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Victoria Memorial – Reflections!

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Victoria Memorial in Kolkata is a very famous landmark. covering an expansive area, this structure is very grand. It is quite a contrast to the Maidan bang opposite it, in the sense that the Memorial complex is so serene, so calm. The gardens in the complex, the silent waters, the exotic flowers planted all around, the grand trees sans leaves, is a treat for sore eyes. Keep aside atleast a couple of hours to fully experience the monument and the surroundings.

Here i just wanted to capture the reflections of the lights and the top dome of the Memorial onto the still water around. Thankfully the surface of the water was plain and there were no disturbances.

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Retrospectives – A Raghu Rai Photography Exhibition!

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“A Journey of a Moment in Time – Retrospectives”, said a column in Bombay Times Arts n Culture page. Retrospectives was the word that grabbed my attention and I wasn’t disappointed as it was an exhibition by the same photographer. Raghu Rai. Just back from a this very fantastic Photography Exhibition at the National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA).

Raghu Rai is one of India’s finest documentary photographer known for his photographs of the Real India. His extensive coverage of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy even won him a World Press Photo award in the year 1984.

Most of the photographs are in Black and White. Ranging from wide panoramas to normal frames to vertical wide angled perspectives, Rai has taken care of every angle. Almost all of the photographs are quite dramatic with the Human Element, a couple of landscapes are also featured. Portraits of Indian Classical Musicians in their element are particularly appealing. Mother Teresa’s portraits are really moving. Photographs of the Bhopal Gas Tragedy really get one by the gut. They are very graphic.

Raghu Rai’s portrayal of life around Ghats of India really appealed to me. Be it the Ghats of Varanasi or the numerous Ghats at Kolkata (really reminded me of my days there). We all go around such places, do all the religious stuff, but do we really ponder over the life going on around us there? Rai gives us beautiful perspectives there.

The second floor of the Gallery has Color photographs which take one through a colorful journey across India, from Varanasi to Thiruvananthapuram to Mumbai to Kolkata.

If anyone from Mumbai is planning on going there, I would definitely like to make particular mention of some images that really floored me.

1. My Father and My Son – a BW image of just the hands of an old man and a child entangled in each other. Just looking at the photograph one can deduce the emotions that aren’t visible in the frame.

2. Among the Sparrows

3. Traffic at Chauri bazaar – a wide panorama shot really gives us an idea of Delhi in the 1960s. The chaos, vendors and rickshaws, so typical of Indian Bazaars.

4. Avani at her farm – shows a profile of lil girl in her car located in a region that has very scary clouds and its bout to rain.

5. Immersion at Babughat – a very typical Kolkata photograph during the Poojas. I loved it just for the nostalgia:d

6. Indira Gandhi at the Congress Session – it shows Indira Gandhi surrounded by her party members in a meeting, with the focus only on Indira Gandhi. The emotions on her face convey lots of thoughts (anger and sadness were two emotions I could deduce)

7. A Bazaar Scene – this photograph has an old man covering the bottom half of the frame, sound asleep with the chaos goin on behind him indicated by the slow shutter speed.

8. Cows and Pilgrims – taken on a ghat, where a pilgrim and the cows fill the frame in such a way that it appears that the man is sandwiched between the cows.

9. Wrestlers in Akhara – Simple daily life photograph but the painting on the doo r of the akhara seems to merge with the real wrestler as an extension to his arm. Very very creative composition.

10. Combed beach – the textured sand after the waves have retreated back in the waters.

11. Ayodhya – The day before – This series of photographs was clicked one day before the Demolition of the Babri Masjid. Not a soul can imagine from the mood of the photographs, what
was to follow the next day.

12. An Artist Studio – It shows one of the many sculpture studios in Kolkata. The fascinating part about this image is that the statues and real people are arranged in such a manner that we feel the statues are real and the real people are statues. This picture just reinforced in me the true Power of Composition of ones photographs.

