Frames of Mind is Bangalore Photography Club’s flagship exhibition. This will be the fourth exhibition.
All are welcome! 
Start – Friday, August 28, 2009 at 12:00pm
End- Sunday, August 30, 2009 at 7:00pm
Venue – Chitra Kala Parishat, Kumar Krupa Road, Bangalore
PS : One of my photographs is up on the wall
Call No. 1
[Phone rings, and I see a number from Mumbai]
Me : Hello
Caller : Good Afternoon Sir! I’m calling on behalf of [My ISP]. I’m calling from [Some online gaming company]. Can I have a few minutes of your time?
Me : I’m in a meeting right now, can you call me after an hour?
Caller : Yes Sir!
[Hang up]
Call No. 2 (After a couple of hours)
[Phone rings, and I see a number from Mumbai]
Me : Hello
Caller : Good Afternoon Sir! I’m calling on behalf of [My ISP]. I’m calling from [Some online gaming company]. Can I have a few minutes of your time?
Me : Yes, I remember you had called me a few hours ago – I remember. What can I do for you?
Caller : Sir?
Me : Yes?
Caller : OK Sir
[He hangs up]
I’m confused – was there something wrong? *Scratches head*
Ganesha Chaturthy Shoot @ Gandhi Bazar
I have to say today was something to remember. I’ve been very interested in street photography, but something stopped me from getting into it. Sanju called me yesterday night at around 11 PM and informed me that there will be a BWS(Bangalore Weekend Shoots – A group on Flickr) meet @ Gandhi Bazaar. I checked the thread, and confirmed my attendance. Come today morning, wake up, check the weather. It’s a wee bit cloudy, and with a mild drizzle, but he manages to convince me into going. We synced up at Airport Road, and proceeded towards Residency Road. On the way, the clouds pour out, and we got totally drenched. Halted near Command Hospital, Sanju calls Peevee to find out that he ran off to Chennai 
We make up our minds to go ahead. Rain slows down, and off we go again. Since neither of us was familiar with the location, we find it after a couple of inquiries. It’s half psat seven, and there’s no one at Vidyarthi Bhavan. We decide to have breakfast. In the mean time, Dennis Zach gets Sanju’s number from Peevee, and gives him a call. He walks into Vidyarthi Bhavan, and after exchanging pleasantries, and finishing off the breakfast, we get onto the streets. It’s not raining as badly as it was before. We wait for a few minutes, and then start to walk. When the rain slows down, Sanju tells us that he’s going in and walks off with his camera. His action inspires all of us, and both of us decide that we’ll not miss the action. Well, the rest of the report, is below. Somewhere in between, Jyoti also joined us, but we lost track of her after a while.
Elderly gentleman at a Garland shop:
A Young Girl: Sanju was busy taking shots of this girl. She was looking at him, and her mom’s orange dress made a perfect backdrop. Click!
Gentleman at Ganesha Idol shop: Sanju and Dennis had walked in and started shooting the idols. I was outside getting some shots of this man. He asked me to come inside and get some photos of the idols he had. BTW, the first shot was from his shop.
Fresh roses:
Some more decorative artifacts:
Vegetable Vendor:
Mr. Dennis:
Father and Son : My favorite shot in this series.
Puncher / Pancher / Panchor Shop:
Ideas for Headgear Manufacturers:
Young Girl on the streets : Sanju was busy on the left getting shots – The child was distracted by Sanju – I got my chance to get a candid.
Woman with Bindi : Off all things, her large bindi stood out.
Girl in Tears: A pretty girl in yellow dress, just about to break into tears. Please note, I didn’t have anything to do with her crying.
Florist : He was fast, and was getting the flowers into the required layout very quickly.
World Champion: He finished his talk on the mobile, he and his few friends approached me and spoke to me for a few minutes (I speak broken Kannada – One of them translated it to a language I know better). I showed them the photos that I’d got since morning. He asked me to come over for the special lunch for Ganesha Chaturthi at his home. I couldn’t make it though.
Tying a Knot : She was fast, very fast. With constant interruptions, I had quite a bit of trouble getting the shot.
Man in helmet with an Umbrella:
Florist from across the road:
And the last of the series : This cute kid in the car was staring at me, as I got this pic, he waved goodbye to me.
