Milky Way

I had a strong desire to visit Himalayas and roam in the wilderness of nature sometime in my life.  The opportunity had come in the form of advanced workshop of Nikon School.  Though I was still fiddling with the basics of NikonD I decided to attend the Advanced workshop just to visit the roof of the world.  Ladakh in Leh of Jammu Kashmir state of India is a beautiful place with its Karakoram Himalayan ranges and lakes and rivers.  It is a cold desert with scanty vegetation. 

My first attempt

My visit was from 28^th September to 2^nd October.  That is the time when temperatures start falling and visitors/tourists visits are low.  The travel experience and photography sessions with Nikon mentors are unforgettable memory to be cherished forever.  As part of landscape photography we were asked one day to photograph night skies – Milky Way and star trails.  I was afraid of going out in cold nights.  I decided to skip that session.  But one of the young enthusiastic budding photographers who was having supper sitting beside me enquired what I was going to do that night.  I said I am afraid of cold and will go to sleep.  She said, ‘Looking at you I can say that the chance of visiting this place by you in future is minimal.  Why don’t you enjoy and click some pictures of night sky.  You cannot have such wonderful opportunity again.  It’s a matter of fifteen minutes to half an hour.  Just don’t miss’.

Mentor checked and corrected the settings

At the same time one of the guys had already gone out to click few pictures of Milk way and started showing to everyone in the group.  The pictures were awesome and I decided that I too should have few photographs of night skies at Pangong TSo.

My attempt trying composition

With the help of mentors I could click few pictures of Milky Way.  As a child I vaguely remember seeing Milky Way as my elder sister pointing at some group of stars.  But for the first time I saw the beautiful sky with stars, an amazing view never to forget in my life.  I feel grateful to the young lady who encouraged me to spend few minutes in the wilderness of cold nature amidst mountains, lake and starry skies.  

One more attempt

My First Photo Walk

 Since I was bitten by shutter bug it has become my favourite pass time to log on to sites that share photos.  I follow dPS regularly.   On one of the photo sharing sites I read about photo walk.  It was a new word for me, but it appeared self explanatory.  Photographers will take their camera and walk along taking pictures.  If this is done in groups, I thought it will be more interesting and learning experience. 

Photography had developed tremendously impacting everyday life from the principle of camera obscure to digital and drone cameras,  from dark to light rooms, black and white to instant colorful prints and instant sharing worldwide on social media.   Cell phone cameras have made every person a photographer, but the art and technique of photography is ever developing subject.  Like science and art it is ever evolving.

This is one spot on the street where our mentor asked us to take photos.  All of  us gathered here and take pictures in different angles.  People around started staring at us.  Somebody asked what will do taking the picture?  The leaking pipe is making the area dirty and muddy.  They wanted to know if we will inform the municipality about it and get it corrected.  

August 19 is chosen as world photography day as on that day in 1939 Daguerreotype of photographic process was announced   to the public by the French Government.  Actually this process was developed by Joseph Nicephore Niepce and Louis Daguerre in 1937.  In 2009, Korske Ara, Australian photographer launched the World Photo Day Project with dream to unite local and global communities in a worldwide celebration of photograph.  The firs world Photo Day on 19/8/2010 hosted first global online gallery with 270 photographs from more than 100 countries.  World Photography organisation  incorporated as World Photograhy Awards Limited  hosts Sony World Photography Awards and World Photography festival.  Awards are presented to amateurs and professionals in different categories.

Our mentor showed this fish sculpture and compose a good photograph

 I read about the photo walks and wanted to participate in one. I thought that this will help me to get over my inhibitions in taking street photos.   I asked a photographer in our place about photo walk he appeared quite unaware of any such thing.  I know that it is not possible for a photo walk in our place as it is not a metro.  The nearest place I can expect a photo walk is at Hyderabad.   Hyderabad had its first certified photo walk on August 16 and 17 in 2015 the theme being ‘Virasat’ (heritage) capturing architectural and cultural design and beauty of the city. 

Lotus pond was also another point of interest in Zoo

“Photo Walk is defined as the act of walking with a camera for the main purpose of taking pictures of things that photographer may find interesting.”   But if a theme is given based on the theme interesting pictures can be captured by the photographers.  When there are group of people same object of interest can be captured with different perspective by different photographers.

I am fortunate to participate in a photo walk recently.  The Nikon School has held a basic workshop followed by photo walk for the benefit of its customers, and also others  who bought D-SLR, to know their gear and practice photography.  It was an interesting group activity of more than twenty amateur photography enthusiasts of different ages and all walks of life with Nikon Mentor and technical team.  The collecting point for photo walk was at Zoo in Hyderabad.  It was Sunday.  Early hours (7 AM) of winter morning.  We all walked for about a kilometer along with mentor who guided us in composition and candid photos.  In the Zoo we had wild life photography.

In fact, after I came home when I checked the pictures taken I thought I had different category of photos.   Here are some of my pictures taken on photo walk.

Portrait (my niece)

Can I call this a candid photo?  There were many teams playing cricket here.  This boy is too young to play cricker.  He engaged himself in drawing something on the ground.  Another boy told him that he is being photographed.  So he turned to look at me.

Will this be candid or street photo? Here is the old man preparing breakfast for his customers

This is street photograph.  To see such hoardings is very common every where in India.  Once a hoarding is put it should have wear and tear or another new occasion to put a new hoarding should come.  The hoarding was in front of hotel and two workers on the lorry made it interesting for me.

Wild life

Landscape/ Wild life

Nature

Flowers/Nature

Architecture