Gardens by The Bay Christmas Wonderland

My wife and the kids are away for holiday at my wife's hometown since last week.  I'm stuck for some work related issues, although not a lot and mostly are already settled by now.  That also means that I have lots and lots of free time on weekends...  And for me that means going to Gardens by The Bay to see the Christmas Wonderland exhibits and take some great photos.  For this trip, I brought along both my X-T2 + XF 16mm F1.4R WR and D750 + AT-X 16-28 F2.8 PRO FX.  But for this entry, I'm using the shots from my X-T2 only.

I arrived quite early at before 4:15 pm.  My first destination was the Flower Dome where the Christmas Wonderland exhibit is on.  I wanted to scout around for good spots, taking sample shots, adjusting the lighting and shadow/highlight setting in my camera.  These are two of my daylight sample shots which turned out well.      

A foliage tunnel going to the South American Garden

Bronze statue garden decoration outside Pollen

After scouting around and walking around for about 2 hours I decided to take a break at where else, but Pollen!  This time I just sat at the terrace cafe having a cup of cappuccino and a plate of brownies and ice cream.  While the brownie and ice cream tasted fantastic, I certainly wish the brownies had been warmer.  That would have made for a heavenly sensation inside the mouth.  

After sitting in Pollen for about 25 minutes, the long awaited blue hour finally arrived and the lights in flower dome were on!  As soon as the lights came alive it was magic and the exhibits came to life with a myriad of colours so mesmerizing.  I was almost running around snapping here and there except on the spots where I had to use long exposures to capture the shots.  I suddenly remembered that exhilarating feeling of trying to catch everything I could within the blue hour's short life span.  I think the results did not disappoint. 

First long exposure shot of the main display

Revolving nutcrackers among colourful flowers

A tower of angels and presents in between warm yellow Christmas trees

A ballerina enclosed in a "crystal" ball

View from level 2 of the entrance

After conquering flower dome, it was time to move out and check the Christmas fair ground.  This year, we'll need to use tickets to get into the Christmas Fairground.  Not so cheap too at $8 per head, but in my opinion makes for good crowd control - it's noticeably less crowded this time compared to last year.  So I was determined to make this trip worth what I paid for.  Here are some shots of the fairground.

The light gate by the entrance to the fairground

Same thing as last year, but still looks so good

Inside that colourful gate 

Booths selling Christmas goodies nearby the super trees

The luminary there is a bit overexposed, but at least I could recover some of the colours

My favourite shot of the Super Tree - this is one of those rare moments I could capture quite a lot of colours of that tree

This time around I decided to go up the skyway.  I had always wanted to know how it was like to see the garden from top.  And surely I had to take some shots from up there too.

View from the top

When I was on the skyway, I really wish I had the XF 10-24mm.  It was at that moment when I realized that my XF 16mm was too narrow!  I have to strongly consider getting that lens, next.  Most of my good shots up here were taken by the D750 + AT-X 16-28 F2.8.  However, the lack of VR also resulted in many missed shots.  

Then I moved on to the other part of the fairground for more exciting shots to take. 

Christmas tree forest of blue and green

The Ice Palace - fancy ice skating?  You can do it here!

Decorated stage for a cappella performance of Christmas tunes

I really enjoyed this photography excursion - it reminded me of how exhilarating and satisfying it was to capture great photos.

On the way back home, I also snapped a shot of these light gates near the arrival area. 

Another series of light gates heading to the ticketing centre from main entrance

 Here's a closing shot for this entry: 

A shot within a frame - I love those bokeh!!

~ Photos taken with Fujifilm X-T2 + XF 16mm F1.4R WR~