Poras Chaudhary: Colors of India

Poras Chaudhary is a freelance photojournalist and a documentary photographer, who started photography in earnest in 2005. Influenced by the work of various Magnum photographers, he is self-taught photographer and prefers highly saturated color work.

He won a number of awards including the Digital Camera Magazine’s ‘Photographer of the Year’ award in 2006, National Geographic Traveler’s photo contest Merit Award winner in 2008 as well as being a Runner Up in ‘Epson Color Imaging Contest 2008’.

While the above image is of Poras' gallery "Festival of Colors", I'd suggest you also navigate to his Ladakh gallery, where you'll see one of the best photographs of his collection; the three Bakarwal shepherds.

Holi, also called the Festival of Colors, is a popular Hindu spring festival observed in India, Nepal,Bangladesh, and countries with large Hindu diaspora, and is said to have a medicinal reasons. The spring season is believed to cause viral fever and cold, and the colored powders used during the festival are made of Ayurvedic medicinal herbs.

Perhaps we should try this out to combat H1N1 flu infections?

"posted by TTP robot"

The Johor Zoo - The Double (Part 3)

The doubles I took from Johor Zoo.

The Pelicans

The Elephants

The Camels

The Hornbills

Related post :-
* The Forgotten Johor Zoo at Johor Bahru (Part 1)
* The Forgotten Johor Zoo, Johor Bahru (Part 2)

MY TRIPS - Home

Robot Posts

I will be traveling over the course of the coming few weeks, and will have intermittent access to the internet...just in case however, i've set up a number of posts that will be "robot" posted during that time, as I did whilst on my February photo-expedition. I hope to be able to report now and then on my photographic "exploits" in Cairo etc.

I wish I had a robotic assistant as cute as Wall.E !

Gianfranco Tripodo: Wat Bang Phra

I saw the work of Gianfranco Tripodo mentioned in a Lightstalkers forum discussion, and noticed he documented the ritualistic tattooing at the Thai temple of Wat Bang Phra, near Bangkok as I did a couple of years ago. His gallery is titled Sak Yant: Thai Magical Tattoo.

Gianfranco Tripodo is a photojournalist currently based in Madrid, Spain, and is a member of Cesuralab Agency, an Italian photo collective under the artistic direction of Alex Majoli, Magnum Photos. He was published in L’Espresso, IoDonna, El Pais and worked with PhotoEspaña Festival.

I've already posted a number of posts on Wat Bang Phra and its tattooing monks here. It's worth casting an eye on the posts to understand the importance of these religious (or "magical") tattoos to the Thais.

My own gallery The Tattooing Monks of Wat Bang Phra is on my website, and I noticed that one of the tattooing monks appears in both Gianfranco's gallery and mine.

Diti Kotecha: Shekhawati

I occasionally, usually by accident, come across work of such fresh creativity and imagination that it figuratively stops me in my tracks.

To me, the work of Diti Kotecha, a photographer based in Mumbai who describes herself as a documentary and travel photographer, graphic designer, cat lover and collector of knick-knacks, qualifies as one of those "stop-in-the-tracks". Her website is not gallery extensive, but it's one that I encourage you to visit and look around.

My favorite multimedia gallery (unfortunately limited in number of images) is the one Diti titles "antique remains". Her images were made in the Shekhawati region of Rajasthan, and some are of the wonderful havelis in the small town of Mandawa.

The ruling clan in the area were the Marwaris, who built large mansions in Shekhawati and Marwar, which were called havelis. Artists were commissioned to paint the buildings with frescoes depicting Hindu lore and current events of the time. Unfortunately, and despite the havelis being on the tourist circuit, most are largely dilapidated, and some even abandoned.

Diti's blog Yesterday Was Dramatic, Today's OK is also an interesting insight in her photographic style. I'd wager that Diti will go far in her chosen career.

Beyond The Frame: Vedic Master

©Tewfic El-Sawy-All Rights Reserved
I'm resuscitating the Beyond The Frame feature on The Travel Photographer blog, which today shows-off one of my favorite photographs from my February photo-expedition in Kerala. One of photo shoots was inside an ancient Vedic 'gurukul' (or training/boarding school, and very similar to the Buddhist monasteries for novitiates), where we were treated to a demonstration of this way of teaching sacred Vedic scriptures.

It is an ancient Indian educational system, which is currently being rejuvenated with the assistance of the Indian government. The young boys who populate the Vedic school usually belong to a caste of Keralan Brahmins, and are responsible to carry on the age-old tradition of chanting Vedas during religious rituals or functions. The chanting is learned by practice, and nothing is written down.

The rhythm of the Vedic chants is followed by the young boys' moving their bodies in cadence to the verses, which reminded me how the Buddhist novices recite their mantras, or how the Islamic students recite the Qur'an at their madrasas.

The photograph is of one of the Vedic masters keeping a watchful eye over the youths, while they're chanting the verses.

Canon G10 & VII Agency

Here's an entertaining advert for Canon's G10 featuring some of the VII Photo agency founding members: John Stanmeyer, Gary Knight, Antonin Kratochvil, Ron Haviv, Joachin Ladefoged and Marcus Bleasdale (seemingly the only member with no beard).

Technically, the advert is flashy and very well made, however the tips offered by both Gary and Antonin seem to be targeted at an audience who, despite the VII info, may not really know who they are...except that they're working photographers peddling a Canon camera.

Since the ensuing debate on this advert on the internets will also be entertaining, I have no intention of commenting any further, except as I already have.