POV: Passion & Enthusiasm

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

"hello sir,

i'm a 18yr old from india

i've dropped my college for my passion of travelling ,writing n photography!

your work have quite inspired me continue it!

n just wanna thank you!

your blog is quite a source of inspiration for me!

thank you"

It's a leap year, and what better way to end this February's 29 days!

This wonderful email from a young Indian woman was waiting in my inbox...and while I frequently get complimentary emails on my photography and blog from readers, this one was so enthusiastic, and so full of hope for the future, that I had to feature it here.

Naturally, I urged her to remain in college, get a degree and pursue her passion at the same time. I hope she does.

I occasionally meet with young people seeking my advice as to how to forge a career in travel photography. It's always a difficult task to balance youthful aspirations and hard-core reality...but one of my principal pieces of advice is to stay in college (if they don't have a degree...and get one), and take up a profession that can pay the bills for a while.

Alex Webb: Streets of Chicago

"I did not have a goal in mind. In fact, I do not have goals in mind when I photograph. I respond to what I see before me." 

Reading Alex Webb's interview on The Leica Camera Blog, I gasped (figuratively) when I got to these phrases. How refreshing to read something said by a photographer that is so devoid of pretension! No bullshit here. He responds to what he sees. He doesn't pretend to see a La Pieta (as some did in Samuel Aranda's World Press winning photograph) in any of his frames...an honest guy and comfortable in his own skin, this Alex Webb.

Perhaps uncharacteristically for many street photographers, he chose to photograph Chicago's character in color. Having mostly worked in color since 1979, Alex tells us he respond to color, and that black and white for him at this time isn't an option. He sees in color and feels in color, so works in color...for him, it's that simple.

That's an interesting statement. When I walk the streets of New York with my camera, I see in color as well, and certainly photograph in color. However, when I return home and view the resulting images, there are some that work better in monochrome than in color. This is the advantage of digital photography, which allows us to alternate between the two. Purists may disagree and will extol the incomparable qualities of Tri-X film and others...but there's no denial that we currently have the best of two worlds.

Since buying a Leica M9, I've been working on a long term project which will involve producing an audio slideshow of my street photographs of New York City. Alex Webb's Streets of Chicago certainly will inspire me to complete my project. I haven't yet decided whether my photographs will be in color or black & white, but after viewing his work, I am inclined towards color.

Hardware: The Oracles of Kerala Photo Expedition/Workshop™

click to enlarge

I will soon be traveling to India to lead my The Oracles of Kerala Photo Expedition/Workshop™, and thought to feature here most of the equipment that will accompany me.

I'll be taking a Canon 5D Mark II, a Canon 7D, and a bunch of lenses (28-70mm f2.8, 70-200mm f2.8, 17-40mm f4, and a 24mm f1.4), along with a Canon flash 580ex. I'll be taking a Leica m9 with a Leica 28mm f/2.8 Elmarit, and a 40mm f1.4 Voigtlander lens. I'm also taking a Canon-mount Holga lens for fun.

For audio, I'm packing a Tascam DR-40 Recorder, an Audio-Technica ATR6250 Stereo Condenser Video/Recording Microphone and Sony headphones.

I'll also be taking my iPhone4S (for picture-taking as well as communication), and a Blackberry for an India sim card.

And naturally, a couple of scarves.

Jim Shannon: Holi Festival

Photo © Jim Shannon-All Rights Reserved

As Holi is about to be celebrated in India (and elsewhere) in just about 10 days, and I know a number of friends are planning to attend its festivities in Vrindavan and elsewhere, I found Jim Shannon's advice and past experience to be both very valuable and sensible, and hope they will as well.

Along with the monochrome photographs of Holi by Toby Devenson (who traveled with Jim to Vrindavan) featured on this blog just yesterday, today's post will provide more than ample inspiration and guidance to those who will experience Holi for the first time.

As Jim writes in his Holi Hunters article which appears in Sidetracked magazine:

"this is one of the few times caste and wealth is forgotten. By the time everyone is covered in dye, it's impossible to tell who is rich or poor".

