the flag bearers....

Victory Day
16 December 2011
Mirpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh

the moment we had come to know that Pretty and her brother had the most unique of birthdays, we knew we had to do something about it.... and then when we learned that Pretty's dad was a freedom fighter, we thought it would be a huge missed opportunity if we couldn't manage time for an exclusive photo-session.... the Victory Day was coming; so, we planned for the session right away... and when we ultimately met the family and spent some time with them, we knew that we were about to do one of our most important shoots.... it was a privileged evening; some heart-warming moments and an opportunity to tell an exclusive story; a real-life story....

Professor Abdul Halim had been in the Pakistan Air Force when Bangladesh's independence was declared.... he joined the struggle for independence from the very first day and fought in the Tangail and Pabna areas of the country.... he had been one of those early venturers who risked everything and never looked back.... never had a doubt about what he was fighting for.... he remembrances from those fiery days of 1971 ignited that passion in our heart, and we almost forgot that we had a photo-session to do.... his real-life stories we so vivid and earthly, which could easily differentiate with the unreal.... his descriptions were pure, raw, and uncut.... thats history has to be read; unexpurgated.... he still remembers how after the capture of three Pakistan Army vehicles early in the war (probably around April 1971), he was hailed along with his few brave colleagues.... and how people turned against them when they were forced to retreat from Madhupur.... his words are as fresh as they had happened yesterday.... the history is as real as it can get...

Professor Halim's two children carry the flag of the nation which was born after a few like him decided to raise their voices.... Professor Abdul Halim fought off the enemy in 1971 with his gun.... that was just the beginning of another struggle.... the struggle to build a nation.... Pretty was born on 26th March, the Independence Day, and Hameem was born on 16th December, the Victory Day.... they are the children of the sun.... the flag bearers of today.... they carry forward the struggle to build the nation that their proud father dreamed of....

and there is the family.... spending time with Mrs. Halim showed us the value of this proud family.... their struggle to raise this family is an epic one; something that can inspire people.... her descriptions of the early days were vivid and captivating; capable of brining emotions.... these conversations made our stay over there truly worth-it.... Pretty and Hameem are lucky to have parents like that.... our salute!

the photo-session wasn't complete without some intimate portraits of the family.... we saved it for the last part of the session.... but this time, we did a change.... there was no national flag in the back.... the flag was a very important part of the shoot.... and as it was the Victory Day, and Hameem's birthday, it was all the more appropriate....

technically speaking, this group shoot was dependent on some moody light; yet, the contrast had to be lessened.... the main light for the whole shoot was a Elinchrom Ranger RX + Rotalux 100cm "Deep Octa" softbox combo.... the power of the Ranger was needed to get enough depth for group portraits.... trigger for the Ranger was the Elinchrom Skyport... to reduce contrast, we set up two YN-560 flashes in optical trigger (S1) mode aiming for the ceiling on the other side.... that light trickled down just about enough to cut contrasts.... two lights allowed for a faster recycle time.... the big size of the room allowed the use of 70-210mm lens, compressing perspective.... yea, we turned their living room into a temporary studio!!

anyway, a lot more to come.... getting little time to complete blogs now-a-days... but hope to catch up soon enough.....

five shots only!!

23 December 2011
Dhaka, Bangladesh

this was the fourth time I had been lucky enough to participate in a graffiti shoot event, though this was the fifth event to take place... the first time it was more like an exploration.... second one was more preparation.... and the third one was differentiation.... and the fourth one??.... well, umm..... please read below....

this was another of those strobist meetups that we used to call "Koba Squad".... again, all the thanks go to Zaim for not getting tired of organising this every now and then.... and also thanks to all the participants for daring the weather and a Friday morning sleep.... and I also need to give thanks to my models for being patient and having faith on my ideas.... thanks to Faryeeha, Ayon, Rezwan, RR, Nasser, Ananya, and others (please forgive me if I forgot your names) for helping to create something different....

