Daily Passionate Photography Thoughts

Passionate Photography Thoughts – Photos that speaks

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Passionate Photography Thoughts – Photos that speaks

Dear Friends,

First of all let me welcome our new members who joined the Passionate Photographers group since my last communication with you. As the name denotes this is a group intended to ignite your passion for photography. How this group and your presence as a member can fuel the growth of your photography knowledge and photographic output depends on your active involvement within. Please therefore read the limited number of discussion threads present here to get a basic idea of interactions happening here.

Our interest in photography make us curious onlookers of any photo posts either in print or web media. Many times some of the best creations are produced by experts with the latest equipment available to them. It may be wide variety of lenses, lighting equipments or even models or subjects who are professionals to modulate the subjective topic into a magical visual experience. However , many of us do not have these advantage factors and the same should never hold us from continuing our passion to go in without inhibition and capture that magical and price moment which comes in front of you.

How can you do it? This is where an open attitude towards this hobby and creative activity comes in. Many of us are fond of cricket. Now imagine getting a chance to play at the beautiful Sheikh Zayed cricket stadium for a T20 match. A golden opportunity from out of the blue. You get to bowl only 24 genuine balls against your opposition. It is here your mind plays the key role. If you have been a player who plays cricket, you always play the game in your mind several times. The situations, the pros and cons, the weather conditions, the batsman whom you may play against. All those things are practiced and perfected in mind. Also your own positives and negatives, the effectiveness of your equipment like bat and other gears. All the factors compares to a photographic opportunity which comes to you suddenly.

Imagine you have a digital camera which is not a very high end model. First thing for you is to study it’s numerous features and their effectiveness on different light situations and surroundings. For this you have to keep on clicking, changing each and every option and testing it out. Like the bowler, who bowls numerous overs in the nets and perfect that unplayable Yorker, doosra or theesra or whatever, you too have to test the various options several times. This will make you comfortable and quick fingered to change the settings to the required mode to capture your object within the minutest of seconds available. In photography, seconds or milliseconds are precious. It teaches you the importance of time within time. This is why I say and propagate, those who are interested in photography, normally succeed in all other fields of life.

Constant practice make you comfortable and experienced with your equipment. Like the same way you change gears on a fast track, you will be able to switch over to various modes within the applicable precious seconds available at your disposal. This is how you get to see extremely interesting photographic moments captured by photo journalists. Regular members of photography related groups can visualize the amount of devoted effort by professional photographers to give us a golden moment. Examples like a boy jumping into a running bus, an mad elephant attacking a man, a sprinter finishing the race etc are some of them.

Lighting is another important factor that aides to a perfect picture. What do we do, if we are not equipped with specialized lighting equipments. What more you need than the natural and greatest light providers – i.e the Sun and the moon. Through constant observation, a photography enthusiast will be able to learn about different light options available during different times of the day and night. Your photography life becomes easy once you start understanding these natural settings better. Positioning yourself in the right spot to gain the advantage of these lights will then do wonderful effect your otherwise normal equipment and settings. By constant practice and observations you will learn the best settings for any particular scene to look priceless.

Observe closely each and every photo you get to see, especially of experts and professionals. Play the settings in your mind like a bowler and you will never know when that priceless moments comes clicking in front of you. Try it and your Photo will definitely speak the next time.

Our growth has been slow, but steady. A look at the photo section of the Passionate Photographers prove how we all grow each day. We can see several examples from passionate photographers.

I sincerely look forward to your comments and guidance notes from experts who are members here. Mere onlookers will never do good for the growth and knowledge share of this community. I repeat what I wrote in my previous communication about the accidental death of my brother in law holds good here also. Timely interactions and active involvement is extremely important for keeping the pulse of a community clicking along. If you are a professional with experience, please do not remain an unworthy onlooker. This is my sincere request.

God bless and have Passionate Photographic days ahead.

