Canon PhotoMarathon 2025 showcases visual stories for SG60

The 19th edition of Canon PhotoMarathon 2025, one of Singapore’s highly anticipated photography events, welcomed over 600 photography enthusiasts. Organised by Canon Singapore, it was themed One Click, One Vibe and aims to promote photography as a vital visual arts form by celebrating innovation, storytelling and artistic expression through the lens. 

This year’s competition saw submissions across three mystery themes – Home, Vintage and Vibe(s) – unveiled at intervals during the day. Participants raced across the island, conceptualising, shooting and submitting each photo within a two-hour window per theme for a chance to win Canon products worth around S$50,000 in total. 

“As Singapore’s photography scene continues to evolve, we understand what photography enthusiasts need and endeavour to continue supporting them in telling their creative stories. Canon PhotoMarathon has grown from a competition into a vibrant showcase of creativity, diversity and technical excellence that fuels the photography community in Singapore. 

"One of the themes this year reflects the values of SG60 and serves as a reminder of the everyday lives and spirit of the people in Singapore,” said Andrew Koh, Senior VP and Head of Singapore Operations, Canon Singapore.

Mark Teo, a Commercial and Action Sports Photographer and a third-time judge of the Canon PhotoMarathon shared: “It is always inspiring to see how different people interpret the same theme. Each year, the standard just keeps rising. This year’s themes were trickier, prompting participants to think outside the box in order to differentiate themselves from the crowd. Clean composition, good lighting and clear relevance to the theme really made the winning entries stand out.” 

Canon Singapore has also continued its partnership with APSN, a social service agency that provides special education, vocational training and employment support services for individuals with mild intellectual disabilities. Through this collaboration, Canon seeks to unite individuals through photography — a universal art form that knows no boundaries. 

This year was no different as students from APSN were invited to participate in the student categories. This is reflective of Canon’s philosophy of kyosei (共生) – living and working together for the common good, and empowering individuals of all abilities to excel in harmony.

“Beyond encouraging students to express their creativity and build confidence, the Canon PhotoMarathon reflects our school’s values – I Can, I Want, I Will – and motivates them to believe in themselves. Most importantly, the event fosters inclusivity by empowering individuals with special needs to become active contributors of society. Through platforms like this, we not only showcase their talents but also inspire the broader community to celebrate their achievements,” said Muhammad Faris, CCA Arts Coordinator, APSN Delta Senior School. 

The Canon PhotoMarathon 2025 winners: 

	Open categories	Student categories
Theme 1: Home	1st prize: Kenneth Chia 2nd prize: Dongli Zhang 3rd prize: Samuel Sze	1st prize: Ryan Yeo 2nd prize: Chen Xi Teo 3rd prize: Isaac Sin
Theme 2: Vintage	1st prize: Ahmad Iskandar Abdullah 2nd prize: Irfan Djorhanaen 3rd prize: Mohd Safuan Salahudin	1st prize: Keller Seah 2nd prize: Dionne Pang 3rd prize: Alvaro Vincent Wijaya
Theme 3: Vibe(s)	1st prize: Hui Min Lee 2nd prize: Rita Chang 3rd prize: Farha Patel	1st prize: Rewan Teh 2nd prize: Bryant Bong 3rd prize: Keller Seah

Wayne Kwan, an educator who has joined over 11 editions said: “I first participated in the Canon PhotoMarathon in 2012. Photography is my way of capturing memories, and I enjoy the thrill of the hunt for unique angles. This year is extra special as my wife and son have joined me in this year’s PhotoMarathon, turning this event into a meaningful family experience built upon our shared love for the hobby.”

De Long Goh, 58 years old, engineer and long-time participant of 10 years, shared, “Every year brings something new, reconnecting with friends, exploring different subjects and challenging myself to think creatively about what to shoot. Some themes can be difficult to interpret, but that is exactly what makes the event so rewarding – it pushes me to improve my photography skills every year.”  

Home Open category first prize winner:

Source: Canon. The winning picture in the Open category for the theme Home.