the idea was to try out some "film noir" kind of shoot.... but as it turned out, it was less of a classical Hollywood-style shoot, and rather more like a twenty-first century crime drama shoot.... well, sort of... we were not planning for it in advance... so, we made something out of just our imagination.... not a lot of found objects that we could use over there.... but we at least had some space and some rooms and walls to do our stuff.... in sum, we had to improvise.... may be next time, when we are more prepared with ideas, it would be something better.... but I must say, our models did wonderful.... they understood the ideas, took instructions pretty well, and constantly tried to implement the ideas as best as they could.... it was a team effort....

anyway, I had a specific theme for the shoot was more in the line of thriller drama.... "fear of the shadow".... so, there were shadows; lots of it... and darkness, and some striking colours, to strike fear.... and of course there were the expressions.... fearful, of course.... we shot just five frames.... we just thought it was better to go for a small number of satisfactory photos, rather than a lot of less-than-satisfactory ones....

technically speaking, except the last shot, all the photos had two lights.... the main light on the subject was a YN-560 flash shooting through a Lastolite 24" Ezybox Hotshoe softbox.... and the other light was another YN-560 with some sort of gel filter.... the first one had blue gel, second and third one had red gel.... the fourth one didn't have a gel on it, rather it had a grid spot on it to concentrate light.... in all the cases, the lights were triggered by Elinchrom Skyport radio triggers.... I first thought of leaving one flash in optical trigger mode.... but as Zaim & Co. had been using flashes on the other side, I had to resort to two triggers....

the last shot was a bit more complex... I brought out a third flash for it.... two flashes were gelled green... two models created the silhouettes by standing in front of the flashes.... the third light was the main light in the softbox illuminating the main subject... this time, the third flash was on optical trigger, as I didn't bring out a third radio receiver....

this was my first outing with my newly acquired old camera, the Nikon D70s.... its a great little camera with a lot of capabilities....  it performed well.... the 2" monitor was bit of a pain considering the 3" monitors that we almost habitually see everyday.... used a 20mm Nikkor on it, which became a 30mm lens because of 1.5 crop factor... 30mm was enough for the type of shoot I had in mind.... didn't need to change the lens... and in fact, didn't need to touch anything in the camera during the whole shoot... only changed some settings with the lights.... the camera was untouched.... f8, 1/160sec, 200 ISO....

a lot more to come....

frozen memories....

22 December 2011

Bashundhara R/A, Dhaka, Bangladesh

every now and then these guys make my day.... well, this time it was evening... the Paraboyz are the unique bunch of guys with little similarity... 'living close by'..... yet, that small similarity is strong enough to create a long-term bondage like no other.... this bunch of dudes had been connected for almost twenty-three years.... and interesting to note that some of the members of this group are just too young to remember the early days of interaction!!.... but couple of decades later those early days are more precious than ever...

can't thank Aurnab and Nazia enough for taking the initiative and making it all happen.... would've loved to see the gathering even bigger.... but anyway, thats how it goes now.... people are just too busy to spare an evening.... thats what makes such gatherings so precious.... those who showed up deserve appreciation for daring the weather and weekday traffic.... they all sacrificed their times somewhere else to attend this event.... hats off!!

Aunik and Omi filled the memory cards of their DSLRs with lots of candid moments.... so, I thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to freeze everyone's face given that every time we see one another, there's always some change happening!!.... the group is already much bigger than before, as Srabon noted out in one of his Facebook comments.... everyone's gone through at least some sort of change.... that makes a frozen moment so much more interesting... 

I took my tiny little P&S, the LX-5.... and also took a couple of flashes and a set of radio trigger for the flashes.... all that fitted in a small bag, which none would believe contained a portable studio.... thanks to everyone who posed in front of the tiny camera against their will and still gave an expression which should hold until the next get-together!!