Saving the Best for the last. “Indira Gandhi in the Himalayas” – This picture just has the Himalayan hills in the background and a silhouette portrait in the foreground. It’s a Profile shot with not even a cm of visibility, but anyone can easily recognize that its Indira Gandhi. I was super impressed by this image.

“Burial of an unknown child” from the Bhopal gas Tragedy series really chokes you. You will definitely feel something. I think it was this photograph that won the World Press Photo Award.

That was about it. I am so glad that I finally got to see a Raghu Rai exhibition. Happier even more that I have been able to keep up my resolution of seeing atleast one Photography Exhibition every month. Its been great so far with Exhibitions by greats like Rai and Henri Cartier Bresson already seen.

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Ciao

Abandoned!

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Was walking to the bazaar of my native place in the evening. Noticed this bright yellow Gajra lying amidst all the dry leaves. It looked very out of place, very detached. It was a contradictory situation, in the sense that the bright yellow did attract my attention, would attract anyone’s attention, but at the same time this is not where the Gajra was meant to be in the first place. It seemed like a commentary on one aspect of my life. Caused me to wait and compose the image. Then decided to desaturate the rest of frame, keeping just the out of place Gajra in focus. My feeble attempts at Abstract Photography:P

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Seminar on Macro Photogaphy!

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Macro Photography is one aspect of photography that is really fascinating to me. It really makes a person super observant to his surroundings. Photographic Society on India, had a presentation on Macro Photography today. Luckily it was my morning shift today, so made it to the seminar on time.

The photographer named Yuvaraj Gurjar was at the centre stage. The seminar had already started, so i took the only available seat. The photographer stated off with a slide show of his collection of macro photographs. They were visually very appealing. He is basically into insect photogaphy specially butterfly. Also in the slideshow were photographs of snakes, some venomous, some not. He also gave us a brief story behind some of the photographs.

The part i liked the best about this seminar was the holistic approach which the photographer has taken towards nurturing this art. Specialising in Macro Photography, he stated that most of his Sundays are spent in some forest or the other. He has done immense research on the insect species as well as reptiles, which is very paramount, if one really wants to capture some mind blowing shots. Equipment used by him is top of its class. But its person behind the camera that really matters.

Some of his photographs like the life cycle of a butterfly from the egg stage -> to the larvae stage -> to the caterpillar stage and finally emerging outta the coccoon to the full-winged butterfly state, were sheer brilliance at work. His knowledge on the various species of butterflies and their locations, their lifestyles was very exhaustive. Came to learn that there are around 4000 species of butterflies of which around 1000 or so can be found in India. North Eastern states like Arunachal Pradesh have a very dense population of variety of butterflies.

Macro photography is one thing i havent really explored sans some random shots. It is fascinating for the simple reason that it magnifies miniscule details of objects which one would never give a second glance to. After hearing the photographer on the research to be done if one really wants to excel in this kinda photography ie. Macro Wildlife Photography, my respect towards the art has just increased. One gets to see Nature in a completely different light. Plus Macro Photography is a great excercise for the body as one can definitely not hope to take photographs at just the eye level. So kneeling, sleeping on ones stomach and the likes are very much the positions one needs to get in to get the perfect shot. And since DSLRs hardly come with a swivel screen, so one has to do all of the above to see his/her result on the LCD:d

All in all an hour and a half well spent. Photography is so VAST, each aspect of photography is an entire subject in itself. That is good in a way cos it keeps the mind at its active best. At its creative best. It never lets those grey cells rest :D

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Ciao

The Tower!

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This picture was clicked from a View Point named Ganesh Tok. This point has a Ganesh temple at its base, a little climbing up the stairs and you come to a point, from which you get a complete view of Gangtok City from a height. Notice the roads going zig zag, and yeaah the very prominent thing as can be seen in the pic is the TV tower. Yeah Gangtok has a Doordarshan Kendra. You can see this tower from almost anywhere in Gangtok.