Kenneth Chia, 39 years old, engineer and first prize winner of the Open category for the Home theme said: “I was very surprised to win the first prize, and my hands are still shaking. When I think of home, I think of my 17-month son and all the things that I treasure the most. 

Once the theme was announced, I went back to my HDB flat to capture what was most important to me. My kid is home. This image of my child was taken against the flag which embodies Home, a symbol of our shared identity.”

Aaron Low, Photo Director and one of the judges said: “The Canon PhotoMarathon really brings the community together by forming lasting bonds through a shared passion for photography. To me, the most important part of photography is storytelling, and a strong photo should convey a clear message that resonates with many. Composition and the overall impact of the image, beyond technical details, are crucial. The winning photos comprised these elements and turned out outstanding.” 

Celestia Tan, Fashion Photographer and also a judge said: “Canon PhotoMarathon offers a unique platform for photography enthusiasts to explore, experiment and have fun. For me, the true magic of photography lies in capturing a moment and bringing a vision to life. The second theme, Vintage, was probably the most challenging for participants, where many adopted a literal interpretation due to the time constraints. The most exciting part of this competition is seeing how participants interpreted these themes, capturing diverse stories and unique perspectives through the lens.”

Launched in 2003, the Canon PhotoMarathon is designed to inspire and provoke creative expression by pushing participants to think beyond conventional boundaries. With mystery themes, tight timelines and an open invitation to all levels of photographers, participants race against the clock in a test of creativity and quick thinking to capture fresh, unique perspectives that bring each theme to life.  

The themes encourage photographers to explore new ideas, experiment with different techniques to tell stories. This fosters a vibrant community where creativity flourishes, and diverse voices come together to redefine the art of photography.

Beyond Canon PhotoMarathon 2025, photographers can engage in a range of Canon-led activities aimed at nurturing Singapore’s photography scene. Activities include immersive workshops and guided shoots that offer valuable opportunities for both emerging and experienced photographers to sharpen their skills, expand their creative horizons and receive mentorship from seasoned professionals to elevate standards of photographic excellence in Singapore. 

Stars facilitate innovation: INSEAD

Good mentors are worth their weight in gold, according to new research from INSEAD.

In Where Do Stars Come From? The Role of Star vs. Nonstar Collaborators in Creative Settings, published in Organization Science, Manuel Sosa, INSEAD Associate Professor of Technology and Operations Management, Jürgen Mihm, INSEAD Professor of Technology and Operations Management and Haibo Liu, Assistant Professor of Management, University of California Riverside, discuss the skills required to integrate, or synthesise, various raw materials in a way that will maximise creativity, and create innovations that help organisations outperform their competitors.

Specifically, the research zeroes in on the creative aspects of interpersonal collaboration from a new perspective: the quality of the collaborator, both stars - people able to generate a disproportionate amount of influential output - and non-stars.

“We wanted to understand, if by working with a star, you would be more likely to become a star; we found that indeed you would,” Sosa said. “The interesting question is how does this happen and why does this happen? What happens when you work with a star that is different from when you work with other people?”

By examining the creative performance of designers who have been granted design patents by the US Patent and Trademark Office over a 35-year period, the authors found that collaborating with star designers indeed significantly increases the chances of becoming a star. Interestingly, they found evidence that creative stars are more likely to possess creative synthesis skills required for creating breakthrough innovations and that they transfer such skill to their collaborators.

Such skills include the ability to understand existing innovation paradigms and create a new one by reconciling distant and often seemingly contradictory viewpoints and then continue to iterate and refine such a new paradigm until it leads to an outstanding innovation output.

All of these creative skills are highly tacit and unlikely to be learnt through a book or in a classroom, the researchers say. While some creative stars may pick them up intuitively or through years of trial-and-error experience, the likelihood of someone absorbing these skills is much higher if they work in close proximity with someone who already possesses them. This allows innovators to observe, learn and practice synthesis skills from the star.

“It is important to note that collaborating with stars doesn’t preclude collaborating with others who are non-stars,” Sosa noted. “Both types of collaborators benefit the innovator’s creative performance and increase the likelihood of creating a breakthrough innovation.”