 

on a technical note, the flashes were two YN-560s.... the trigger for one was an Elinchrom Skyport radio trigger and the other one was in optical trigger mode (S1).... the main light was coupled with a DIY tiny diffuser to soften the light....  thanks to Anonto, Srabon and Rahat being excellent assistant, holding both the light and the diffuser.... the second light gelled orange, was behind the subject, shooting into a white wall....

the last few pictures were in a different setting.... basically one YN-560 on camera right shooting into white ceiling.... simple one-light bounced solution.... Shihab was a bit hesitant to make their couple portrait a bit more interesting.... so, the dudes just showed him how to do it!! :)

a lot more to come.....

a casual shootout....

13 December 2011
Mohammadpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh

we were planning to do a Victory Day (16th December) photo-shoot with Lamisa.... it was still at the planning stage when we thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to produce something for the Martyred Intellectuals Day (14th December).... but we were not really prepared for a time-intensive session.... it was more like a rehearsal for the big shoot ahead.... the rehearsal would be with the national flag... the Victory Day shoot would also feature the national flag as the backdrop, so we thought it would be nice if we could get some practice regarding the setups....

we received lotsa nice feedback regarding the final image that we had shared.... the most striking part of the picture was Lamisa's expression.... that expression took some effort to bring, to be honest... for the three-year old, what could we expect?.... she was much happier to smile in from the camera rather than giving a moody look..... we knew that it created a problem that would trouble us during the upcoming bigger shoot as well, because that shoot also required some moody expressions.... the total shoot lasted 6 minutes!!..... for those who thought these expressions came spontaneously, you have another chance to think about it.... :)

on the technical note, the shoot was done with an 85mm Nikkor on a D700.... to put the background out of focus, I used f2.8.... and also kept a bit of distance between the subject and the backdrop.... so, to gap that distance, I either had to use a separate light for the backdrop or had to use a bigger light to cover it all......I went for the second option.... Elinchrom Ranger RX + Rotalux 100cm "Deep Octa".... the larger softbox ensured enough light on the background as well creating that moody light on Lamisa's face.... Elinchrom Skport was the trigger.... simple, but effective lighting....

a lot more to come....

never underestimate the bounced flash!!

09 December 2011
Mohammadpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh

yea, this is another of those boring technical blogs!

whatever fancy light-shaping tool I use, its always worth keeping the options open.... by open, I mean considering some of the simplest of ways to modify light.... one of the softest lights is created by bouncing from a large white surface... while wedding photographers use this as their main light almost all the time, there are problems associated with it.... one being the colour of the wall, which you can't change and the distance of the bouncing surface, which may just be too far from the camera or the subject... that way, it will eat up all the flash power and bounce only a small part of the light... and in worst case scenario, the light may not even come back to the lens!!.... anyway, my aim is not to show the drawbacks of such bounced light... rather utilising their potential in the presence of some sophisticated light-modifiers....

while the main light can give direction to the light, bounced lights can help cut shadows and contrasts.... even when using a big and broad light source as the Elinchrom 100cm Deep Octa, I kept an eye on the shadows, some of which I didn't want there.... yet, I wanted that light to be a bit directional....

the main light behind that big Deep Octa was the Elinchrom Ranger RX.... used a couple of YN-560s to bounce light off the white wall on the left.... two lights to make sure that I had sufficient frame rate.... I didn't want the YNs to struggle to cope up with the Ranger.... the YNs were in optical trigger mode (S1), picking up light from the Ranger.... the Ranger, on the other hand, was triggered by Elinchrom Skyport....

 

our model Naqvi was so spontaneous.... at six months, his expressions stole the show... we played with him with different themes... he shined in all of them.... he felt a bit drowsy at the end of the photo-shoot, but he was able to finish the session in good note.... we had to cut short the session a bit to accommodate his feeding and rest... in any case, for a baby session, its always the baby, who dictates the pace of the photo-shoot....

Naqvi was not a stranger in front of our lenses, as we already had another session with him a while back... he was adorable at that time, so as he is now....

a lot more to come.....