As the time was just about 615 am, you can see the fog beyond the 1st mountain. If seen clearly, we see a lot of houses built on the hill itself, surrounded by tall pine trees. Also seen in the picture is another very prominent feature of Gangtok, the white colored prayer flags.

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Ciao

A Lone Bicycle!

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Kolkata has many narrow alleys (aka gullies), formed because of the gaps between two very closely spaced buildings. I was photographing one such narrow road when i noticed this bicycle left unattended outside a house. The bicycle seemed ready to take off any time. So thought of capturing before it decided to do so:D

I had thought of keeping this in the B/W mode, but the green door and highlighted wood on the upper part convinced me that it would look good in color. The green metal balcony fence remind one of an era gone by. I also liked the shadow formed due to the wood in the upper half.

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The Mumbai Skyline!

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Today’s Maharashtra Day. So thought of putting up a relevant picture. Of all the pictures I picked this cos it just represents to me the greatest place on the planet!
This picture was clicked sometime back. It was a cloudy day as can be seen. I dunno why I’m putting this up so late, but i somehow love this picture. Its so Mumbai! Clicked off Marine Drive, the picture showcases the southern end of the Queens Necklace, winding around the Girgaum Chowpatty Beach with Walkeshwar in the background. I know none of the places mentioned are clearly visible here:P as i wanted to focus on the sky more than the places. To enhance it I used a cooler tone, and kept the ratio in favour of the sky.

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The IndiBlogger Meet!

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I had registered my site on the site named IndiBlogger.in just for the heck of it. Actually i had found their IndiBlogger badge quite cool, and wouldnt mind having it on my page. But when i registered on the site, i got an even cooler IndiClicker badge, which kinda gels with this blog of mine. Apart from being a blog directory, the guys at IndiBlogger.in also organised meets.

The date was initially fixed at 20th April, and somehow for reasons unknown, it got postponed. I was like, damn this meet is never gonna happen. But a few days later i got a mail in my inbox, informing me of a new date along with the venue and the time. So far so good!

The D day arrived. I was ready for the meet. The only catch was that i had absolutely no clue of any of the bloggers who were gonna attend the meet. I hadnt even gone thru any blogs of the people expected at the meet. Apprehension was building up by the moment!

The meet started according to Indian Standard Time (adding 30-40mins to the scheduled time). First of all the Indiblogger team started off with the “About Us”. Then each one of the team member gave us a brief bio on their blogs. Then we had the “One Minute of Fame” thing. This was basically an “Advertise your Blog” session. Was a nervous wreck by the time i came on to advertise my blog. Trust me, nothings more difficult than campaigning for your blog, when you have over 50 eyeballs staring at you. Public speaking is definately not my forte:D

It was quite refreshing to see the variety amongst the bloggers. I dont think any 2 bloggers blogged on the same theme/topics. It was a potpourri of themes. Some of the bloggers talked bout some techie stuff which I had no clue about. (I know i should feel ashamed bout that:D after all im an engg.)

Next on the agenda was a “How well do you know your readers?” session, where in the Indiblogger team had collected random comments from the blogs of the people present. Luckily they had a comment from my blog too which was quite easy to guess as i dont have many comments on my blog anyways:d I had to do the Indiblogger jig.

Next : Tea Session. I found this session the best. Ok that was not just because of the food which was quite good (being a Taurean, cant prevent myself from complimenting good food), but, it was during the tea session that i got to interact with maximum number of bloggers. Also interacted with the Indiblogger team. It was surprising to learn that these 4 guys had formed the site and didnt have any revenue model so to speak. Inspite of that going ahead and organising meets in different cities, was an effort worth appreciating. Finished off the session with a dollop of vanilla covered with chocolate sauce:D

Next in line was a session on Microsoft LiveWriter. By the way, forgot to mention, the event was sponsored by Microsoft. Apart from that, two bloggers talked on pro-blogging and micro-blogging. I’m sorry i cant recall who was who, so im not takin any names. In the end we were asked to fill up a feedback form and were promised Tshirts:D This was followed by the Indiblogger Skit!

