Happy Halloween 2015 from Jeju, South Korea!
For Halloween this year, I attended and photographed a Halloween party for kids. It was lots of fun.
My friend Ryan and his wife Yeojin own and run an excellent hagwon (academy) called Lion English. This was their fourth year holding a Halloween party for their academy students, and I was thoroughly impressed with the activities, planning, and organization of the whole event.
Photographing the kids playing the games and trick-or-treating was great, and to be honest, it was easily the best Halloween party for kids I’ve ever attended (or any kids’ party for that matter).
A shot of Ryan dressed up as Captain America.
Yeojin dressed up as Catwoman. Here she is posing with the kids while trick-or-treating. Ryan and Yeojin sure know how to throw a great kids’ party.
Party Details
Stephanie (dressed as a Minion) worked the Guess! game station.
The party lasted from 7:00-9:30 pm and was held in a circular gathering area in a small park. About 45 students showed up dressed in costume, eager to play games and ready to have a good time.
First, each student was given a ‘passport card’ which listed the games that they needed to play (ex. Spider Walk, Bone Dig, Frankenstein Putt). Once they finished each game, they would get a stamp on the card. In total, there were 8 games that the kids could play, each manned by a different foreign teacher/older student who volunteered to help out. It goes without saying that after they played a game, they got candy to put in their trick-or-treating bucket or bag.
Yeojin managed the Candy Poke darts game.
As you’ll see from the photos, the games were painstakingly created and put together to have an authentic Halloween feel. The effort put into making the games went a long way because they were seriously fun for the kids!
Alex manned the well-constructed Frankenstein Putt station
After each student got a chance to play all of the games, they were divided into groups, given a map, and lead by a teacher around the neighborhood where 6 or 7 designated families were giving out candy to the trick or treaters.
To me, this was the most exciting part of the evening; it really made me remember Halloween when I was a kid, costumed and running from house to house with friends trying to maximize my candy output for the night. It’s really impressive that Ryan and Yeojin were able to recreate that authentic American Halloween feeling for kids.
A mother and her son handing out candy to the trick or treaters.
Photographing the Party
There I am getting the action shots up-close.
It was totally dark in the area where the party was held, so I used my trusty but very reasonably priced Yongnuo YN-568EX II Speedlite atop my Canon 6D body for nearly all my shots.
I was planning on mostly shooting with my Canon 50mm f/1.4 lens due to the low light, but I realized the kids were quite shy if I tried to take individual shots of them, so I switched to my wide angle Canon 17-40mm f/4 L lens. I knew I would need lots of group shots and some wide shots to capture kids participating in the games, so this lens was my go-to for the event.
Personally, I love shooting with a wide-angle lens on a full-frame camera body because it actually allows you to see a much wider depth than the human eye can perceive. I just had to be careful and keep the subject of the shot centered, as this lens on a full-frame tends to really distort around the edges.
The slight distortion in this shot isn’t a problem because the focus and brightest points are all central.
Below is a gallery of the best of the rest shots. Click on any photo to view it in Lightbox.
*Bonus*
First bonus photo is this black and white shot I took before the kids started trick or treating. I saw this boy sitting next to the Jeju dol hareubang (grandfather) statue, under a cool circular bench, and thought I could make an image with a nice balance and contrast. A touch of B/W editing and cropping and I got this creepy shot (which doesn’t exactly fit with the rest of the images).
For a lighter bonus, a cute video:
Earlier in the day, I was hanging out at my mother-in-law’s house in Seogwipo (the southern city in Jeju) with my wife, daughter Lila, and niece and nephew. We all bought some small, silly costumes and were trying them on when I took this video of Lila. Enjoy the cuteness. Hope you had a great Halloween 2015!
Wow, that bonus photo is a great shot! That party looked so fun! I really like all the creative activities made for the kids with the Halloween theme! My favorite is the miniature golf! Great looking party!
This is such a great idea. Love the ‘designated family candy house’. Also the games look amazing. So much time and effort was clearly put into this Halloween!
I love Halloween! I’m glad that Korea has slowly adopted this holiday from the US. I love to dress up and now that I have a son, it’s even more fun to dress him and take him trick-or-treating. Great photos of the kids and looks like you all had a lot of fun.
Love that creepy bonus shot at the end! I remember going to a local haunted spot with my friends when I was in high school and taking similar creepy shots… good times!
This party looks amazing… sounds like your friends knocked it out of the park. I love the level of detail they put into the games.
Wow how fun! Our hagwon had a Halloween day going on but it was all inside, fun to see that it’s also doable to go and do activities outside with the kids! Looks like you had a lot of fun and great photos 🙂
This party looks awesome! It’s great to see the kids enjoying themselves and to see how much effort you guys put into throwing this party. What a memorable experience for the little ones and adults a like. Everyone had such killer costumes!
That’s so awesome. I love that the Hagwon went to such great efforts to bring a western holiday to Korea. It’s definitely a great way for Korea to be exposed to a different culture. As a child growing up in Canada I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a party quite like the one in your post. I bet those kids had a great time!
Great pictures by the way
Loved your costume! It was really awesome and I like how well the party was set up! It’s good for kids to experience!
What an amazing time for those kids, and great job capturing the festivities! Events like these are missing in Korea, and it’s great to see kids experiencing it for the first time. I’m also impressed with your shots in such low light. We have the same camera, but that flash sure did a spectacular job! It looks like you and the kids had a good time and your pictures are a lot of fun.