Creativity is something, I little understand. Mostly my brain works in the engineering space so in a sense, my approach is quite structured, well… at least a lot of times. When H S Ganesh started the Creative Nature Photography website (CNP) way back in 2008, he very kindly invited me to join. He posted a few images to indicate, as to, what represented “creative”. I trawled through my collection and found it extremely difficult to select any image that might qualify.There were a bunch of technically ok images but, I didn’t think, it rated anywhere near creative even to me, a person who knew very little of “creativity”. One thing I was becoming aware was, I was getting a little bored of the usual shots that I was taking. My shots looked nice, got some wows but something was lacking. As I kept looking at CNP, my jaw would drop at the consistency with which some folks “saw” and evoked more than a wow from me.
The subconscious mind is a wonderful thing. In between waiting for birds & tigers, I started to shoot away trying to create different perspectives but, as soon as the subject arrived on the scene, I would be back to the usual ! A lot of these “intermission shots” as I call them were trash, but a few began to make some sense over time. I always did have an “arty stuff” album in my gallery but, I was very aware that, there were not too many images that would qualify to be placed in there. Earlier this year I trawled some non technical photography books and started to read some. It “kinda” made some sense but, frankly a lot of it, went right over me. Oh yes, the Brooks Jensen book ( a collection of his essays actually) , made very much sense and, its a laugh riot to read as well !
When Ganesh called me about the CNP meet, I said yes even before I thought it out. I have been following Ganesh for a while now. He did brilliant “bird on a stick” images and , technically knew pretty much everything and, had moved on….. onwards and upwards . Ganesh was someone with whom I had had many discussions over the years. Though, none of the discussions were on creativity ! I had also interacted over email with a few others on email, namely Shiva & Nilanjan. Nilanjan is a two time BBC wildlife award winner (2010 winning image-Emerging Blackbuck & the 2011 winning image-Fire Flying ). Both Nilanjan & Shiva make some amazing images. After I had said yes to Ganesh about attending the meet, I was a little unsure about the kind of people I might meet. I delayed booking my tickets but finally jumped in thinking, well… at the least, I will go shoot at a new place. Honestly, I had zero expectations from the meet. Felt “kinda” like, Bruce Lee coming into a big city for the first time ( remember that scene ? ). Photographic creativity to me, actually felt , that kind of alien !
I packed my 600mm in my Kiboko and all the tripod & stuff in a duffel. Two bags and I was set. Oh yes I did carry my fleece jacket knowing Bangalore and the outdoors would be cold. Smooth plane ride into Bangalore, grabbed Bus no 11 from the airport and got dropped off at the point where Ganesh picked me up and took me to his home. Nilanjan & Praveen Mohandas were already there and, I got introduced to them. I some amazing coffee and soon enough, we were salivating over Ganesh’s large format prints and, photography book collection. Evening we hustled over to a restaurant called “Jalpan” for some superb veg food and also met up Pramod, Shankar & Shiva. Since we had an early start the next day, I thought it was a good idea that we didn’t go to a “watering hole” . Nilanjan had to make do with a “mocktail” and a paan instead ..Gaaak !!
Early morning Shiva picked us up at 0500H. An eight hour drive took us via Shimoga – Hosanagara- Nagara – Madodi to Aditya Biloor’s Simha Farms. The drive itself was a very nice ice breaker with, Shiva, Nilanjan, VMR & myself discussing a host of things in photography. Aditya also has a prize winning entry in the 2011 BBC wildlife photography competition. His winning image was, “Ant Line“. Simha Farms at Madodi is a quaint homestay, with some amazing local vegetarian food and no network ! And, its right at the base of the Kodachadri mountain 🙂
A bunch of folks had already landed, we were some 26 of us for the meet. I decided not to unpack my gear but just mingle and get to know the people I was meeting. Very interesting was a Sunbird that was popping in and out of the flowering plant just in front of the porch. Instinct was to run for my gear, but I dialed down 🙂 Needed to get my head around creativity (whatever it was ! ) There would be time enough for this birdie, I told myself ! After a late but extremely tasty lunch, we headed down to the river just below the farm. I showed Ashok and the folks a little about better beamer and fill flash. Folks had an interest in knowing about flash and I was happy to teach whatever I had learnt. Lots of jabbering and photography talk happened all along. That evening, Aditya’s BBC certificate and the book with Aditya’s image, Wildlife Photographer of the Year: Portfolio 21 arrived. Then, somewhere along, I “got volunteered” to do the first Kodachadri the next morn. We needed to get moving at 0430H, in a local jeep, to be at Kodachadri before dawn. Idea being to catch the sunrise from the top . Groan…a second early morning in a row but , I wanted to go . After dinner, RD brought out the “hooch box” and the kitchen supplied some yummy pakoras to go with. We were all in splits as Nilanjan regaled us with his anecdotes. And, you bet, some of us did actually rolled off our chairs laughing !
