For years, I've talked of visiting Sri Lanka.  Although I'd heard only wonderful things from friends who had visited, it was just one of those places that I hadn't made it to. That is, until a few weeks ago, when I spent 10 magnificent days on the island often referred to as the "teardrop of India".

I was immediately smitten with Sri Lanka: it's friendly people, brilliant beaches, beautiful scenery and gorgeous climate.  I wondered why it took me so long to come here.

After spending a few glorious days at Apa Villa Illuketia, a remarkable 200-year-old plantation estate a short distance outside Galle, I headed to Apa Villa Thalpe, their sister property consisting of three villas on the beach overlooking the Indian Ocean, for another week of rest and relaxation.

I managed to pull myself away from the seaside a couple of times during the week, when I headed into the historic town of Galle, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, "one of the best examples of a fortified city built by Europeans in south and southeast Asia...and the largest remaining fortress in Asia built by European occupiers".

I relished wandering the narrow streets and lanes inside the Galle Fort, admiring the interesting blend of colonial Dutch, English, Portuguese and local Sinhalese architecture.

Having enjoyed so much shooting only with my iPhone in Goa, India just a few weeks prior, I set out to create a small body of street iPhoneography from my Galle meanderings.  The result is this small series of street photographs captured and processed using only my iPhone 4S and some of my favourite apps such as Phototreats, PicTools, Luminance and Pixlr-o-matic; I added the white borders using Lightroom 3.

I posted this series of images to Instagram and, about one of the photographs, one of my followers asked me (only half kidding) whether I ever used my DSLR's to shoot anymore.  The truth is, the iPhone is so convenient, unimposing and powerful that I find myself more and more opting to take it on holiday, or out on personal photographic walks with me rather than carry my big, heavy Nikons.

Clearly, my DSLR's will never be replaced by my mobile phone for my editorial reportage and fashion or commercial and advertising work, but for someone who is passionate about making photographs, the ease of having a camera in your pocket and with you always is second to none.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on this blog or on Flickr.

Earlier this month I spent nearly a week on Candolim Beach in Goa for a wedding celebration.  It was a fantastic few days on India's southwest coast, spending time with old friends and making new ones.

I arrived in India, packed to the gills with my Nikon DSLR cameras and lenses, with the goal of making a landscape or reportage photograph of Goa as a gift for the bride and groom.  I also had my brand new iPhone 4S in my pocket. No prizes for guessing which one went with me everywhere that week...

The result was not one photograph of Goa for the bride and groom, but rather a collage of 18 pictures that I made on my iPhone over the course of the week.

I presented this framed collage, created with the help of Adobe Lightroom 3, to the newlyweds last week.

My Nikons never actually left my villa, proving (once again) that the best camera really IS the one that's with you.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on this blog or on Flickr.

I spent most of last week in Cambodia with my filmmaker friends and frequent creative partners, Mike Rogers and Meghan Shea of Persistent Productions.

The three of us were there to visit Sala Bai, a hospitality school for underprivileged youth in Siem Reap, as part of location scouting and pre-production meetings for an upcoming film and photographic collaboration.

In November, we will return to Siem Reap for 10 days to create photographic reportage and a short documentary film about Sala Bai and the positive work they are doing for Cambodia's disadvantaged youth.

For nearly a decade, Sala Bai has been training, free-of-charge, approximately 100 young people annually in the hospitality industry.  The school's goal is to provide the students with the skills and experience necessary to secure gainful employment in one of Siem Reap's numerous hotels, guesthouses or restaurants, helping them achieve economic independence and improving their quality of life, and those of their families.

Sala Bai offers students four specific training programs: restaurant service, cooking, front office and housekeeping. The 11-month curriculum includes theory classes,

practical training and internships at partner hotels in Siem Reap.  The students are supported by social workers who mentor them throughout their tenure at Sala Bai, as well as assist them in finding a full-time job after graduation. Remarkably, 100% of Sala Bai's students secure gainful employment in the Cambodian hospitality industry within three months of their graduation.

