Twisted Indifference

I was done with the photography workshop by 1400 hrs. A cola and a smoke and then a cab down to Jehangir Art Gallery. The street was already filled up with the artists setting up their exhibits. I met up with fellow bloggers for lunch, including celebrity bloggers like Sakshi and a blogger that churns out ideas by the dozen.

Now down to the photography. The photograph used at the top of this post was clicked with the intention of putting it as the opening photo. When I saw the sculpture of the paint cans hanging on the stand, I knew this was what I would want to open this post with. Confession time, I agree this is a clichéd snap. I believe a lot of people will have attempted a similar snap. With the plethora of photographers around I doubt that it would not have been attempted. Always fun to play with Depth of Field (DOF). Even though the aperture was stopped down till 5.6, which is not really something that would support a clear DOF in say a landscape shot but it was more than adequate here. You can still see the slight gaussian blur after the 5th can.

The correct DOF can make or break a good photograph. I believe that a proper tutorial on DOF would make a great post. That however would have to be kept for later. I have another post to make for the Kala Ghoda Art festival and I still have to feature the remaining vehicles shot at the Auto Expo 2008. I have a feeling that I am going to end up updating everyday this week.

Another couple of snaps that I clicked at the fest.

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The last time I missed the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival due to lack of planning on my part. This time it is not too different. I made sure that I registered myself this time for the photography workshop I wanted to attend. I am however, still wide awake and writing this post regardless of the fact that I have to make my way to Bombay early in the morning. The venue is roughly 4-4 1/2 hours away from here with a change in the mode of transport in between. I should hopefully get a couple of hours of sleep after I am done with this post and the off to catch whatever motorised transport I can find.

The fact that it is freezing out here is not helping. The temperature is threatening to fall lower than 9 degrees as the night progresses.

I tend to add the important stuff last at times. So here’s the deal, I will be there at Kala Ghoda from 0930 hrs to 1300 hrs at least. So here’s lookin’ forward to some brilliant photos. It should be up on the blog soon even though there are a lot of Auto Expo 2008 images that still have to go up.

I am appalled. I wanted to put up a snap of mine for this post, similar to this. I wanted this to be an editorial post. So what is the problem? I am so busy shooting everyone else, I have very few snaps of myself. I could not find a single snap of mine that I liked. I guess I need to rectify that soon.

I will be in Bombay over the weekend. I would have already been in Bombay but with the pre-weekend rush I was unable to get an empty seat on a bus. I will be catching the earliest one out tomorrow. The next installment on the Auto Expo 2008 should go up late evening on Monday. There is a lot more to come. We got Volvo, KTM and Hyundai to name a few. I did not shoot Daimler, nothing new on display but I do have a certain other German TreaT in store. Here’s wishing that I manage to get a decent shot of myself in Bombay. See you Monday!

I am aware that there should have been a post on conceptual art photography even before the one on Negative Space but then I have been very lazy about wading through my backup archives. I do have stuff that has been shot recently but somehow the photos I have in mind are exactly what I want to post up here since it is was shot to a very relevant extreme. I doubt that that photo can be used as general stock shot anywhere else.

Since my lethargy is keeping me from doing that, I am putting up a portfolio that I had done recently. The shoot was supposed to be done outdoors but when I went to her place to pick her up I found the one of the rooms done up way to brilliant not to shoot there.

The original plan was to shoot outdoors so I had my reflectors but no lights. Luckily, the Nikon D200 and the SB-800 are killer combos. I mean how cool is it to trigger the flash wirelessly? Especially when it comes to people who still expect wires as far as dedicated flash is concerned. I am talking about people in general not directed towards anyone in particular.

I am trying to figure out how exactly to explain the lighting setup. I mean it was very basic, the on camera flash that triggered the speedlight wirelessly. What I had done was cross lighting. The subject is in the center with the two light sources roughly at 45 and 135 degrees from the model. Simple yet effective and plus you have the model’s friend to act as a tripod since you forgot to pack one while leaving. Understandably the epitome of being unprofessional but desperate times, desperate measures.

In this shot, the main source of light was sunlight filtering through an open window (not visible in the shot, obviously!). Now while for normal shoots, the one’s that I do for the magazines and tabloids Auto White Balance is good enough, when you have the opportunity to roam, ROAM! I switched over to the Daylight setting since the colour temperature AWB rendered in this case was a little too tame. This was actually a test shot of sorts, it just came out so good that I had to use it. While testing I shoot JPEGs. Agreed, while shooting RAW, White Balance (WB) hardly matters but for me getting everything right as much as possible on the camera matters the most. That and the fact that post-processing involves me sitting still. I need a tutorial on how to do that.

This was just phase one. We still planned on going out but when I reached my usual salon for her make-up, I was shown the door since the make-up artist was down with all possible ailments that make-up artists are susceptible to. A major part of the shoot was scrapped thought I did still manage to shoot off a few rounds. I did a few shots outdoors a few days from then, they should also be up soon.