Ramesh Menon
10092009

Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon – Archiving

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Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon – Archiving

Dear Passionate Photographers,

A warm welcome to all the new members of Passionate Photographers group on Face Book. As the name denotes, you all have joined this group out of your interest for Photography. For any form of creativity there should be no boundaries or restrictions. Because, what I feel creative may not be the same for someone amongst you. But, it doesn’t mean that what I have done is not creative. So, with the above statement, I relax a mandatory condition kept for photo submission to this group. You can post photographs on any subject you feel interested and comfortable – except children and pornography. This is to keep our forum from any controversies or issues. However, if you are able to find time to post photos pertaining to the selected topics (Best Moments of your Summer holidays, Animals and Birds, Flowers, Smile) provided as Theme for Summer 2009, well and good. The theme is selected keeping in view of a competition planned for children to be conducted by Talent Share blog very soon. Also, please try to post limited numbers of photos each time selecting the best from your collection. This will make reviewing and editing work easy for our expert team.

Please also welcome Mr. J. H. Gaspar and Mr. Sujin Balakumaran to the expert team to guide us through a world of knowledge sharing and team building in the coming days. Mr. Gaspar has immense photography knowledge and a guru who nurtured photography talent to many. Mr. Sujin is a talented photographer, a team person and moreover, a friend for all who love to share knowledge and skills. I am sure we all will gain from both of them and their immense photography experiences.

In my previous communication, I touched the point of Discipline. This time, let me take you to Archiving. As a person who is passionate about photography and who likes to click photos without inhibition, I end up taking many pictures each day. Normally, What I do, is to do a transfer of pictures taken each day at the end of the day to a month-wise folder, systematically designed in my computer. This is done, when I keep my batteries for daily charging, so that main set of batteries and the spare are always fully charged each morning. I always take pictures in high resolution and when the transfer process is done and as I get time, I distribute copies of them to numerous folders, again systematically designed – say birds, animals, city scenes, autos, places, events, faces etc. This makes it easier for me to retrieve photos easily whenever I need a specific photo for a write-up or for presenting to a competition or for press. Normally, before posting on to my blogs or for that matter on any public portal, I resize the picture size to make it convenient for viewers to see them from any type or speed of access point they use, including PDA phones. This way it makes easy for normal readers to view and any time anyone interested in a high resolution of it could revert to me for viewing or any other commercial purpose. In addition, as I keep on clicking, I always keep a stock photo of a particular interesting situation for later use so that it never become a duplicate of what I submitted in the sites. The archiving system I developed is by trial and error and by experience. Currently with the help of bigger storage facilities like 500 GB hard disks and so on, keeping multiple version of our precious photography moments safe have become an easy task. However, for new viruses, there is always an easy access and I try to avoid using USBs and other connectors on common computers.

Wish to hear your comments and see your photography knowledge shared. Please invite any keen photographer who may be interested to share his knowledge and skills for our benefit and let us progress ahead each time we visit Passionate Photographers group.

Always keep your eyes open for a precious moment and have a great journey ahead.

God Bless.

Ramesh Menon
29082009

Daily Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon – 30 July 2009

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Daily Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon – 30 July 2009

Welcome all, to the world of Passionate Photographers.

I hope you enjoyed the slow and steady start we had. I know it takes time to gain momentum before we get truly passionate contributors to this wonderful group. It is therefore our common need to set a discipline before we gain that magical momentum. Let that be the topic for today.

You might have noticed the comment by Mr. R Vijayan on my new photo album – Temptations on the Move – Delhi Gaya Haridwar Rishikesh. Every one carries a camera these days and clicks several precious moments. But seldom take additional few minutes to keep them organised for viewing or any other use later on. Partially this is due to the lack of storage facilities or know-how related to the instrument one uses.

Discipline, personal and professional is very essential and I contribute a lot of my success in both the field due to my interest in photography. According to me a person who is passionate about photography is like a soldier. Like a soldier, who keeps his fitness at its peak and maintain his equipments war ready every time, a passionate photographer will keep his camera and his photographic intuitive mind ever ready for a golden moment. To this he has to:

• preserve his camera and accessories in its perfect environment condition

• keeps the batteries charged, carry additional spare batteries for emergency prolonged use
• keeps all the necessary data transfer cables and additional storage cards handy
• keep on reading and enhancing his knowledge about different types of photography techniques.
• Keeps on clicking without inhibitions pictures of objects that suite his interest. As he knows better that practise makes one perfect when a real opportunity arrives.
• Keep on exploring various features of his photography equipments under various conditions so that he is familiar with the instruments and well aware of what is the quickest way to capture a golden moment with the instrument he has at that particular time and place.