0430H , we piled on to the jeep and the driver promptly “took off”. The track, for most part is pretty boulder strewn. Our great driver flew over them all at a fast clip. I felt like being in a “mixie”, only this one going up and down, like some mechanical yoyo gone berserk ! Luckily my heavy camera bag anchored me well. We reached the temple (till where the jeep can go ) at 0530H. It then took another 20 minutes hike uphill to reach the skyline. The hike is a plod over a steepish trail. I had to huff a bit with my bag and tripod…. dang fitness is not what it used to be ! Should have been ok with just the bag I thought but, a tripod was necessary so had to be lugged. And, I have the heaviest sucker too.
Ok on top, pretty dark still with very faint pre dawn light beginning to show up, and creative me was pretty confused ! First thing that came to mind, take a shot of the great bear. Duh, how creative was that ?
I thought might give star trails a shot but, I was not prepared enough for it. The next thought, “I saw”, not felt (note the “saw” part ) the rays of pre dawn light showing up and I tried to get a better delineation of that. I used a graduated ND filter to mask the sky. Got something but, not good enough I thought. Completely forgot that I could pull off an HDR . Baah !
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And the light is coming up fast now. And in all this “ray” business I missed seeing the valley light up in shades of grey. Talk of being fixated by the “ray”. Sounds like some phaser from star trek uh … “the ray”. Basically, tense for some dumb reason, shooting after a break, fumbling some, seeing pretty much nothing. Then at some 0622H, a kestrel shows up and I switched out of the 17-35 and snapped on my 70-200 . Bird ahoy ! Black eagle cometh ! Brain waking a little. Another birdie hovering high above. A kestrel. I tried a silhouette of the kestrel against the mountain. I knew the kestrel was way too small but, I tried anyhow.
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Somehow the Black Eagle & kestrel worked my mind for the better and I turned to get the “red fireball” low in the horizon and through some grass. Graduated ND filter out , and kinda looked ok. So I got a vertical and a horizontal. The wind was picking up by now and one had to be careful with the lens caps etc, lest they are blown away. 0646H , the sun is well up in the sky and I switched to the 600mm. When I mounted the 600 is when I realised that I had forgotten to get the new soft hood along. New gear and early starts, never a good combo ! I had spotted a tree on the rock that was jutting out into the morning sky. I lined up the golden sky behind that tree and shot a few silhouettes.
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Again, pretty but not very creative. But my confidence was beginning to come up. Must be my familiarity with the 600mm ! The moon was pretty bright now in the sky and I shot a few hand held frames with the 600. Believe it or not, this was my very first ever moon shot ! Some of the others had by now dived into the grass to get some closer perspectives and I did a quick double exposure , in camera shot. (On the Nikons , its in the Shooting Menu as Multiple Exposure) Not bad I thought. I showed the double exposure to the others. Shiva then had a brilliant “Brrr Durga” idea. ( “Brrr” because of the cold and “Brrr” was in some Cocacola advert and “Durga” cause of the multiple durga hand like exposures) or that should be “Coke Brahma” idea. I think someone said “Brahma” fits better cause of the three heads, in that multiple exposure ! Shiva shot a left face, right face and a front face in a three exposure, in camera merged shot . That was way cool ! I think that set the tone. It was fun shooting arbitrary exposures and basically just enjoying oneself. That kicked up a frenzy of double exposures and suddenly, all of us were having a blast. The energies just added up to make a super fun environment. Then I had my idea. Why not try to get the moon and the grass together in one shot ? That would be tough with the 600 but, one could try if one switched out the lenses quickly enough to take the second exposure. Ofcourse one can extend that time and for that please “RTFM” 😉 . I thought I would try a double exposure with the 600mm and the 17-35mm. Shiva helped me and we practiced a couple of times, the quick change of lenses to get the shot inside I think 30 seconds, else the camera will not expose over the same shot but take a new frame altogether. Set camera in 2 shot multiple exposure, lie down in a patch of tall grass, load up the 600mm , shoot one frame of the moon. Situp, remove the 600, take the 17-35 from Shiva, mount lens on the body, lie down . Now manual focus & shoot. While focusing, I saw the sun had climbed up and I positioned the frame so as to include the sun and the grass along with a little flare. The focus & exposure was manual. Click, and I got up to preview. Gotcha, I had the exact shot that I had in mind. The moon huge in the frame due to the 600mm , and the grass and sun coming into the frame from the outside. Nailed it 😀 BIG GRIN ! This will take a little processing I thought, but it was pretty well workable. Happiness ! Finally some freaking “creativity” ! Yippe … and yes ….”Hellllo, Miss Creativity” , we finally meet albeit, momentarily !!!
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After a much needed “chai” at the tea shop at the temple, we got back in the vehicle, for a backbreaking , pretty much flying, jeep ride back . While we all hung on to our bags and our seats, the conversations revolved all the way from underwater photography to, buggy mounted and remote controlled helicopter mounted cameras . Back at the farm, we had some wonderful breakfast awaiting us. The rest of the gang had gone down to the river for a morning shoot and were already back.