When we return to Cambodia for our shoot in November, we intend to focus on Khatna, a young woman who recently graduated from Sala Bai and now works on the front desk at the boutique Heritage Suites Hotel in Siem Reap.  We intend to tell the story of Khatna and her journey, in less than one year, from Mechrey Village -- a rural floating community located on Tonle Sap Lake, where she lived with her pig farming parents and four sisters -- to working the front desk of a luxury hotel in the city.

As part of our pre-shoot interviews and location scouting, we traveled with Khatna, by tuk-tuk and small motorboat, to Mechrey Village to meet her family and see their humble home.

I opted to leave my Nikon DSLR's at the hotel, instead brining only my iPhone to document this informal family visit.  This series of Hipstamatic images (which I tweaked a

little in post-production using Noir) are of Sovern Sorn, Khatna's father, who welcomed us warmly into his small wooden home, and then sat silently by the window throughout our hour-long visit, smoking cigarettes and gazing out at the passing boats.

At first Sovern was reluctant to let me photograph him, but after showing him a few of the processed images as they popped-up on the screen of my iPhone, he opened-up and permitted me to quietly snap away.

Our visit to Mechrey Village with Khatna was a highlight of our time in Cambodia, and Mike, Meghan and I are very excited to return to Siem Reap in November to get to know Khatna and her family better, as well as begin our creative project alongside the students and administrators at Sala Bai.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on this blog or on Flickr.

Opening this Saturday 17 September at the Singapore National Library Building is SIN: A Singapore Instagram Exhibition.

With 'Singapore' as it's overarching theme, SIN will feature hundred of images of life in the Lion City as seen through the lens of 107 photographers using the hugely popular iPhone application, Instagram.

In partnership with Instagram Singapore founder Ivan Quek, curators Goh Eck Kheng, Tan Ngiap Heng and Chia Aik Beng sifted through more than 8,000 Instagram pictures before choosing the 298 photographs that will be on display.  I am extremely proud that three of my Instagram photographs, 'Henna Hands', 'Painters' and 'Patriotism' will be exhibited as part of SIN.

SIN: A Singapore Instagram Exhibition will be open to the public from 10:00am-9:00pm daily through Sunday 30 October at Level 8, Promenade in National Library Building.  For more information, visit the National Library Board.

Are you on Instagram?  Follow me at @scottawoodward, as well as SIN curators (and extremely talented and popular iPhoneographers) Tan Ngiap Heng at @froggyappleton, Chia Aik Beng at @aikbengchia and Instagram Singapore founder Ivan Kuek at @phoneomenon.

I was just 22 years old when I moved to Singapore in 1997. I came here for a job opportunity, and I intended to stay just a year (maybe two).  I was a young, fresh university graduate, and I had my whole life in front of me.  Singapore was to be only a brief stop on the road to adulthood, a short excursion in Southeast Asia.  I had no idea that 14 years later I would still be here, nor that I would affectionately call Singapore my home.

I am not sure when or how it happened, but somewhere along the way Singapore became special to me. Perhaps it was the melting pot of Asian cultures or the beautiful tropical climate or the close proximity to so many exotic destinations that made me fall in love with Singapore.  I can't really put my finger on one thing.  It's all of these things, and more.  But Singapore is not perfect.  Nowhere is.  As we know, love is not without its frustrations.  But we love despite the imperfections.

Inevitably, Singapore has changed and grown, and as the years have slipped by, the city has expanded and the landscape has been altered so dramatically that sometimes I barely recognize it.  But no matter how many casinos or luxury condominiums or shopping malls or office skyscrapers pop up (literally overnight), wonderful little communities and tiny cultural enclaves seem to endure.

I've made it my mission recently to seek out and explore something new in Singapore every week.  So far I've discovered a charming coffee shop in Tiong Bahru, an amazing vintage furniture shop in Bukit Batok, and a new restaurant at Dempsey Hill.  This week, perhaps I'll visit a photo exhibition at a local gallery or explore the small neighbourhood of Siglap.

I feel like I've grown and changed alongside Singapore, and -- although I sometimes long for "the good old days" -- ultimately I feel that we are both better for it.

