The Making Of…

fine art print - boat on the river yamuna

Boat on the river Yamuna, India

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“It is in looking too intensely at a thing that we often miss out the beauty of things around it.”

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The Making of  “Boat on the River Yamuna, India”

Yes, the reason for visiting Agra is to photograph the Taj Mahal, but in focusing too much on the Taj, many a visitor often misses out the visual wonders to be found around it. Like this boat on the river  for example.

Just behind the Taj runs this river. And for centuries has the ferryman plied his trade here, ferrying passengers from one bank to the other. Nothing extraordinary about it, not until you look at it with different eyes.

What caught my eye was the play of light, the expanse of space, and the relative stillness of the scene that presented itself to me. The ripples in the water were few and far between –  there was a sense of balance and harmony even as the players in the scene played out their respective roles. Click! And the image was made!

In post-processing I chose to give an impressionist feel to the image, while cropping it to a square format; the better to give it a feeling of balance and harmony.

Another image that ranks as a favourite, this one! Brilliant play of light, gorgeous tones, subtlety of lines… printed on canvas, this fine art print comes across as an impressionist painting.

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fine art print - kashi - the city of light

Kashi – The City Of Light #1

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The Making of  “Kashi – The City Of Light #1”

“You don’t make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved.” ~ Ansel Adams

On the banks of the river Ganges in the state of Uttar Pradesh in India stands the spiritual capital of India. Its many names include “the city of temples”, “the holy city of India”, “the religious capital of India”, “the city of lights”, “the city of learning”, “the oldest living city on earth”. It is more commonly known as “Varanasi” and also “Benares”. But the only name that really does justice to it is the original name mentioned in the scriptures: Kashi – The City of Light.

Kashi is said to have been founded by the Great God Shiva, who is said to be eternally present here along with his consort Parvati. Kashi is home to over 23000 temples and is one of the most important places of pilgrimage for practitioners of the Hindu faith who flock here to perform their rituals and bathe in the holy river Ganges. Life in Kashi hence rotates around its temples and the bathing ghats (flight of steps) that lead to the holy river.

In the making of this photograph, I was primarily driven by a couple of factors. Driven as I am by my quest for Light, Color and Contrast, it was natural that I was drawn to what I saw unfolding before me. The intensity of the colors, the glow of light off the steps in the background, the contrast and juxtaposition of the players in the scene all screamed out to be photographed. And therein lies a story…

Central to hindu philosophy are the terms Purusha and Prakriti. Purusha is the self (spirit/soul), Prakriti is matter/energy. They are quite similar to the concepts of Yin and Yang in Taoist thought, seemingly opposite forces which are actually complementary parts of the same unified whole.

Shiva – The Lord of Kashi – is Purusha personified. As  the supreme renunciant,  he is not given to action. He does not participate in the going-ons of the world. He merely sits and observes. His wife Parvati on the other hand is the very energy that drives everything to action; she is Nature, she is Movement. She is Prakriti personified.

Stillness and Movement. Male and Female. Yang and Yin. Purusha & Prakriti. Seeming opposites, but in reality the material world cannot exist without the play of both. Just as it is contrast that makes an image, so is it that this play of seeming opposites makes the world and Life so interesting.

The Photograph

This image.  I must say,  is one of my favourites. Gorgeous colours, light to die for, brilliant composition, perfect moment, outstanding post-processing. This photograph does not look like a photograph at all. Rather, it comes across as a painting.

This photograph is all about contrast. Contrast of colors, contrast of subjects, contrast of movement and stillness, contrast of genders. It is perhaps apt that  for the first time I truly viscerally felt how the play of opposites is vital to the balance of an image as it is to life; how apt that it should occur at a location that is the very soul of India’s hindu faith!

In post-processing I gave this image an impressionist feel, the better to convey the City of Light aspect of Kashi.

The Fine Art Print

This photograph is available in two formats: (a) as a ready-to-hang mounted canvas print, and (b) a framed image printed on either canvas or Fine Art Paper. Owing to the nature and post-processing used, I personally recommend option (a).

The print is available in two style sizes: Panoramic Collector (20″×8.35″), and Panoramic Gallery (32″×13.4″). Sizes are in U.S. inches and are approximate. Please view the Pricing Guide – Images in Panoramic Format below for pricing details.

All materials used in the printing and framing process are acid free, making the print especially resistant to aging. Prints are produced using the highest quality papers / canvases using the best inks possible.

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Buddha Is In The Details

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The Making of “Buddha Is In The Details”

The Middle Path or Middle Way is the expression the Buddha used in his first discourse to describe the Noble Eightfold Path to achieve enlightenment. Put simply, it eschewed the taking of extremes.

Visually, that for me spells as “take too long a view, and you’re liable to miss out on the finer details. Take too short a view and you won’t get the larger picture.”

