nostalgia: Canon 1000D

First thought

Caught in the thought web

In my childhood days, one dream recurred every night. In the dream, huge stones were rolling down towards me, and I have no way to go. Suddenly all of them disappear. This dream was a fear factor for me. May be by the age of 16, that dream stopped. I got along with the life. However, that feeling remained with me. Now many times, I feel so insecure about everything. Although everything is in place, some unknown fear / threat bothered me often, especially in the evenings.

Evening- rough sea and cold wind blowing across

I tried to give a voice to this fear in a poem and a prose. Recently I took few photos, and those photos evoked the similar fearful evening feeling.

Thoughts are like monkeys - you need to tie it- is it possible?

Shall I think about past or left out future?

Telescope is useless in search of peace

Second thought

The Mumbai city cared for every one or it never bothered for any one. When I stepped out of a bus on a Borivili bridge, it gulped me. Millions around, but I felt alone. In one kannada song, the a orphan boy comes to city and he finds no place to stay, and on the background one song – there is a song “so many houses here, which one is mine”.

Bus of thoughts- travelers ( thoughts) come and go- I stand here alone

Young thoughts in crowd

Third thought

Here is a man who is lost and rest of the word is looking something else. Many occasions it is that feeling "you are alone" makes you very uneasy and uncertain. It is immaterial that who is there around you, what kind of material things you posses or money you have, you feel naked or just mind no body. That time I always feel and wish I could become a bird, fly away to far off places in search of peace. I know I may not get peace but at least I am happy that I as searching something. Life is nothing but searching. The meaningful search make it bearable and meaningless search make is agony and no search make you sad.

Alone in the crowd

Fly away

Searching future for the child

Photos

Here are the photos which represent (may be) the feel of lost. Interestingly,children or adult, we get lost in thoughts irrespective of the place. In traffic, functions, seashores and almost everywhere.

Lonely walks

Somewhere outside

Am I a stone or living one?

I too think!!

Lost in smoke of thoughts

Wrinkles of thoughts

Lost in traffic of thoughts

Lost in traffic of thoughts-

A artificial Mustache made me think more about uncertain future?

We too get lost in thoughts!!

Selling flowers- where are fruits?

Not just face even body is lost in thoughts

Many things have been written about Ganesha festival in Mumbai. It is an integral part of Mumbai culture. Immersion after 11 days is a big event. Even one percent of Mumbai population participates in this event, then participation is around 1.3 lakh people!!! It is just an unbelievable thing for someone who has not seen such a crowd. Every road, area, housing society go on procession.Children, teen, teen+, twenty five+ , thirty+ sixty+ all are there in this event. Bollywood music and dance are the major part. Many people use drums and bhajan. BUT DANCE REMAINS THE SAME. You can see in these photos.

As a photographer, it was challenge to shoot with low light or in focus lights. Shutter speed , ISO and aperture- I played around but not with great success. I started to shoot with 70-210-3.5-4.5 Canon USM lens, without flash. Most of the shots were blur or dark. I changed to 60 mm 2.8 macro, even that was not very adequate to capture the movements, being a macro lens it hunts lot in dark area and focuses slowly. Finally I used my 580 ex flash with 60 mm macro. For wide angle views, Canon S100 P&S camera. For most of the photos- Camera setting was f 2.8/3.5/4.5-iso1600 (max on my camera),1/200sec and flash was set to TTL (with exposure bias occasionally ).

My daughter was afraid of the crowd, and hence I made her to sit on my shoulder and tried few shots, but she was moving rhythmically and adding to the camera shake!!. After an hour or so, she was tired and went back to home with my wife. Now I am free (but exhausted) to do bit of photography. My aim as a photographer was to bring the feel of the event and the energy of the people mass to viewer. I don't know how much is achieved. I found it truly difficult to compose and make sharp or intended shots. I appreciated the photojournalists lot more that day and I saw the photos in the news paper with more respect.

This Ganesha visarjan was held in my residential complex, Mumbai. Total four big mandals are set in different locations. All will start procession around 7 pm and they will cover 1 km in 3 hrs!! and move to sea for the immersion. I did not go to see the final immersion since it was too late and photography in that particular part of the sea was not allowed!!.

Ganesha .............. close up.......

Sitting on the lorry and waiting for the journey... crew are checking final arrangements!!

He is in his manadal uniform and started the dance and encouraged the children to start the dance...... adults are bit hesitant so..........

Here are girls and old girls dance in mass.

Hands up in the air and move move and move..........

These few shots to show the crowd, I used slow shutter speed to show the movement.

These are the children- opening dance-men

Aarati is offered............

Common to see the shoulder dance, here is one.............

Oh, mother is showing her kid the dance and other onlookers

Good hair style and dance style too

Elsewhere, out the world ............

Too bright light.........

Oh look at that, bit shy to dance............

Friends cheer................

Oh look at me how I lead this dance.....

Ha ha ha ... dance shout and dance

His favorite song played and he is singing and dancing along ...........

He was true character.. tall boy and seen in many photos

He got this whistle and adding more decibels to already loud music

Three idiots watching around- may be bit sophisticated fellas- we dance only in pubs!!!!!!!!

Middle age is the golden age- we dance too

I liked this one a lot...... happy friends

Now DJ has given a break and girls are in serious talk , what steps for next beat

Oh these chaps that I am a journalist and posing for a photo

Tired taking rest on sidelines , meanwhile their friends are doing some twists

Nasha ( intoxicated by music and dance)

ha ha ha , go go go

One more character- he had unique steps by face and feet!!

This group I followed quite sometime and they were joy to watch.

Look at the batman -

Kar ke dhikaya!! we did it ........

Hidden deep in the crowd- saying wow wow ..

This one I liked a lot - after many shots of the hands in the air - this one was the best of the lot

It was a very humid day- after a long dance taking rest - covered with sweat

This guy seems to be a regular gym goer- he will dance for a while and go to side and do some stretches, checks his tight shirt and get back to the crowd............

Aajaa, come one .............

ooooooooooo .......

Again batman in full swing .......

What happened? some pain, someone stepped on his feet- I checked - nope, his slipper's bar ( Hawaii slipper ) was out, he was trying to insert that back in position..... don't give away to wild guesses as I did!!