Blog - Sandip Debnath

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Night life at Madiwala
2007-05-06 19:25:00
Madiwala comes in my way to office ...( contd.)
More About: Life , Documentary , Night , Night Life , Wala

Y weekend Magazine
2007-05-05 08:55:00
Published on May 4, 2007 on Y weekend Magazine .
More About: Tear , Sheet , Weekend , Week

Debate Session at Sera Mey Monastery
2007-04-09 17:59:00
Again at Bylakuppe. This is second time for me and absolutely a personal tour.. No photography intentions were made.I went with my family for a holiday there. But I must say this is not the right time to go there. The climate is too hot. You won't find any green landscapes there.It was so hot and dry, my family members were scolding me for taking them there. I was really sad by seeing such a dry character of this place.Casually and as a part of my itinerary I went to Sera Mey Mona stery in the afternoon, and came to know that there would be a debate session at 6:30 PM in front of the Monastery. I looked at my watch and found it was only 3:30PM. My wife insisted me to stay back so that we can see the very different debate session. I roamed around a bit and came back at 6PM at the same place.And I was totally stunned by seeing the gathering and the debate session. within one hour I finished my memory card by shooting continuously and after that I felt, a photograph can not do justice ...
More About: Events , Debate , Sion , Aster

Stroll by the sea
2007-03-16 09:55:00
It was shoot just before the sunset. I was little disappointed by denial of the gatekeeper of the shore temple at the evening when I tried to enter. It was the closing time for them. I took another route to go to beach and was happy to find lot of activities there. The light was just fantastic . The whole beach was looking like a daily fair- ice cream seller, souvenir shops, fruit seller, horse owners and lot of local tourists and lot of happenings. I was lucky to be there at that time.This photo was shoot on ISO200, 1/4 sec , f/4 and 17 mm.
More About: Roll , Troll

Mamallapuram | A journey towards history
2007-03-06 15:16:00
If you are annoyed with the behavior pattern of the Bangalore autorickshaw drivers, then I must say, there is nothing to be worried about Bangaloreans, once you have experienced them at Chennai. No auto drivers can go worser than Chennai auto drivers. My Tamil friends warned me before, but I had not faced them earlier !27 feb, almost 5:30 Am in the morning : just reached at Chennai Koyambedu bus stand; next destination was at Mama llapuram. I have read somewhere that this small city was called Mahabalipuram earlier. It is one of the recent name-change-event in India that took place and the place has been renamed as Mamallapuram after the name of king Mamalla.At 5:30 AM, Koyambedu bus stand was really sleeping; people were sleeping on the platform, no one was there on 'May I help U' booth, nothing is written in english even. I asked one on-duty Police person about the platform number from where I could get a bus for Mamallapuram. The correct platform number was 6 and the bus numb...
More About: Travel , History , Journey , Stor

H A P P Y H O L I
2007-03-03 15:19:00
© amrita pal / sandip debnathHOLI is a festival of color in India.We shared a light mood amongst us, a close circle of our friends. I wish a Happy Holi to all my friends.
More About: Events

I was little disappointed by seeing the entry fee ...
2007-03-01 01:24:00
I was little disappointed by seeing the entry fee chart at Five Rathas compound. The entry ticket for an Indian citizen costs Rs 10 and for a foreigner Rs 250. I strongly feel that there should not be any difference between the entry fees. I went to European countries and found no difference in any kind of fees in any of their tourist places. It made me uncomfortable to see those tourists however purchasing the tickets with a higher fee because they came to India to see our historical and cultural richness !Pancha Rathas (means five chariots) were carved during the rule of King Mamalla (Narasimhavarman I, A.D 630 - 670) in 7th century. These Rathas were individually named after Draupadi, Arjuna, Bheema, Dharmaraja and Nakul-Sahadev from the Mahabharata. One archeology site says "the site gives the delightful impression of a city of life-size model buildings, whose variety of roofs, floor plans, and columniation defines a veritable source-book of South Indian temple forms" about t...
More About: Travel , Seeing , Little , Point , Litt