I consider all the above factors equally important. However, to the last one I give more importance because it gives an overall positive outlook to an individual. Like you develop an interest to get to know more about your photography instrument, by constant practise, you get to know also the finer aspects of your family, friends and colleagues with whom you interact frequently. A totally different outlook will evolve in your interactions within no time if you enjoy encouraging photography with passion. It becomes a duty and devotion to contribute towards the benefit of the society in many possible ways.

I am thankful to those members who joined Passionate Photographers group on Face Book. For all your information, as a matter of discipline I had to remove one member yesterday who joined and uploaded photos. Nothing wrong in it, but there was no connection to the themes given, there was no trace to interact with his Face Book ID either by comments or messages. As a person who encourages and promote interactive communications it is against our common perceived benefit of sharing knowledge. I hope the member comes back with his communicative ID and share his valuable expertise with all of us.

Please start contributing passionately at your own pace. Invite and encourage your friends and fellow photography enthusiasts to join Passionate Photographers. Let us collectively further the growth of this group to a knowledge enhancement forum for passionate photographers on this e-world.

I will be travelling to India tonight for about 20 days and will try and keep in touch with you through this wonderful interactive forum whenever I can.

God Bless and Have a great journey ahead.

Ramesh Menon
30 07 2009

Daily thoughts created for Passionate Photographers group on Face Book

Daily Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon – 29 July 2009

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Daily Passionate Photography Thoughts by Ramesh Menon

Good morning all. A passionate response indeed to this new initiative of mine to bring together all those who are passionate about photography. As you might have noticed already, each member of this group holds equally responsible role for a steady growth and sustained knowledge share process. This is a thread started to share my experience as a passionate photographer. Let me take this opportunity to briefly introduce the volunteers:

Mr. Ahmed Kutty is a well known Press Photographer working with Gulf News in UAE. Photo journalism is not an easy task and those who read newspapers with interest will straightaway notice his photos even if there is no name mentioned below it. We are now blessed to share his creative collection through Face Book.

Mr. K K Moidu is film critic, an active blogger and established journalist working for Gulf Today. His reviews are popular amongst the film industry and the fans.

Mr. R Vijayan is an ardent supporter of creativity. More than that he has a great heart to say always a few words of encouragement or constructive criticism whenever he observes a creativity happening. Upcoming singer Rashmi Vijayan is his daughter.

Adur Pradeep is a well known journalist working for Khaleej Times. Famous for his sports reviews and write ups, he carries a no nonsense approach and his own bold style of constructive criticism. A comment or observation to be passed with a few words of encouragement will never miss from his side.

Sujit Sukumaran is an established Toast Master in UAE. Add a very good writer, a professional Resume Maker, a promoter of vegetarianism and Indian culture along with a ‘no physical or personal difficulties can hold me from moving on in my life attitude’; you will get a picture of Sujit.

Dr. Rajah Balakrishna is well known amongst Photography enthusiast in the Middle East. A living encyclopaedia of the subject, his experience that will be shared here in this group will be a bounty for all those passionate photographers to share with.

Rajashree Menon – my loving wife. Very creative in mind and dedicated to her profession as a Software Quality Assurance and Project Manager, finds time to check the quality points of my numerous creative pursuits. A spelling here, or grammar there or a stroke missed at another place will never be missed.

Last but not the least – Ramesh Menon – this humble me. Take a few minutes, visit my profile and also visit Photo Speaks, Letters to the Editor, Mind Speaks, No News, Achievements sections of my blogs and you will get to know me.

Welcome all the above volunteers and equally welcome yourself to this wonderful group we have.

My passion for photography started many years ago, when my father returned from Bombay to start his pharmaceutical business in Kerala. In his collection were some excellent books on photography published by Kodak with whom he was working then. I read them as many times as I could during my school days but a dream of getting hold of a camera of my own came many years after that. Imagine how lucky the present generation children are. The points noted from those readings remained strongly and will share that book with you all when I return from my holidays in India. This is the result of an important aspect of collecting and preserving valuables which I have maintained from my childhood.

Well, I hope you enjoyed today’s passionate photographic thoughts. Now, its time to move on from passion to profession. See you tomorrow and I humbly request you to start uploading your collection of photos as suggested in the theme for this summer. Please also upload links to your photo albums at the links section.

Develop the photographer in you, slowly groom yourself to click without inhibition and come out with a photo that speaks life around you.

God Bless and have a passionate photography day ahead.

Ramesh Menon