This was my first attempt at street photography – I had some issues with framing, as clearly visible in almost all of the photographs. I was not prepared for the speed at which I had to complete composing, and getting the shot on time. It was a challenge, and I hope to get better as time progresses. All shots are right out of the camera with no processing done.
No, I’m not turning this into a photoblog. I want to improve my writing skills, and photography skills. Hopefully, I’d be able to write what I see – I’d rather want the photo to speak for itself though.
Popular saying – Change is the only constant in life. I know I haven’t been regularly posting – I have been focussing more on my photo-blog.
Blogging here, will, as it has been over the last few months, irregular.
If you’re into photography, you could check my photo-blog on Flickr. And if you’d like to keep track, here’s a handy link to the RSS feed.
One thing I haven’t liked about Flickr is that it doesn’t allow people with out a Yahoo! Account to leave comments. So, if you’d like to say something, you can log-in with your Yahoo! Account.
Thanks for stopping by.
PS: I don’t mean to close down this blog – I will be less active than before.
Yesterday, I was going through some streets in Indira Nagar. On the road, were five guys, holding out a big blue cloth sheet, blocking out the road completely. In front of me was a van, a couple of cars that blocked out the rest of the activity. The guys holding the sheet looked at each other, and quickly moved to let the traffic pass. I crossed them, and stopped my vehicle to look at what was going on.
The five guys were holding out the sheet to catch a cat that had climbed onto a tree. I’ve seen a cat-rescue operation only on TV before – I had time, and didn’t want to miss this.
One chap had climbed the tree, and was prodding the cat with a long pole. This ended up scaring the cat, which took one step at a time to the highest branch. It also held on to the branch, and was not budging. This kept happening for a few minutes, when another chap climbed the tree – This guy was fast – He asked the other person to step down, climbed right next to the cat, man handled it, got it out of the branch, and dropped it. The cat, not knowing what was underneath, caught another branch and stayed on it. The guy climbs down, gets the cat again, and drops it on the sheet. Once down, it scared the wits out of one of the guys holding the sheet – It charged at whatever it could run at, to make its escape.
I guess that’s one cat that won’t be finding itself hanging off the edge in the near future.
1. “Leak” reports to media stating that there will be an increase of Rs. 10 per litre of petrol.
2. Watch the commotion, protests and enjoy them with a smug smile.
3. Call for another press conference and say that the Government is subsidizing the price – Actual price per litre should be around Rs. 85
4. Sit back and wait – watch the people get confused.
5. Increase price by Rs. 5 – People breathe out a sigh of relief – “Thank goodness it wasn’t as bad as expected”
This is the second time in three – four months price of fuel has gone up in India. There were traffic jams all along the roads, near fuel stations – People queuing up to fill up their vehicles so that they “save” money. Good opportunity to sell adulterated fuel too.
Guess I’m just venting out – I’m one of the affected too. 
I have a motorbike and I need to buy fuel for the bike.
I travel – I take photographs. Sometimes, I go to a lot of places on the same day, and I take photographs. Later, when I transfer the image to my computer, I get confused on which photograph is which place.
How cool would it be if there was a way by which I could leave tags for each image – voice or text – that would tell me where and when I took that photo. Of course, a better idea would be to shoot name boards / signposts – but still – leaves me aspiring for more.
One of the most interesting newsletters I subscribe to is Cryptogram – a newsletter that comes on the 15th of every month. I found it by accident a few years ago, when I was going through Bruce Schneier’s blog. Anyone with a degree in Computer Science and interest in security *ought* to know who he is, and what he does.
Schneier celebrated the 10th Anniversary of Cryptogram with this issue, and of all things this is very interesting:
Ten years ago I started Crypto-Gram. It was a monthly newsletter written entirely by me. No guest columns. No advertising. Nothing but me writing about security, published the 15th of the month every month. Now, 120 issues later, none of that has changed.
Isn’t that amazing? So many things change in 10 years time – and yet, there’s this newsletter that hasn’t changed. I have been reading the newsletter for the past few years, and what he’s mentioned is true – There’s been no change in the way the newsletter’s been. You don’t have to be an IT professional to read his blog – He writes about security – Not encryption algorithms. It’s for everyone.
Check his blog out, subscribe to his newsletter – I’m sure you won’t be disappointed. There is something for everyone in what he writes.
Thank you, Bruce Schneier. Thank you for all the wonderful articles.
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