Color Photography
2007-02-23 14:24:00
When I talk about color photography these pictures always comes in my mind first. One of them has been shot with my Canon 350D with a 17-40mm f/4L lens and another one was shot with a small tiny Nikon 3700; a 3.2 MP point and shoot camera.I must admit here that, 17-40mm f/4 L lens is an excellent piece of glass, which not only reproduces super sharpness but also an excellent color. I strongly feel that the color in the first photograph came so well because of this lens.The second photograph was a little tricky one. With a small tiny point and shoot camera nothing much you can do while shooting. I wanted to give it a feel of something different. I have set the camera shooting mode in "dusk" , which means it changes the white balance in the camera settings. It was early in the morning, probably at 5:30 AM, not much sunlight though, Chennai Express was about to go off the platform. It was a last minute check up with the reservation list pasted on the train compartment by a fellow pas...
More About: Photography , Color , Scrap , Graph

some warm light here
2007-02-21 17:07:00
If you get this kind of light early in the morning , will you be able to keep quite and not to take your camera out ? Umm , I think it was difficult for me not to shoot. I was going back to my home town after a long time; a year or so. Feeling excited about it and watching outside country-scape through the window of the sleeper coach train compartment, I was about to miss this wonderful sight. First ray of sun was just falling on her face, through the window. December is really cold for the people of North Bengal and when you travel through the train, it even gets colder.While coping with the cold winder morning, this warm sun light comes as a true enjoyment to us. And so did they.This photograph is not retouched much. The color is original here; it was just a great light. ISO 200, f/4.5 , 1/40 sec and 19mm.
More About: Scrap , Light , Here , Some

Play time
2007-02-19 16:26:00
I wanted to do a new experiment with my workflow, I wanted to take some image to play with; I started searching in my archive and found this one. An old photo, but from my favourite place; Russel Market. I thought I would take a photograph that describes a play for playing with workflow. Sounds weired, huh ? Then call me a dumbo.Jokes apart.Let me tell you the workflow here I did with this photograph.1.Open the image in Photoshop CS2.2.Click on image > adjustment > Match color.3.Check box on "Neutralize.4. Drag the luminance bar to 120 and color intensity to 75. Save it.5. Click on filter > sharpen > unsharpen mask.6. On the unsharp mask pop up window, select amount as 100,radius 3.0 and threshold 0.7. Click on edit > fade unsharp mask > opacity 100, blending mode Darken.8. Repeat the step number 6 and 7 but this time while fading put the opacity 85 and mode as lighten.9. Resize the image accordingly; I resize it to 600 pixel.10. Save it. Now you can play with it too. Try your ow...
More About: Time , Play , Scrap

Nomads Life | Making Dinner
2007-02-17 05:47:00
Yesterday evening, I started late from my office; just to make sure that I would get the dawn light while shooting for my recent project.Everyday I look at the location and think, next day I should carry my camera and go for shooting , but I was not able to make it for some other reason.Then I approached Aditya, my friend, colleague and photographer, so that we both can go together. After he got his first DSLR, he started a new blog with a strong determination to shoot at least a photo everyday. I was quite sure that, if I could get hooked with him, I would be successful.I wanted to shoot something very urban; like urban landscape or urban life. Nearby the location I found a group of people staying in tents just like a colony. Dogs, roosters, cats, utensils, tempo traveler, coca-cola crates and everything were there. They were celebrating Shiv Raatri yesterday. I went there and approached them. Not everybody were easy in front of the camera, rather some of them were afraid of being ...
More About: Life , Documentary , Dinner , King , Maki

