15 October 2011
Mohammadpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh
on assignment.... my photog buddy Arif came into our makeshift studio with his life-partner Tajia.... it was a session long planned for.... and thank God that it finally worked for all of us.... we had been in contact for the last several days to make this session as relevant as possible.... our idea was to make sure that the photos represent the people and their relationship..... not just in a literal sense, but also in the world of symbolism and emotional attachment.... the pictures had to talk.... a set of formal portraits are good to remember after years, but a set of memories are so much more.... and thats what we had been aiming for....
this required a lotta teamwork... both the subjects were involved in the planning and the shoot.... and our three-member shooting team (my wife, the Creative Director; me, the photog and Lamisa, the cheerleader!!) was also busy setting things up.... we also wanted to make sure that the overall shoot wasn't just a set of photos to remember, it was more of an experience.... we had a lotta fun....
Arif and Tajia are a wonderful couple.... just got married recently.... made for each other.... but you have to talk to them to find out what glues them together.... its one of those unsolved mysteries of God that keeps millions of couples around the world together under the same roof.... no relationship is a perfect relationship.... every relationship revolves around a "chemistry" that mixes the contrasts and commonalities, and brings balance.... we were trying to show that same "chemistry" between our two lovely subjects....
I would try to publish the whole story in parts, as it would become a bit too big for one post.... and would also put a lotta pressure on me to publish.... this first part of the shoot concentrates on some of the contrasts and common interests of the couple.... and as said before, not just in a literal sense.... we were in the process of creating a drama, which wouldn't just be of interest to the couple, but to others as well.... and also tried to keep the symbolism to its limits....
as per the tech stuff is concerned, the ones with the blue tone was the more difficult of the two setups.... used a blue gel filter on an SB-900, bounced from a white paper pasted to the dumb monitor, which symbolized a TV.... another light was a YN-560 shooting through a Lastolite 24" Ezybox Hotshoe softbox, which was the key light, hanging from a Manfrotto monopod, held by my wife... used a 20mm lens to bring all of that in the frame and to create a perspective..... the second setup was a simple one with the Lastolite softbox as the only light source... used a 70-210mm lens to shoot those.... trigger was Elinchrom Skyport, and optical trigger for one light when two lights were used....
the expressions in the images surpassed my expectations, really.... you never know what you are capable of doing, until you really do it... and Arif and Tajia proved exactly that.... a simple thanks to them wouldn't be enough....
anyway, more coming up in a hurry.... stay tuned for the other parts....
Mohammadpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh
on assignment.... my photog buddy Arif came into our makeshift studio with his life-partner Tajia.... it was a session long planned for.... and thank God that it finally worked for all of us.... we had been in contact for the last several days to make this session as relevant as possible.... our idea was to make sure that the photos represent the people and their relationship..... not just in a literal sense, but also in the world of symbolism and emotional attachment.... the pictures had to talk.... a set of formal portraits are good to remember after years, but a set of memories are so much more.... and thats what we had been aiming for....
this required a lotta teamwork... both the subjects were involved in the planning and the shoot.... and our three-member shooting team (my wife, the Creative Director; me, the photog and Lamisa, the cheerleader!!) was also busy setting things up.... we also wanted to make sure that the overall shoot wasn't just a set of photos to remember, it was more of an experience.... we had a lotta fun....
Arif and Tajia are a wonderful couple.... just got married recently.... made for each other.... but you have to talk to them to find out what glues them together.... its one of those unsolved mysteries of God that keeps millions of couples around the world together under the same roof.... no relationship is a perfect relationship.... every relationship revolves around a "chemistry" that mixes the contrasts and commonalities, and brings balance.... we were trying to show that same "chemistry" between our two lovely subjects....
I would try to publish the whole story in parts, as it would become a bit too big for one post.... and would also put a lotta pressure on me to publish.... this first part of the shoot concentrates on some of the contrasts and common interests of the couple.... and as said before, not just in a literal sense.... we were in the process of creating a drama, which wouldn't just be of interest to the couple, but to others as well.... and also tried to keep the symbolism to its limits....
as per the tech stuff is concerned, the ones with the blue tone was the more difficult of the two setups.... used a blue gel filter on an SB-900, bounced from a white paper pasted to the dumb monitor, which symbolized a TV.... another light was a YN-560 shooting through a Lastolite 24" Ezybox Hotshoe softbox, which was the key light, hanging from a Manfrotto monopod, held by my wife... used a 20mm lens to bring all of that in the frame and to create a perspective..... the second setup was a simple one with the Lastolite softbox as the only light source... used a 70-210mm lens to shoot those.... trigger was Elinchrom Skyport, and optical trigger for one light when two lights were used....
the expressions in the images surpassed my expectations, really.... you never know what you are capable of doing, until you really do it... and Arif and Tajia proved exactly that.... a simple thanks to them wouldn't be enough....
anyway, more coming up in a hurry.... stay tuned for the other parts....
