Bokeh Dance

Bokeh is defined as 'the blur, or the aesthetic quality of the blur, present in out-of-focus areas of a photograph'. 

I've always had a fascination for those soft circles of light in the background and the effect and mood they lend to a photo. 

I learnt that it is the aperture that helps determine what the bokeh will look like and chanced upon the right combination of camera settings for me while clicking these pictures of bamboo. I managed to get a crick in the neck as well, standing there with my head bent back for goodness knows how long. But I didn't mind, as I was happy with what I got for my trouble.

This one is a picture of the leaves of a bottlebrush tree.

A walk under the trees in a wood

I had penned a small poem some time ago that I think goes with this image very well-

 A walk under the trees in a wood,
"Pray, what good will it do?" Why, look around,
the ground is littered with leaves, the earth is soft under the feet,
high above the green boughs meet, and the sun filters through,
leaving dancing spots of sunlight on you. The birds and insects call,
pitter-patter on the leaves the seeds fall,
and all around is the cool and drowsy breeze of the afternoon, whispering of surprises waiting to be discovered.
What good you say? But what better way,
to get a feel of green earth's good magic,
than a walk under the trees in a wood?
 

Stills of Beauty

Nature is always alive with movement and life, ever changing, never still.

The best a photograph can do is capture a single moment, freeze a small slice of time.

That maybe a photograph's limitation, but it is more than enough to get a sense of the breathtaking loveliness of nature and record a unique but fleeting moment of beauty forever.

(ok, maybe not forever. After all, a photo can get deleted, destroyed by a malicious virus, faded by old age, spoilt by water, torn by kids, thrown in the trash, and....anything else? You see, lots of horrible things can happen to prevent it from lasting forever, but I think you get the idea. :))

 

 

                               

Freedom of the Skies

Usually I just click a picture that appeals to me and think about the story behind it later. I weave the words around the photos and not the photos around the words. Even then, most of the pictures have their own story, whether I intended it that way or not.
Unfortunately, this particular picture has no story behind it, or front of it, or anywhere that I can see. I spotted this crow flying across the sky one day while I was taking a walk and managed to capture this perfectly timed shot.
I have put it up because sometimes a photo has to speak for itself.

My experiments with Color

There is a feature in my camera called selective color which allows you to choose a maximum of three colors in your frame and leaving those colors, turns the rest of the photo into black and white. You can also control the range of the shades and tints that will be included. For instance, I chose just red in the first photo while in the last, only three colors (pink, orange and green) were selected, but both the dark orange and light orange were included as shades of the same color.
The different effects that can be created are just endless. 

The Cactus Story

We have two-three different types of cacti and succulent plants in our garden, and there was one variety that used to give beautiful flowers of bright colors. Then, for some reason that I never understood, pigeons attacked and destroyed those plants till there were only a few miserable stems left. They never recovered, never had the chance to, and withered up and died. After that, my mother planted a new and different type of plant in their place, the ones below. The pigeons didn't spare these either but they are hardier and are able to survive and thrive despite the attacks. I suppose it just goes to show- Survival of the Fittest! :)  

 

The picture below is of our aloe vera plant and I don't know if it is a cactus or not, but I put it up anyway because I liked it and thought it would look nice. :)

A New Beginning

I got a new camera! Actually I received it as a gift a few months ago and the only reason nothing has been posted about it until now is that I was too lazy to do it.

So now I have upgraded from my humble and small compact camera (a Canon Powershot A530, in case anyone is interested) to a DSLR, the bigger, better and heavier Nikon D5100.
So far, I have had great fun with it and I'm still learning and exploring all its possibilities, which are numerous. The only thing I missed about the old camera was its light weight.  While getting used to the new one, I discovered that I could now easily do things that were difficult before, like taking portraits or pictures of food, for instance.

Some of the first pictures I took with my new camera were of flowers. I have a fascination for flowers and can't seem to click enough of them. :)

Pineapple top

 

I noticed this beautiful pattern created by the leaves (or crown) on top of a pineapple just before it was thrown away. It is amazing how something as ordinary as this can look so good in a photo. Also, I'm sure nobody looks at the pattern of the leaves as they cut up a pineapple. Just think of how many interesting things escape our notice everyday!

The Sea

Clouds and the Blue sky

One day the sun was shining, the sky was blue and puffy white clouds were floating around. I thought it was a nice time go for a walk and take some pictures. My brothers Srikant and Dinkar also came along.
The beautiful photo below was taken by Srikant.

Trainscapes

Photos of the passing scenery from the train window.

Yellow insect

One morning, I spotted this insect on the drawing room curtain. The yellow curtain could be seen through the transparent patches on its black wings. I liked the contrast between the yellow cloth and black insect.

Water in a drop

Spot billed pelicans

Spot billed pelicans at Lalbagh Botanical Gardens, Bangalore.

Through the bathroom window

The view of a plant through the frosted glass of a bathroom window. Only three leaves closest to the glass could be seen clearly.

A Sunset

A sunset at different times during the same day.

Leaves of light

The sun shining through the red and green leaves of the badam tree

Pink Light

The light of the sun pouring through the thin petals of pink bouganvilla flowers