Four kids and a Canon

Learning to See: A Father Behind the Lens

5 min read1 hour ago

Tell us a bit about yourself — where are you from, and what did you do when you weren’t taking photos?
A: My name is Denzil Bernard Jayasinghe. I am 71, a manager by day and the family patriarch of seventeen — four kids, their partners and eight grandkids, seventeen of us including me. As of today, I live in Sydney’s north‑west and am planning to move to an apartment on the north shore in 2027. I like to keep a sense of order in my life, whether it was work or leisure.

Q: How did you get into photographing your children?
A: When my father passed away nearly twenty‑five years ago, I went into shock. It had never really occurred to me that he wouldn’t be there; he had been a strong, pioneering influence on my life. In that grieving process, I realised my own time on this planet was limited, and that our time with loved ones was finite too. It struck me that my time with my four children — three of them then budding teenagers — was slipping away. I decided I wanted to record them in their best years for posterity. I bought a Canon compact digital camera straight away and began photographing my children. A few years later I moved to a Canon DSLR, then to a few Canon full‑frame bodies with some fast prime lenses. Along the way I attended an art school to learn the basics of film photography — light, shutter speed, darkroom work — and discovered it was hard but rewarding work.

Q: What were your early images?
A: My father had actually photographed me first, with a borrowed black‑and‑white camera. Later, when I landed in Dubai, still new to the adult world, I bought an instant pocket camera that took 110 film.

Q: And then?
A: The family images I made of my own children were taken when they were teenagers — mostly impromptu, grabbed in the middle of everyday life.

Q: What kind of themes were you exploring in those photos?
A: I wasn’t chasing technical perfection; I was chasing the moment. If a photo was a bit blurred, it didn’t worry me — what mattered was that the experience and impression were there. I was openly jealous of Annie Leibovitz, who had mastered both the moment and the technique and was probably the world’s best photographer. I was just an ordinary guy who had learned photography in his forties.

Q: For you, what were the best and hardest parts of photographing your children?
A: The best part was seeing them enjoy themselves and being able to capture those moments, knowing I was their carer in those tender years. The hardest part was when they got annoyed and I was still struggling with where to place them or how long I was taking — you could see that irritation in some of the photos.

Q: How much planning went into each photo?
A: None, really. They were impromptu moments that erupted in our daily lives.

Q: How come you don’t photograph your grandkids the way you did your kids?
A: You’re right, I don’t photograph them in the same way. My adult children are the ones capturing most of their moments now, on their smartphones. We have multiple photo channels where they share images and little clips, and it’s wonderful watching my kids enjoy the growing moments of theirchildren’s lives. The grandkids are still very young — between one and seven — so they haven’t hit those turbulent teenage years yet. In a few short years, things might change. In the meantime, I’m still holding onto my camera gear: the Canon R5C, the 5D, and a medium‑format Fujifilm with their prime lenses, waiting for the next chapter.

Q: What’s next for you, photography‑wise?
A: I’m toying with the idea of selling most of my gear and simplifying down to a single camera. Every quarter there’s some new gadget on the market — the Fujifilm X‑Half, and so on — and it’s tempting. But my current kit cost me a lot, and the thought of letting it go is painful. I haven’t decided yet. It’s quite possible I’ll keep the big cameras and quietly add a small, light camera I can slip into a pocket, like the old 110 camera I bought in Dubai in the seventies. In a way, it feels like I’ve come full circle.