Jim's advice on how to photograph during Holi, especially in Vrindavan., is a must-read. I noted he photographed in the Banke Bihari temple in that holy town, but urges caution not to cause grave offense by photographing the religious deity itself. He also recommends covering one's face and arms with thick sunblock, which seemed to help in washing the dye off a little more easily. He also recommends wearing a pair of goggles to protect one's eyes from the industrial dyes.

But what about protecting one's photographic gear?? Jim and others suggest the OP/Tech Rain Sleeves which is a polyethylene sleeve made to protect an SLR camera with a lens from dust and inclement weather...and dye powder.

Jim Shannon has traveled and photographed in 42 countries, and his photographs were published by Arte Fotográfica, BBC News, BBC Countryfile Magazine, Guardian Weekend, Lonely Planet, Lonely Planet Magazine, National Geographic Traveler, The New Republic, The Observer, The Sunday Times Travel Magazine, The Daily Telegraph, Time Out, and Wanderlust, amongst others.

Toby Deveson: Holi In Monochrome

Photo © Toby Deveson-All Rights Reserved

Toby Deveson is a brave man. A brave man indeed to have considered shooting one of the most colorful festivals in India in black and white.

And if you consider his biography in which he writes "Toby Deveson has been taking photographs since 1989 when he was given an old Nikkormat and a 24mm lens. After trying a friend's darkroom he set up one of his own in a damp basement and was soon addicted to the alchemy of intoxicating smells and mysterious light. Twenty years later not much has changed. The darkroom is no longer damp but the camera and lens are the same.", you'll conclude he's a very brave photographer.

Choosing to shoot Holi in monochrome as Toby did is very unusual in this day and age. Holi is such a flamboyant festival, filled with explosions of color, that other photographers normally prefer to record its images in natural colors. The photographs on his gallery were made in the Banke Bihari temple of Vrindavan, Mathura, and in its streets.

Perhaps he chose to go against the grain, and didn't want the all powerful colors of Holi to distract the viewers away from the composition of his photographs, or from the shadow and light play or from the forms in his frames.

After all, I adopted the same rationale when I photographed the equally colorful Durga Puja festivities in Kolkata this past October. I also encouraged the participants in The Cult of Durga Photo Workshop to
produce their work in monochrome to better capture the festivities without the intrusion of color. It's a mindset.

Toby Deveson lives and works in London as stills photographer and television cameraman. He has been living in Britain since 1990 when he obtained his degree in photography, painting and music.

POV: The Dove Whisperer & Storytelling

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved

Regular readers know that I've joined a new storytelling website called Cowbird, and have already posted a couple of mini-stories.

I've just started a few days ago, and I've realized a couple of interesting things. First off, the community of Cowbird are not professional photographers...there are some, but the majority describe themselves as storytellers not as photographers. Secondly, haphazardly eyeballing members' pages, tells me that the majority of them reside in the United States, and by definition tell local stories.

But here's what's interesting as far as I'm concerned. The most popular story among the four I've published so far is The Dove Whisperer. I think there's a number of reasons for that. It's very brief, it's simple and it's touching...and it was one of the 'recommended' stories on Cowbird.

In my multimedia workshops, I stress that stories need to be brief, simple and compelling. So it's not surprising that The Dove Whisperer is more 'magnetic' than the rest of my stories.

And one more thing...and I also stress this in my classes, choosing a title that resonates with one's audience is almost half a battle won. We all know that a title that is mysterious, compelling, unusual but also descriptive is extremely important to the success of one's project...be that a book, article, multimedia slideshow or movie.

I don't know how Cowbird, which is still in its infancy, will evolve and mature....but the possibility of reaching a large (or I should say, a different) audience for my stories through its platform is exciting. 

Finally, The Dove Whisperer was a forgotten moment experienced in Bhutan in September 2009. I was shooting in a small monastery in Jakar when this elderly man appeared with a dove under his arm. I asked what he was doing, and was told he was a bird healer. He was known to tend birds that had broken wings, and released them once they could fly. 

The whole thing didn't last more than five minutes, and yet when I was thinking of a story for Cowbird, I remembered it, searched for the photograph and it was on Cowbird in less time.

