me Nightmares

#24 Long Exposure Blur

#25 Over Exposure

#26 Street Food

#27 Railway Station, Phuket

#28 Our Guide

#29 Framed Through A Window

#30 Over Exposure

#31 2 Stops Under Exposed

#32 Late Night Snacks

#33 High Iso

#34 Late At Night

#35 Family Panning

#36 Panning

#37 Taken Using Flash