In fact, some companies today avoid the idea of having a design team with a dominant star, and instead focus on the proven premise that diversity – having a wide-ranging pool of potentially innovative ideas – is key to creativity.

Sosa added, “What we found is that as well as bringing with them new data and experience like a non-star, stars contribute a set of creative skills, rarely found anywhere else, that can have a lasting transformation of the innovator’s creative abilities.”

The paper expands on this to assess the conditions required to maximise the chance of rising to stardom, and noted that this varies greatly depending on whether a star is part of the collaboration team.

When non-stars collaborate, shared expertise or a cohesive social network can limit diversity and steer the team towards “group think” - a phenomenon where everyone agrees with each other, even if the conclusion is wrong. This can negatively impact creative output.

However, when non-stars work with stars, greater shared social network connections and closer similarities in expertise facilitate the exploitation of creative synthesis skills. That is, the circumstances help to build a common insightful understanding of the problem at hand; it encourages collaborators to see similarities among their different perspectives and iteratively refine the most promising ideas, increasing the likelihood of breakthrough innovations.

Most importantly, such cohesive collaborative conditions facilitate the transfer of tacit creative skills from stars to his/her collaborators which in turn increases the chances of them becoming stars in the future.

Your Windows device is going to help you get more creative really soon

Source: Microsoft. The possibilities of Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, sketched on a Microsoft Surface by Michael Mindflyer.

Microsoft has announced that the free Windows 10 Fall Creators Update will start rolling out to Windows 10 users worldwide, starting today. The fourth major update to Windows 10 is all about creativity, and is engineered to bring mixed reality and 3D to Windows users, enhancing gaming, audiovisual content and mixed reality.

Some highlights include:

Windows Ink gets better

With the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, users can now ink directly onto PDFs. Smart Ink also allows users to make squares more easily, or automatically turn doodled boxes into a proper table.

Create in 3D

"3D will offer the next major boost to human productivity, enabling a next generation of computing that moves far beyond the 2D world we’ve been confined to. This is so powerful because 3D is truly representative of the world you live in – improving the way you comprehend, retain, and learn," said Yusuf Mehdi, Corporate VP, Windows and Devices Group, Microsoft in a blog post.

Microsoft Paint users can now migrate to Paint 3D, where they can create and share 3D objects. 3D objects are supported by Microsoft Office - rotate and animate objects within documents and presentations.

Source: Microsoft blog. This is what Windows Mixed Reality can do.

See 3D creations in the real world

With Mixed Reality Viewer, users can view 3D objects in the real world and snap pictures of the virtual 3D objects using the world-facing camera on the PC. This is part of Microsoft's push to introduce the world of Windows Mixed Reality.

For accurate immersion in a virtual world, virtual reality technology often needs to track where a user is looking, for example by mounting cameras around a room. Acer, Dell, HP, and Lenovo are launching the first Windows Mixed Reality headsets, which come bundled with advanced motion controllers. "Windows Mixed Reality headsets are the only headsets that don’t require you to drill holes into your walls and you can take them on the go," said Mehdi.

Acer and HP will offer Windows Mixed Reality Headsets with motion controllers; the Lenovo Explorer headset is ergonomically designed; and the Dell Visor features 1,440 x 1,440 LCD panels for a sharp and smooth 360° panoramic experience. Samsung’s just-launched US$499 mixed reality headset, the Samsung HMD Odyssey, will be available November 6. The Samsung HMD Odyssey has dual AMOLED high-resolution displays, a 110-degree field of view, built-in premium AKG headphones, and integrated six degrees of freedom (DOF) inside-out position tracking.

The headsets will be supported by Windows Mixed Reality PCs and Windows Mixed Reality Ultra PCs. Windows Mixed Reality PCs refer to desktops and laptops with integrated graphics. When plugged into these devices, the new immersive headsets will run at 60 frames per second. 

Windows Mixed Reality Ultra PCs are desktops and laptops with discrete graphics. Discrete graphics is typically more powerful than integrated graphics. When plugged into these devices, the headsets will run at 90 frames per second, which would deliver a smoother experience.