It's funny how things remain in the recesses of one's mind, and pop out at the right time.

Carnival Festivals & Ash Wednesday

Photo © Vanderlei Almeida/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Most of the important photo blogs have by now featured images of the Carnival in Rio De Janeiro, and elsewhere... whether  in South and Central America or Europe.

For instance, these large sized photographs appeared on The Sacramento Bee's The Frame, on the Boston Globe's The Big Picture, twice on The Atlantic In Focus and here, as well as on The Wall Street Journal's Photo Journal.

If there's one festival I want to attend and photograph, it's certainly Rio's Carnival. With all its colors, fantastic costumes, wonderful music and utterly gorgeous women, it's unquestionably the most magnetic of the world's festivals. In my view, head and shoulders over its Venetian cousin.

The Carnival in Rio de Janeiro is held before Lent every year, and is considered the biggest carnival in the world with two million people per day on the streets. The first festivals of Rio date back to 1723.

Photo © Jose Cabezas/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday, which according to the Gospels, marks the
beginning of the 40 days period during which Jesus spent fasting in the desert
before the start of his public ministry, and during which he endured temptation
by Satan.

It's quite common in mid-town Manhattan to see Catholics emerging from St Patrick's
Cathedral on Fifth Avenue with smears of ash on their foreheads; traditionally
signifying repentance and mourning.

When I first worked in Manhattan, I had no clue of this and almost telling one of my
colleagues that he had dirt on his forehead...but i caught myself in time when I noticed
others had it as well.

Jonah M. Kessel: Tibet

Photo © Jonah M. Kessel- All Rights Reserved

It's been a while since I featured  images of Tibet, and Jonah Kessel's work is well worth the wait. I particularly liked his use of a wide angle lens, like the above picture.

Jonah M. Kessel is an interactive art director, visual journalist and also describes himself as a nomadically curious photographer. His company, currently based in Beijing, offers visual communication solutions on a wide array of platforms including photography, amongst others.

Prior to working as the Creative Director of China Daily in Beijing, Jonah worked as a photography and design consultant for the Journalism Development Group in North Africa; as the Visual Director of the Tahoe Daily Tribune in South Lake Tahoe, Calif.; and as a freelance photographer for multiple media outlets across the United States. He received more than 35 awards from media organizations for his photography, web and design projects.

His international travels took him to Algeria, Malaysia, India, China, Tibet, Nepal, and the Philippines.

Anthony Pond: The Ring Train of Yangon

Whether in Myanmar (Burma), India, China, Viet Nam or elsewhere, trains or trams are wonderful to meet local people, and photograph them.

In Yangon (Rangoon), a local railway line does a loop from the city’s main station through the inner city, suburbs and outlying villages, before returning to the station some 3 hours later. The "circular" is a train for local people, offering hard (and worn) wooden seats, sputtering fans, and with occasionally stuck windows, but it's a fascinating insight into local life.

Anthony Pond has just produced another audio slideshow of black and white (toned with Silver Efex Pro 2) photographs, and which were made during a ride on the circular train of Yangon. My very favorite is the one of the elderly nun.

Anthony worked for more than two decades in the criminal courts in California as an attorney for the Public Defender’s Office. Now pursuing his passion for travel and photography, he traveled repeatedly to South East Asia and India, amongst other places, to capture life, the people and the culture.

He is joining me on my The Oracles of Kerala Photo Expedition/Workshop™ in a few weeks, and I certainly look forward to be working with him during it.

Fuji X-Pro 1 Hands On Movie

Chris Niccolls from The Camera Store had the chance to spend an evening shooting with a pre-production model of the new Fuji X-Pro 1. He shows off the features, lens options, and hybrid viewfinder, and demos the video and low light images from this camera.

I don't need to rehash what's already mentioned on this video, but I ought to highlight its moiré capability. I've just returned from a walk-about in my neighborhood with my M9 during which I bumped its iso to 640. The resultant photographs showed noticeable moiré when enlarged.