Being there in India, Sandip thinks, photography i...
2007-02-17 03:02:00
Being there in India , Sand ip thinks, photographyis not a phenomenon to capture a moment, it is thesoul of a frame which you need to show to the viewerthrough your lens. Working for a Computer Firmin Bangalore, India; Sandip feels that he is lucky toget the opportunityto observe and learn aboutthe rich culture and religiousbelief in India, especiallyin the Southern part. Sandip alwaystries to find out the human element in his frame,he strongly believes that a picture with out ahuman element in it is something like a bodywithout its soul.Born in West Bengal ( India )... Doing freelancePhotography and working on assignments.Sandip can be reached at sandip.deep@gmail.comor call him at +91.934 254 5683.photo courtesy © Lavannya Goradia
More About: Think , Here

Fishermen | Pondicherry
2007-02-15 11:45:00
If you are at Pond icherry, you may be disappointed by seeing the beach over there,; as all the beaches are covered with stones. you wont find any sand beach there. But it is lovely to see and walk on those black rocks and take photograph. Last year when I went there , my intention was different. I wanted to make a documentary on the life of fishermen community. After I came back from Chidambaram to Pondicherry back, i asked one of the auto driver to take me to a place where I could find fishermen village as well as sand beach. He did not disappoint me. I reached to a unnamed place approximately 10 km north of Pondicherry. It was afternoon then. The light was just beautiful, but not on the sea side, ( You all know that Pondicherry is on the east coast of India ), I got a very nice light falling on those fishermen bringing fish back and their children playing by the sea. I waited there for some time ;watched the activities keenly; talked with some of them and then started shooting.It...
More About: Documentary , Cher , Cherry , Herm

World Water Day 2007
2007-02-15 11:38:00
This official poster can be downloaded from here. More Campaign materials are available on the official website.On one of my old blog post, I wrote about this event earlier; now it is officially published.This gives me a happiness of being a part of this mass awareness. Both these images used in this poster and brochures were shoot by me earlier.
More About: Events , World , Water

Durga Puja | Biggest festival of the Bengali
2007-02-14 06:24:00
"Durga, in Sanskrit means "She who is incomprehensible or difficult to reach." Goddess Durga is a form of Sakti worshiped for her gracious as well as terrifying aspect. Mother of the Universe, she represents the infinite power of the universe and is a symbol of a female dynamism. "It starts from the first day of the waxing phase of moon in autumn called Mahalaya. The activites start before dusk with chants of various hymns of 'Mahishasura Mardini' . A very busy day for the Bengali s. Thousands of people gather at River Ganga early in the morning to offer Tarpan in memory of their forefather. Mahalaya is an auspicious day observed seven days before the actual Durga puja begins.The inauguration of the Goddess idol starts on Mahashasthi, sixth day from Mahalaya... and the festival starts too ...
More About: Photo , Stories , Festival , Fest

Chichen Kebab
2007-02-13 14:14:00
Chicken Kebab is something I always love to eat. Last week with Aditya, I went to Madiwala for a night shoot. I am recently doing a series on "urban cityscape- a stroll at night". This shoot was just a part of it. This young boy from Oodlabari ( A place in North Bengal )came to Bangaloare three years ago to search his fortune. He ended up by starting this fast food shop. I had a nice time with him taking about his native place, his family and his aim in future etc.It was difficult to shoot in low light. However, I pointed my 17-40mm f/4 L lens on this guy's hand. Autofocused, but exposed for 1/4 sec. It was shoot on wide open; on 17mm. ISO 400.
More About: Scrap , Chen , Chich

Yellow Telephone
2007-01-25 17:38:00
I liked the way this yellow telephone is kept on the market.
More About: Scrap , Tele , Yellow , Telephone , Yell

Photoblogs Magazine | March 2006
2006-12-21 18:27:00
PhotoBlogs Magazin e , Marc h 2006.
More About: Photoblog

Raghu Rai at TASVEER
2006-11-11 10:51:00
"Tasveer " means photo in hindi. Tasveer, as an organization, is committed to showcase contemporary Indianphotography by regularly exhibiting the works of Indian photographers precisely and joyfully.To achieve this, as the first effort,Tasveer is exhibiting a rare collection of Raghu Rai's works.His photographs are an insightful journey into the mysteries of human life and nature. A set of 40 plus photographs spanning across 20 years of his works are the proofs of his journey towards the ultimate experience called DARSHAN.Tasveer # Sua House(next to the British Library)26/1,Kasturba Road Cross,Bangalore.
More About: Events