Happy 46th Birthday, Singapore.  I hope to celebrate many more with you.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on this blog or on Flickr.

I recently returned home to Singapore after a wonderful three-week holiday with my family in Ontario and Alberta, Canada.  As anyone who has taken a flight literally half-way around the world will attest, Singapore to Toronto is a long way to go.  However, it is the special times I get to share in Canada with my family -- and in particular, with my three young nieces, Carissa (4), Brooke (5) and Paige (7) -- that makes the mind-numbing drudgery of the >24-hour flight worth it.

Every summer holiday I endeavour to strike a balance between spending quality time with the girls and simply enjoying our (fleeting) moments together, with wanting to indulge in my photography passion and document and preserve those special times forever (for me, as well as for their parents and grandparents).  It is often difficult for me to find this equilibrium, as throughout our time together I am constantly witnessing wonderful scenes and catching glimpses of beautiful light and longing to capture these moments with my camera.

However, this summer was a little different for me.

As always, I lugged my Nikon D3x and an assortment of lenses all the way back to Canada.  Only this time, not once did I take my DSLR out of it's bag.  Instead, I used my

iPhone, which was always in my pocket, to document at least one thing that we did together every day.

This collection of images is the result of my iPhoneography experiment with the girls: our time together playing on the swings, blowing bubbles in the backyard, sliding into the blow-up pool, going on twilight walks, visiting with Grandma & Grandpa, exploring the museum, wandering alongside the train tracks...

Like all little girls, Carissa, Brooke and Paige share similar interests: all things princesses, tirelessly singing and dancing and devouring story book after story book.  But, like all people, they have so many differences.  And it is their intense individuality that I think I love the most about them.

These little girls literally steal my heart for those few days I am in Canada every year.  And then it breaks a little whenever it's time for me to leave.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on this blog or on Flickr.

My iPhone is never far from my reach.  I love taking photographs with it, and inspired by the countless amazing photography apps and the addictive photography social network, Instagram, I am becoming even more obsessed with iPhoneography.

Lately, what I've really enjoyed is taking a few moments to capture the same scene with my iPhone that I am shooting with my 'real' 35mm or medium format cameras while photographing editorial assignments and ad campaigns.

This collection of iPhone pictures were shot using the Hipstamatic photography app and Instagram filters during breaks in shooting my recent Ei8ht magazine fashion feature at dusitD2 Barraquda in Pattaya, Thailand.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on my blog or on Flickr.

Friend, filmmaker and longtime collaborator Mike Rogers and I just returned from an amazing adventure assignment to Indonesia.  We spent two days with the World Wildlife Fund's (WWF) Elephant Flying Squad, living in their camp at Lubuk Kembang Bunga Village on the outskirts of Sumatra's Tesso Nilo National Park while shooting an editorial print and digital video feature for SilkAir's inflight magazine, Silkwinds.

According to the WWF website, "In 2004, [the] WWF introduced the first Elephant Flying Squad to Riau Province in central Sumatra, to a village near the newly established Tesso Nilo National Park.  It was a way to bring short-term relief to the intense conflict between people and elephants there and to create support for elephant conservation among hard-hit communities.  Because the region around Tesso Nilo is being logged so rapidly and the forest converted into agricultural plantations, elephants with no place to go are forced to wander in search of food, making farms and commercial plantations an irresistible temptation for elephant-sized appetites."

The mission of the Elephant Flying Squad -- consisting of 11 mahouts and seven trained elephants (four adults, two youngsters and a one-month old baby) -- is to "drive wild elephants back into the forest whenever they threaten to

enter villages.  It has proven to be very effective in reducing losses suffered by local communities near Tesso Nilo" as well as successfully reduced the number of wild elephants killed by angry farmers or scared villagers.

Perched high on the backs of the giant pachyderms, and holding tight to a bare rope that wrapped around the elephants' bodies, Mike and I were fortunate enough to accompany the squad on a typical patrol through the Sumatran rainforest.  It was a magnificent experience to trudge through the jungle on the back of these majestic creatures and document how the Elephant Flying Squad helps preserve the wild elephant population in Riau.

