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Wednesday, 10 December 2014

Photography as I see it.

The photograph is a medium that can expose, bare, or make visible something of yourself. It is a tool of revealing that which would have otherwise remained unnoticed or something that attracts you to it. At the root of this artistic, creative impulse is a keen fascination to observe that which is hidden or unseen by many. 

There are photographs or rather the clicks, where you gaze at it and you start getting fascinating thoughts, an object or something in life that they depict. I firmly believe that there is more to an image than you can see at first look. A perfectly timed click is the most beautiful moment of photography. It is also being at the right place, at the right time to capture something that is really amazing. Once in a while, I stumble upon certain photographs that stop my brain for a moment. It may be due to an instant connect to what you see, comprehend and then the reality of it.

Photography is not my cup of tea. It is a creative talent. When I see a picture, I like to understand it and I have been sending clicks to my close one's who think alike, asking them what they see in it. It is a different perspective from everyone. I look for the positives in it, though I have found some that are impossible to find any positives. Early morning after a cup of coffee or tea, I have had this habit of roaming around in my compound. I just look out for simple things that give me immense joy. A fallen leaf or a fallen flower, sometimes a falling flower that is caught on a leaf or a cobweb, a carpet of leaves or flowers, dew drops or raindrops or a bird tweeting its soul out. I find an instant connect with them, probably because I was a nature lover from my childhood.

Sometimes I used to try out a verse and send them to my friends. Recently reading my verses on fallen flowers, one of my closest friends asked me, "Is a streak of negativity seeping in?" My answer to her was, " I love sunsets, the fallen flower, the moon after new moon when it starts waxing, I look forward to seeing it daily in the evening sky."  Her reply to me was, "The problem with me is I see the pic as it is and feel the negatives and avoid it . You stare at it in the eye and visualize the next positive scene . When I look at the dark sky I just see darkness and then the twinkling stars , you foresee the next dawn . I see the setting sun and the oncoming darkness  , you see the colors the setting sun leaves behind and starts visualizing the twilight and starry night.  Not an easy to follow thing."  It is not that I don't feel negative at all, I am like anyone else, but I love to see a positive side to it. 

If I see a click and connect to it and then I am unable to understand or analyze it, I keep gazing at it and dwell in it. But at times my slowing brain takes a lot of time to comprehend it. Those are the live ones that speak a lot. A fallen flower to me is the glory of graceful aging. A click that connects provoke a thought. You can  write a beautiful story, an article or a verse seeing a photograph that is lively and beautiful. I still believe in the quote that a beautiful picture is worth more than a thousand words.  A really beautiful click gives a  description or a reflection. It is a  developing of visual literacy. It offers varied interpretations. It is like confronting it in a straightforward manner, expressions with communicative emotions, a point of view or a unifying idea of a composition and a visual element.

Photography is a visual language, that is capable of communicating. A good photograph is one that can bring out a graphical poem or story and a graphical  poem or story is one that can be visualized as a living photograph. 

“A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed.” Ansel Adams. 

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