Lazy breakfast over, we settled down for, kinda formal introductions. Shiva & Pramod filmed us all. Common theme that came out, everybody is inspired by H S Ganesh and CNP 🙂 Compared to my couple decades of wielding a camera, a lot of the folks were quite new into photography and extremely creative. I thought that, I had a lot of “unlearning” to do before I could learn again. Aditya & Nilanjan were formally congratulated for their winning images. The introductions over , we moved on for some coffee and the next session which was on “creativity” by H S Ganesh . “Hello creativity” we meet again I thought 😉 . Ganesh in his usual style took us through the meaning and interpretations of creativity vs just an aesthetically pleasing image and, explained the vision behind CNP . That took us on to lunch. During lunch, someone spotted a Brown Keel back snake and I got a few shots off.
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Creative was still elusive though I did try. I wanted the ant in the pic below to be in the focus and the snake out of focus. But as soon as I clicked, the ant changed its position ! Hey ant, hold on there, I thought. Not easy being creative with wildlife eh ….
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The next session was from VMR on “Photography with a purpose” , read conservation. Lots of opportunities there and, its not just flora & fauna , there is also the human side to be explored. But, be ready to rough it out , more than a little bit. One will need to take it as a project, network with more folks to build a, 360 degree image story. Meanwhile, Ganesh’s prints and books were all being setup and being prepped for the next talk. Of special interest were Ganesh’s monochrome prints and his experiments with various papers and grain. On the books side, of course there was the BBC book, Wildlife Photographer of the Year: Portfolio 21 but there was also, Nick Brandt’s – A Shadow Falls . If you are into photography and nature, this is an absolute must have.
Next morning while the rest hit Kodachadri peak, we guys decided to wake up a little late and hit the river down below. Shiva and I woke up in all the morning dorm chaos and somewhere, Shiva mentioned it will be good if we can get a peacock on the tree on the river. As we walked down to the river, the first thing we see is that, there is a peacock on a tree by the river ! And it was as if , “God said”, “your wish is my command” Shiva ! Wowzie ! Totally wish come true !
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I wanted to do a jig but, since I was hauling the 600mm, made do with a funny bum shake to myself 😉 There were two guys already shooting there and we met up Aditya Biloor & Ashwini Bhatt. I guess I was too “lazy” to switch out my TC and I ended up with the peacock shot but with the top of the trees cropped. I should have not been lazy ..I guess. That little crop make a big difference between a normal shot and a wall hanger. We were already a little late and the mist had almost cleared over the water. The tadpoles were beginning to move out into the open water and all of us made different images of the myriad patterns they made. I had brought on only my 600 + TC . Hence I made do with the extreme telephoto perspective.
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Getting back to the farm, there was some superb breakfast waiting. I watched the sunbird popping in and out of the shrub. Quick breakfast and “hey birdie, here I come !” I was pretty much on that sunbird the whole day. Chatting , having chai or coffee, but jumping in and shooting the sunbird as it hopped in and out. Basically having a blast 🙂 So much so that I was supposed to have sunbird babies by the end of the day. So conjugal I had become 😉 ! But, I think that almost 12 hours of going on that sunbird was a form of “catharsis”, of moving into a new frame of mind by getting the regular “bird on a stick” out of my system by shooting in excess. Do it and get over it kinds ..wonder who had that philosophy…was it Osho ?
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The other guys got back from the mountain and we had our next session on CNP features and CNP going forward. That done it was time for the group mug shot. I dunno what happened but suddenly, I saw Ganesh scramble up a coconut tree. Neatly done local ishtyle !
As the evening wore on, I moved from the sunbird to the “dreamy look” . Something which Nilanjan taught us.
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All along there were some flash lessons that were happening and I explained how to “skim the light” over the subject to get more texture detail. I tried some flash blurs with flowers .
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Late night, the flash lessons and experiments continued , while Nilanjan continued his rib tickling “routine”.
Next day , we had an early morning start. Evening we had heard that a wild elephant had clambered up the trail to Kodachadri. There were fire crackers going all night into the morning. We stopped at Shimoga for some breakfast of “Paddu”, Chowchow bhath and coffee.
Paddu
The somewhere along we spotted a shoe shop. Nilanjan had bust his shoes on the Koda trail and needed to buy a pair. This good looking pair was Rs 1200 🙂
Nilanjsn’s new shoes !
Then somewhere short of Bangalore, we stopped and Shiva grabbed my interview ( something that I thought I had wiggeld out of !). Shiva then dropped Nilanjan and me just ahead of Hebbal for us to take the airport bus. Thanks Shiva for all the hard work ! Nilanjan and I jabbered and discussed the meet all the way to the airport. Boy, did we feel energised !
Something had happened at Kodachadri, and I can definitely see ( should be feel !!!) that I am looking at my photography in a pretty new light. Heck of a lot to learn now !
Sensei Ganesh , and the fab four….”OSS”
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Fabulous write and lot of detail and nice MOM ( in corporate lingo! ). I loved the image containing the reflection of both sun and moon! Gem of an image that is.
Thanks for this nice “diary writeup” ! When ever I feel nostalgic, I will come back to this post by you 🙂
Cheers
Wonderful write up . I missed the event as I was travelling 🙁 . Loved the images you have made …and the new perspective you have come back with !!!
super writeup krish. Was able to relive each moment from the meet.