At the end of the assignment -- after my cameras were put away and while Mike wrapped-up his video interviews -- I sat with the 11 mahouts and their leader outside their small cabin in Tesso Nilo.  As we joked and laughed I pulled out my iPhone (which, amazingly, nobody seemed to have ever seen before) and, using the LomoLomo app, started to shoot a few portraits of the Elephant Flying Squad members.  It was a hit, and before long everyone wanted their photos taken.  This is the series we made.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on my blog or on Flickr.

From dusk 'till dawn, I've spent the past week traipsing around Singapore shooting dozens of locations and personalities for two separate editorial feature commissions.  My photographic briefs are pretty standard for luxury lifestyle and travel publications: shoot a collection of stylish and sophisticated hotels, eateries and bars as well as the people who run them.

It is always a pleasure for me to work on these types of assignments, but especially when they're in my own backyard.  I enjoy exploring and experiencing places in Singapore that I've never been before, and I love meeting the people behind them: chefs, sommeliers, managers, artists, designers and architects.

As always, my iPhone is in my pocket throughout all these shoots.  And I love to pull it out and shoot with it alongside my "real" 35mm DSLR cameras whenever I see anything interesting or inspiring.

My latest iPhoneographic obsession is Instagram, the popular iPhone app that allows users to add interesting retro-inspired filters to photographs and then share the pictures on Instagram's own social network, as well as on other social websites like Twitter, Facebook and Flickr.

I like the way the square format of Instagram forces me to compose images differently than when using my Nikons and their standard 3:2 aspect ratios.  I love the variety of filters and how they can transform the mood of my photographs.  And I really enjoy the simplicity and ease of the Instagram photo feed and how I can see the images my friends around the world are making on their iPhones.

These 20 photographs were all made in Singapore this past week using Instagram.  See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on my blog or on Flickr.

The past few weeks have been filled with commissioned editorial assignments and commercial advertising shoots, which is great for business, but has left me little time for personal creative photography.

Earlier this week, while on-set at the studio, there were a few moments of downtime as the crew and I waited for the stylist to finish prepping the model.  I was mindlessly fiddling with my iPhone and took a few shots of my illuminated laptop keyboard.

This gave me an (admittedly peculiar) idea, as well as posed a small challenge for me: could I construct the URL to my website www.scottawoodward.com entirely from iPhone photographs of random letters that I encountered in the course of my day?  Silly, I know.  But it was fun.

Well, it took me longer than one day; it took me three, actually (there are a lot of "W's" in there).  I didn't know what to do with it when I finished, so here is the fruit of my labour: my "iPhoneographic URL Ransom Letter".

For anyone who's interested, I tried to shoot each letter using a different iPhone app (although I lost track and don't think I actually succeeded).  Counted among the shots above are Hipstamatic, OldPhotoPRO, ClassicTOY, MoreLomo, Phototreats, BlendCam, Gorillacam, Polarize, Format126, LENSES, Vint B&W, Retro Camera, ShakeItPhoto and HDR Fusion.

I spent a week over New Year's in Chiang Mai, Thailand, a city of 160,000 residents about 700km north of the nation's capital, Bangkok.  Chiang Mai is a laid back city full of colourful temples, quaint cafés, fantastic restaurants, used bookshops and roadside markets.  It was my third visit to Chiang Mai in the past seven or eight years, and I enjoyed it tremendously.

Having visited Chiang Mai before, I didn't feel compelled to lug my heavy 35mm DSLR camera and lenses everywhere I went, opting just to carry my iPhone in my pocket instead. One of the highlights of the visit was meeting a family from The Hague, Netherlands who were staying at our hotel.  Their two sons, Maarten and Sebastian, accompanied us to the Thapae Boxing Stadium for an evening of Thailand's very own Singha beer and Muay Thai.

I spent a good part of the evening wandering the stadium and shooting the action with the Hipstamatic app for my iPhone; this is a collection of some of my favourite photography from the night. Perhaps I should call this my "ChiangMaiPhoneography" series.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on my blog or on Flickr.