Tsogyal Shedrub Dargyeling Nunnery
2006-11-05 07:55:00
Penor Rinpoche established this nunnery as complementary to Namdrolling Monastery and probably this is the biggest nunnery in India. We were a bit hesitant in going inside the nunnery; a place which is sacred and also strictly women's only . There was a little boy selling vegetable infront of the main gate pretending to be the care taker of that nunnery. He eventually stopped us. Since hesitant, we were out of wit. Lavannya was the only woman in our group; so being an woman photographer she went inside to find out an opportunity for shoot, if any. Later on we were allowed to go inside and to take photographs. People were so friendly and co-operative that we were over-whelmed at their open-mindedness.[ This photograph has been shoot inside the kitchen of Tsogyal Shedrub Dargyeling Nunn ery]
More About: Documentary

Path to Buddhism
2006-11-01 15:35:00
It was the second day for us in Bylakuppe. On the first day karthik saw a very beautiful place while on the way and insisted us to going there early morning when we would get the first ray of sun. While returning from Sera Monastery we discovered the place again and were surprised. It was just beautiful. Both sides of the road had corn fields and down the road the horizon was made with line of blue mountain with some glittering golden Tibetian temples and Monasteries. Indeed , it was a Path to Buddhism .
More About: Scrap

It was a Sunday Morning
2006-10-21 06:53:00
About three months back, I went to Russel Market for shooting. It is one of the city's old market located at Shivaji Nagar; probably in 1927 it was opened for public.It was a sunday early morning, we were all set with our cameras in this busy market with different activities.Though it is very difficult to search for an image in a Market which can say about a lazy sunday; I think I was lucky to get this frame. Early morning, this dog was enjoying the sunlight infront of a closed shop.
More About: Documentary , Sunday , Scrap , Morning , Sunday morning

Monsoon by Steve Mccurry
2006-10-11 19:41:00
I always like to stand in front of Landmark's( Book shop) India stand. whenever I go there I used to spend normally couple of hours just browsing through the Gallery. I always search for Raghu Rai or Raghubir Singh on the rack.Last Monday I went to landmark again and found Steve Mccurry's Mons oon . It was a second hand copy and paperback edition. Consist of more than 70 photographs the book is a real pleasure for the eye. It is one of the favourite for me. It is a must have , I should say. © Steve Mccurry/ Magnum Photos
More About: Scrap , Curry

In the kitchen
2006-10-10 17:31:00
An young Nun is looking inside the Kitchen in the monastery. She is a novice nun and studying Buddhism.
More About: Documentary , Chen

When I reached this Tibetian Institution at Bylak...
2006-10-09 20:28:00
When I reached this Tibetian Institution at Bylakuppe, I was surprised to see that it was like a no mans land, I realised then that it was a Sunday.This Institution is a residential Institution. As it was a sunday , all students were actually in a mood to relax. I saw one of them carring a Nepali Cinema VCD for watching. I talked to them and went inside their rooms too.The rooms were clean and well maintained, I was surprised to find a posters of Zidane,the famous football star. These students came from different part of India.A very different and intense looking Novice Monk looks back at me.
More About: Documentary , When , Reach

It was already 7:00 PM when I reached at Ulsoor la...
2006-10-08 14:30:00
It was already 7:00 PM when I reached at Ulsoor lake Durga puja Pandal on MahaNavami (the 4th day of Durga Puja). Aarti competition was scheduled at 7:30.The entire pandal was already filled by the visitors. It was hard to find a place for stand and shoot.We went in front of the pandal and stood just behind the place Judge Panel were sitting. Aarti competition started actually at 8:30 after all arrangements. One of the main element of the Aarti is Dhunuchi ( a pot with a source of smoke ).This lady was a potential competitor. We were amazed by her skill and performance.
More About: Events , When , Reach , Ready