Save disk space

All files in OneDrive can now be accessed On-Demand, whether they have been synched to the PC or not. In essence, the files will appear in the File Explorer window without taking up any storage space on the PC hard disk.

Explore:

The Windows 10 Fall Creators Update can be experienced on a wide variety of Windows 10 PCs and on the new Windows Mixed Reality headsets. The headsets begin at US$399. 

A calendar created in partnership with Singapore-based illustrator Michael Mindflyer provides a painless way to adopt a creative mindset over 21 days while getting to know the Fall Creators Update better. Day 1: start a creative checklist in Microsoft OneNote, and start doodling with Windows Ink's SketchPad on day 2. Download a high-resolution version of the calendar (PDF).

Maybank, MaGIC to boost startups across ASEAN

Maybank became the first bank to officially formalise its partnership with Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre (MaGIC) in efforts to further boost startups across the ASEAN region.

Maybank will leverage on MaGIC‘s expertise, regional reach and resources to nurture upcoming local and regional startups. One of the key roles for Maybank is to be the financial services partner for MaGIC’s ASEAN Centre of Entrepreneurship (ACE), which is a startup support services platform offering services such as legal advice, IP consultations, visa applications and company secretarial services through its partners. This platform will support Malaysian startups looking to expand into ASEAN countries and for ASEAN startups to expand into Malaysia.

MaGIC Chief Executive Officer Cheryl Yeoh said that this partnership will help in boosting the development of startups and social enterprise (SE) initiatives not only in Malaysia, but in the region. “We are pleased at this collaboration with Maybank – both as a main partner for our startup support services platform as well as providing the opportunities for fintech startups to grow locally and regionally. We are encouraged by the support we are seeing from the private sector and Maybank as one of the early driver for private sector opportunities,” she said.

In return, Maybank will act as an advisory partner to MaGIC’s Accelerator Programs and Academy, especially in building viable propositions in the context of regional opportunities in the financial services industry, help facilitate market validation and identify potential “go-to-market” partners.

Maybank's Amran Hassan, Head Corporate Development & Innovation said that Maybank has always placed importance in innovation as a key organisational competency that will help identify and shape new sources of competitive advantages. “The collaboration with MaGIC will allow Maybank to play a more prominent role in the supporting the start-up ecosystem regionally,” he said. "We have taken the market lead in the high-growth startup ecosystem as part of our efforts to support promising technology startups across the markets where we operate. We will continue to work with strategic industry partners in providing competitive platforms in our efforts to help build ASEAN into a global centre for innovation.”

Facebook Singapore creates a truly local office that facilitates creativity

Facebook Singapore's new office in South Beach has been designed to reflect the open, connected workplace culture. The company has incorporated unique cultural references and local flavour to create a workplace that is clearly based in Singapore.

The pantry, meeting areas and snack stands offer lots of space to network and chat. This stand is built like a traditional pushcart, and snacks are displayed in bamboo steamers.

The Facebook mahjong table looks to be another possibility for jumpstarting interaction and serendipity.

Local artists have been invited to contribute to the decor. The artwork on the staircases is by Dawn Ng and simulate the effect of being in a storm of pink confetti. One wall is devoted to a photography exhibit by celebrity Instagram photographer Aik Beng Chia.

The meeting rooms all have interesting names. One was called 'Kopi C Siu Tai', and two adjacents rooms were named 'Same Same' and 'Only Different'. Another is called 'Hiverabad', a play on 'hive' and 'Hyderabad'. This one is particularly inspired as 'C++' is a programming language while SEA is the acronym for Southeast Asia.

There are posters galore in the Facebook workplace, many of them inspirational. One of the most meaningful: Nothing at Facebook is somebody else's problem.

Instagram's Anti-Gravity Room offers amazing possibilities for images on Instagram.

The 'office supplies vending machine' stocks most of the common stationery and electronics accessories which might be needed in a typical working day, saving Facebook staff from the administrative effort of requisitioning items or going shopping.

Interested?

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