There were many shutterbugs in the meet, clicking their way to glory. The Nikon DSLRs in action were looking fabulous. Hey Indiblogger team, when and where can i expect to see the meet photographs?

My Thoughts on the meet
It was an excellent platform for like minded individuals to network. Blogging has been a part of my life since the last three years, and interacting with other bloggers, discussing on various aspects of blogging, was a Sunday well spent! The rapport amongst all the participating bloggers was quite good. Also came to know more about the concept of Pro-Blogging. Networking in action was the thing i liked the best. Also, i hope to get more hits on my blog from now on:D Will add the links of the Indiblogger Junta to the right ASAP.

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Ciao

Bombay Stock Exchange!

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The Bombay Stock Exchange Limited (formerly, The Stock Exchange, Mumbai; popularly called The Bombay Stock Exchange, or BSE) is the oldest stock exchange in Asia. It is located at Dalal Street, Mumbai, India. It was
constructed by LnT.
The building is synonymous with Mumbai and the area where its located has an energy that is matched by no other place i have ever been to. It had been rocked by a bomb blast in 1992, but the structure stood still!

I went down on my knees to get the complete building. Right now the stock markets are going thru a tough period, courtesy Inflation. wanted to capture that aspect, so composed the image along with the branches barging into the frame.

Canon S5 IS here!!

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I finally got my dream gadget, as a self gift on my 24th bday, the fabulous prosumer Canon S5 IS. Ever since i started getting familiar with the manual mode of my Canon Powershot A400, i used to feel that i wasnt completely satisfied with it as i had moved beyond point and shoot stuff. The features though great for a newbie, were somehow not enough for me, as i wanted to explore more. At the same time i didnt have the cash to go for a complete pro DSLR. So the next best option was to go for a pro-sumer camera.

Pro-sumer as the name itself suggests, is a camera, that lies between professional and consumer compacts. “The features of a DSLR, the convinience of a Powershot”, so goes the tagline for S5 IS. After much research, i narrowed down my options to the S5 IS.

Features. Well i wont go into much details, just a brief lowdown on the features. For detailed reviews one can always visit dpreview.com. Canon S5 IS is an 8 MP camera, having 12x Optical Zoom (yea that like 4 times my prev camera). IS stands for Image Stabilization, which prevents blurry images formed due to shaky hands at times. Its got Aperture Priority mode (f 2.7 to f 8.0), Shutter priority mode (1/3200 sec to 15 sec) and your Program, Custom and Manual modes. ISO is upto 1600. Macro is of 2 kinds, one is normal Macro and the other is Super Macro (whose dist is as low as 0cm). Also its got a 2.5 inch swivel LCD screen. The ergonomics are too good.

My happiness knew no bounds when i held the S5 for the first time and checked it out. Finally i was checkin the S5 in real, not on the net. The black body and the very picturesque lens setup made me go wow! I can write paens about the look of S5 IS, but ill stop here lest someone doubt my inclinations:P

I used it a couple of times, and needless to say, the results were disastrous. I used to feel that knowing the theory of apertures and shutters was enough to give you an idea of composing the shots accordingly, but sadly thats not true, as i learnt. I still am struggling to get the Aperture and Shutter speed correct. Many other factors like manual focussing, ISO also play an important role. Its an uphill task i gotta say. But then it took me two and a half years to get fully acquainted with A400. Of which one and a half year was spent only using Automatic mode. So i guess it’ll take a while before i am completely comfortable with S5 IS. Since engg exams, this is the first time that i feel i am up against a challenge. Gotta say, it keeps you motivated. Photography is never going to be the same for me again. I guess, the journey has just about begun!

Take Care

Ciao!