It appears that Fujifilm’s solution to the problem of moiré was to design a new sensor that arranges the pixels in an irregular alignment which, in practice, greatly reduces the chance of distracting moiré patterns while maintaining image sharpness.

Although videos like this one are interesting, they're still sale jobs, so I really can't wait read unbiased reviews of the X-Pro 1, and see real life more samples of its images.

As I've posted a number of times, Leica's M9 is firmly in Fujifilm's sights, and I expect Leica will have to meet this challenge. Resting on one's laurels has led the sales of many formidable products to wither.

Just ask Blackberry.

Teerayut Chaisarn: In Search of Sufis Movie

Teerayut Chaisarn is an emerging photojournalist/photographer from Chiang Mai in Thailand, and participated in my In Search of the Sufis of Gujarat Photo Expedition™ in January 2011. He recently completed a 14 minutes movie of his experience during the photo expedition, and posted it on YouTube.

Teerayut started photographing about 5 years ago, and is largely self-taught. He started work as a photographer on the magazine staff of his hometown, but preferred to become a freelance photographer. He also applied his Photoshop post processing expertise to assist various Thai professional photographers, and processes their portfolios.

The Travel Photographer Is On Cowbird!

I've just uploaded my first Cowbird story titled The Sufi Itinerant of Qutb Uddin.

While working on the photograph of Miskine, the Sufi in my post of yesterday, I realized I had a recording of him briefly telling me his life story. Coincidentally, I was invited to join Cowbird, which describes itself as "...a small community of storytellers, focused on a deeper, longer-lasting, more personal kind of storytelling than you’re likely to find anywhere else on the Web."

Cowbird seeks to feature incredible stories by some of the world's finest storytellers, and present them in the most beautiful storytelling environment on the Web. Its community consists of journalists, photographers, writers, artists, filmmakers, designers, explorers, and many others.

"incredible stories by some of the world's finest storytellers"

It allows members of its community to produce multimedia stories, incorporating text, photos, sound, subtitles, roles, relationships, maps, tags, timelines, dedications, and characters, thus mixing elements of traditional storytelling with elements of technology.

I'm excited to have joined Cowbird, and will upload new single image stories as time permits. I've seen that Aaron Huey, a fantastic photographer has also joined Cowbird, and already has a number of stories on it. This one of Zahoor is especially wonderful!

Readers of this blog who feel, as I do, that this is an exciting venue to display their storytelling talents, request an invite from Cowbird...as I did.

Sufi Qawwali In India

Photo © Tewfic El-Sawy. See It Full Size On TTP's Tumblr 

"Khawaja Syed Muhammad Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki, a Sufi saint, died while in a musical trance induced by a qawwali song"

And I'd say what a wonderful way to go!

Divya Dugar, a photographer and reporter for CNNGo, has just authored an interesting and valuable article on Where To Hear Qawwali In India.

Sufism has many definitions, but mainstream Islamic scholars define it as simply the name for the inner or esoteric dimension of Islam. In Sufism, especially in South Asia, the visitation of the tombs of saints, great scholars, and righteous people is a common practice.

Qawwali is a form of Sufi devotional music popular in South Asia, and is a musical tradition that stretches back more than 700 years. One of its most famous singers is the late Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.

Divya takes us to the most famous Sufi shrines in India, and guides us to the Dargah (shrine) of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya in Delhi, to the neighboring Dargah Hazrat Inayat Khan, to the Dargah of Khawaja Syed Muhammad Qutbuddin Bakhtiar Kaki and finally to the most important shrine, the Dargah of Moin Uddin Chishti in Ajmer (Rajasthan).

The Delhi shrines are my favorite destinations when I'm in Delhi, especially on Thursdays and Fridays to attend the qawwali performances from local singers. The photograph featured for this post was made at the Qutbuddin shrine a few years ago, where I met a Sufi itinerant called Miskine. Extraordinarily photogenic, I found him at one of the many dhabas that surround the shrine, and made a number of photographs of him.

I've produced a number of Sufi-related galleries and audio slideshows on the Sufis. In Search of Sufis In Gujarat is a gallery of stills, while The Possessed of Mira Datar is an audio slideshow of a small shrine in Gujarat.