Musings of an Amateur Photographer

Photography is an interesting pastime. Often a rewarding one as well. It is often said that a still photograph frozen in time can invoke more feelings than possibly a video frame of the same.

My interest in photography stemmed while I was in high school. At that time, digital cameras were making early inroads into the Indian markets and were way too expensive. My “machine of operation” was an Olympus photo film camera (Unfortunately I don’t remember the exact model name). With a mechanical zoom lens, it was a powerful image capturing device by the late 1990s standards. But the problem was the fact that a roll of film consisted of just 36 “attempts” and I couldn’t afford to attempt capturing too many butterflies and zoomed in flowers, whixh as I opined myself, were the first images of any great photographer. As the post capturing (developing et al) bills started increasing and albums started flooding in with butterflies, close-in shots of mosquitoes etc, my dad decided to call it curtains. Phase one done.

Professional photographers opine that as far as image purity is concerned, film cameras are superior than digital cameras. That’s for the professionals. For amateur photographers like me, the advent of digital cameras proved to be a big blessing. Purely because now I could go on and take n number of photos without bothering about developing, check on the spot if a picture captured had all the minimum requisite elements-lighting, anti-blur, anti-shake etc. I do not have enough experience or knowledge to comment on the amount of “artificiality” digital photography has brought in with it because I have been more used to digital photos plus the fact that I believe I am not at a skill level where I can justify or negate the opinion of pundits.

Phase two onwards the story shifted to digital domain. A laboratory in my dad’s department at his college had a Kodak digital camera (again poor memory as far as model is concerned, though it was a 5 MP camera, with 3x optical zoom) and I delved into photography further with that as I made my foray into undergraduate studies. It took a while for me to persuade him to buy a digital camera nearly an year into phase two. And that was a dream come true for me. Sony DSC H10 (8 MP, 10x zoom) was something that really impressed me with its increased screen size and image quality though I didn’t find its battery life upto the mark.

I went around. Exploring my world through my camera. And I still do.
Yet in spite of all this, I still am a very amateur photographer. In the true sense of the term. Photography has always been a hobby for me, someday of my life I would love to see it develop as my passion.

Most of the photographs posted on this blog have been taken by me. Wherever I remember, I have tried to put in the date and camera model. A few photographs taken by my parents and my close relatives have also been posted.