"I have a camera.  Sometimes, I use it to make phone calls." - Marty Yawnick, Life in LoFi: iPhoneography

There's something about shooting with my iPhone that has really captivated me of late.  Maybe it's the constantly growing collection of exciting and powerful photography apps available for download on iTunes.  Or perhaps it's the ever-increasing popularity of #iPhoneography that I see everyday on Twitter that keeps inspiring me to be more creative.  Either way, for someone who spends most of his time peering out from behind the lens of clunky DSLR or medium format cameras, the freedom and flexibility of making photographs my iPhone is a welcome change of pace for me.

From lights gleaming off the hood of an Audi prototype electric car to the rooftop of Marina Bay Sands casino, from a clients' statue of Mao Zedong to a portrait of a friends' sleeping infant, from a snapshot of Vampire Weekend performing live on stage to the view of the wall across the road from my favourite little coffee shop, this is how Singapore has looked through the 3 megapixel lens of my iPhone the past few weeks.

See more of my iPhoneography elsewhere on my blog or on Flickr.

Motivated by the very generous compliment my friend Faz gave me last week over at her blog "The Drama Diaries", I decided to download my iPhone's photos folder to my Mac and see what was hiding in there...

Here's what I found: a small collection of iPhoneographs I made on my recent travels to Bali, Shanghai, Melbourne, Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, and -- right here in my own backyard -- Singapore.

Some of these images have been processed directly on my iPhone using photography apps like MoreLomo and Format126, while others have been post-processed in Adobe's Lightroom 3, which even features a built-in lens distortion correction tool for the iPhone.  I put (very minor) finishing touches on all these images in Photoshop.

I am thoroughly enjoying having a camera in my pocket all the time, and I am continually inspired to better use it by what I learn from blogs like iPhoneography and Life in LoFi, as well as the creative work I see other photographers making.

See more of my iPhoneography on Flickr.

Last week a friend and I took a short holiday to Australia. We spent a few days in Sydney, a few days in Melbourne and one (amazing) day driving along the Great Ocean Road.  It was a fantastic break, and a trip that I won't soon forget.

I have been fortunate enough to visit Australia many times over the years, and each time I go I seem to enjoy it more and more; this time was no exception.  Melbourne was fantastic and the Great Ocean Road was breathtakingly beautiful.  But there's just something I find so special about Sydney every time I visit.  It has a remarkable beauty and an energy that I find both palpable and infectious.

I spent a couple of hours on the afternoon I arrived wandering around Circular Quay, gazing at Sydney's iconic Harbour Bridge and Opera House, and being a typical tourist.  I only had my iPhone in my pocket, but it was all I needed to capture what I saw and felt as the sun set on this amazing city.

See more of my iPhoneography on Flickr.

Photography is one of the most accessible and democratic forms of artistic expression there is.  The ubiquity of cameras -- on mobile phones or small digital point-and-shoot cameras in our pockets, all the way to large, powerful digital SLR cameras -- makes it ever easier to capture fantastic images.

But making great photographs has little to do with owning the best and most expensive equipment.  The real secret behind original photography is in how you see a moment and interpret it in a still frame.  Are you able to make something ordinary appear extraordinary by showing it differently?  Are you able to make the viewer feel a physical emotion when they look at your photograph?  Are you able to transport someone with you to a moment in time simply by pressing your shutter?

Jointly inspired by this artistic and photographic philosophy, as well as by my good friend Mike Sargent (the Photo Editor at the Straits Times newspaper in Singapore), who is never without his digital point-and-shoot camera, and Chase Jarvis (a Seattle-based photographer) and his "The Best Camera Is The One That’s With You" project, I've taken to shooting a lot more often with my iPhone.

It's free.  It's fun.  It's easy.

And it makes walking to get lunch more than just about food; its now a daily photography assignment.

See more of my iPhoneography on Flickr.

Or better yet, share some of yours with me.

**EDIT** An article about the point-and-shoot cameras used by a handful of well-known professional photographers, including Pulitzer Prize-winner David Hume Kennerly, can be found here.