The Photograph

This is one of my favorite images, in no small measure because of the above mentioned “Middle Way” approach that I took to photographing it. I was drawn by the repeating pattern of prayer wheels leading into the distance, as I was by the earthy hues. Closer examination of the subject revealed textures that I felt were vital to conveying what I felt about what needed to be conveyed: that true balance is a fine line we need to skirt between what is close and what is distant.

By bunching myself against the prayer wheels I filled the frame with them. By focusing on the middle one, I ensured I had enough scope to let the depth-of-field drop off in a fashion that gave coherence to the image. I focused on the details, yet implied similarity and continuity by the repetition of patterns.

In post-processing I chose to accentuate texture by deliberate over-sharpening. I also chose to accentuate the earthy tones during the process.

The Print

This fine art photograph is available in two formats: (a) as a ready-to-hang mounted canvas print, and (b) a framed image printed on either canvas or Fine Art Paper.

The print is available in five size formats: Decorator, Collector, Connoisseur, Gallery, and Masterpiece. Sizes are in U.S. inches and are approximate.

All materials used in the printing and framing process are acid free, making the print especially resistant to aging. Prints are produced using the highest quality papers / canvases using the best inks possible.

To purchase this Fine Art Photograph, please contact us.

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Wah, Taj!

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 The Making of  “Wah, Taj!”

Who hasn’t heard of it? That most wonderful Monument to Love. One of  The Seven Wonders of  The World. The One and only Taj Mahal…

Photographing it would be a breeze. If it weren’t for the fact that it ranks among one of the most photographed monuments on the face of the planet. And personally, I do dislike making cliche photographs – that’s just not my style – a photograph must be uniquely me – my personal vision, my personal style…

I made this photograph on the last day on one of my annual Five Stops of Light India Photography Tour. Before sunrise, my workshop participants and I headed off  to this vantage point I’d discovered. We then waited for the sun to rise and the fog to clear. The former did, the latter didn’t seem to be in much of a mood to cooperate. I finally decided to trip the shutter as a bird flew across the frame, knowing that I wouldn’t have any detail in the structure itself worth writing home about; but that wasn’t my purpose anyway. As I mentioned, the cliche image just isn’t my style – my focus here was to capture the shape of the structure which is what I did.

In post-processing I boosted contrast to accentuate the shape of the Taj as well as the foliage in the foreground. I also applied a nice warm-yellow graduated filter (the better to give a warm, inviting feel to the image). In ending, I added a texture to the image to give it that weathered and cracked feel of an old parchment. My aim was to try and recreate the magic felt by those early western explorers — the awe they must have experienced upon finally breaking through the jungle and setting eyes on this truly magnificent building for the first time.

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A Steamy Affair, Ladakh

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The Making of A Steamy Affair, Ladakh

Visiting Ladakh in winter is crazy, what with the freezing cold, but that’s exactly what I was doing. I guess that also made the participant who’d requested a winter photography tour to Ladakh, but that’s beside the point.

Given that the people of the region were far more relaxed and open than they are during the tourist season, I found myself having access to places I normally wouldn’t. Many a kind stranger threw open the door to their house to invite me in for a snack. And one monastery was kind enough to throw open the door to their kitchen to me when I came a calling.

So there I was trudging my way down this flight of steps that led to this subterranean kitchen. And what I saw took my breath away.  The light – as it filtered in from overhead – had me spellbound. The effect was further accentuated by the steam rising from the cooking utensils. The cook – and the monks who trooped in – were oblivious to my presence. After a few seconds they did ask me to stop, only to thrust a plate of rice and daal towards me with a stern “Eat!”.

The Photograph

I simply love this photograph because of  the contrast at work – contrast in tones (differences in light and dark) and contrast in colours (yellow and blue). The challenge in taking this shot was to ensure I didn’t blow my highlights out; it’s easy to do that when the scene is as contrasty as this one was. Luckily for me, I know my DSLR camera’s meter like the back of my hand and managed to nail the exposure just right.

There are also several other things that make this image a brilliant one:

– The cook’s face being partly in shadow adds a sense of mystery, while also goes well with the overall contrast theme of the image.

– The gradation of tones from dark below to bright above lead our eyes along that path. Which really helps in our “visceral” understanding of this image considering the steam is going along the same path.

– The slightly visible form of people behind the steam adds to the sense of mystery

– The yellow daal is so small considering the overall size of the image. It it yet so powerful. I cannot imagine this image without it.

– The turn of the cook’s head, the slant of his body… everything is just right.

Post-processing was focused on boosting the blues and yellows and also enhancing contrast.

The Print

This photograph is available in two formats: (a) as a ready-to-hang mounted canvas print, and (b) a framed image printed on either canvas or Fine Art Paper.

The print is available in five style sizes: Decorator, Collector, Connoisseur, Gallery, and Masterpiece. Sizes are in U.S. inches and are approximate.

For purchasing this print, please contact us.

 

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