India
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Strangers Nos. 14 and 15
Arais and Veerrappam were sitting exactly as you see them here, as I walked by with my camera, and thought it was the perfect photo. Â It was about 0830 am on a Sunday, and I assume this is their shop they are sitting in front of, getting ready to open. Â We had a brief chat
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Stranger No. 13
If you have been following along up to this point, you may have noticed that so far all of the “strangers” on this site have been male. Part of this project is getting the courage to start a conversation with a stranger on the street and ask to take their picture. For a foreign male
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Stranger No. 12
Andanan (spelling) was sitting on the floor of what you might consider a garage, with piles of bundles of banana leaves behind him. He was taking them, one leaf at a time, and cutting them into pieces about 18 inches long, and throwing the unusable parts away. In India (Tamil Nadu, anyway), it is traditional
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Stranger No. 10
Pandiyan was also in the market. Quiet and pensive, he didn’t mind me zooming all the way in close. When I showed him his picture, he so much appreciated it that he broke off a sprig of cedar he was selling and gave it to me. I like how his eyes shine on the close-up
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Stranger No. 8
I stopped to chat with Vasanth and almost got separated from my group. Venkath and a partner are in the bottled water delivery business (see his truck behind him). He gave me a card for his business, “Done Marketing” Packaged Drinking Water Supply, we chatted for a few moments, and we were both on our
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Stranger No. 7
This is Akash, who caught my eye because he seemed to be very proud of his bicycle. So instead of the usual close-up portrait, I decided to take a wider angle shot showing the object of his pride. At the time, I thought the photo had come out better than it had – but it
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Strangers Nos. 5 and 6
Apu and Siva were on their way somewhere when they spotted about a dozen folks with cameras heading toward them, snapping photos in all directions as they moved. They asked several folks to snap their photo, and given that they were in a photographic mood, I approached them and asked to snap their portrait. They
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Stranger No. 2
Meet Apu, who wouldn’t say a word but took his lead from the younger Ashok (stranger #1). along with a third friend, he he was helping open shop at a roadside grill on Greenways Road in Chennai.
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Stranger No. 1
I’ve finally kicked off my “100 Strangers” project, and am rushing to catch up with my fellow photogs in this venture. The idea behind the project is to explain what you’re doing, get to know your subject, and work with them to get their best pose. On this, my first stranger (and on the
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Final Chennai Photowalk
I’ve been out of India for over three weeks now, but wanted to finish sharing our experiences of our last few weeks in India before closing out that wonderful chapter in our lives, as documented in the TAZM Pictures blog. We have been doing photowalks for the last couple of years, and would often return to
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Found Film: My Very First Camera
What was your first camera?  Mine wasn’t the one pictured above, but it was close:  A Kodak Instamatic X-15 like the one pictured below. This camera was manufactured between 1970 and 1976.  I got mine toward the end of that period, when I would have been 8 or 9 years old.  But mine is somewhere in
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Vintage Camera Test: Brownie Reflex Synchro Model
The Brownie Reflex Synchro Model was made between 1941 and 1952 in the US, and until 1960 in the UK, and closely followed the (non-synchro) Brownie Reflex. It was called a “Reflex” because, like most SLR (single lens reflex) cameras still in use today, it used a mirror to reflect the image from the lens
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Jaipur, India: Street Photography Goldmine
I have done a few posts already about our trip to Jaipur, India. It was only a 4-day trip, but as I have been looking through our photos, it’s surprising the number and quality of interesting shots we were able to get in such a short time. Especially considering that it was 104 Fahrenheit and
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MORE Monkeying Around in Jaipur
Our recent trip to Jaipur, in Rajasthan, India’s largest state, was short but we brought back a lot of photos. I posted awhile back about our encounter with monkeys our first day there; it turns out this would not be our only encounter! Our second day there, we decided to make our way to what
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Strolling (and Rafting) through Rishikesh
Not too long ago, we had a chance to visit Rishikesh, in northern India and the Himalayan foothills, known as a top yoga and adventure travel destination. You may have also heard about Rishikesh as the site of the ashram where the Beatles stayed in the late 1960s, and where they sought (and found, apparently)
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When 2000 Giant Ganesha Idols are Immersed in the Sea
My Indian friends who grew up nearby tell me it wasn’t always like this. They say when they were growing up, during the festival Ganesh Chaturthi, they would have a small clay statue of Lord Ganesha, one of Hinduism’s most important deities, which would be dissolved in a pond or a container of water at
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Tirukalukundram
Eighteen kilometers west of the Tamil Nadu tourist town of Mahabalipuram is a town of about 24,000 called Tirukaludundram which is known for its hilltop temple, the Vedagiriswarar temple.  The temple consists of an upper part up on a hill, which can actually be seen all the way from Mahabalipuram: and a lower part consisting of multiple
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Backyard Aquaponics Project
A few years ago, my daughter wanted a fishtank for Christmas, which was cool for everyone because we all got to enjoy it in the living room. We kept live plants with the fish, and I noticed at the time that they tended to thrive in the water the fish lived in. Nitrites or nitrates
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Pongal in Chennai / Camera Test
Often I blog about old cameras I’m testing out, often I blog about things we see and experience in India. Â This post has a little of both! The Ansco Agfa Karomat 36 (known by variants of that name) is an Agfa Karat 36 rebadged for the American market, where it was sold by Ansco from
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Chennai’s Republic Day Parade
Today was a pretty special day in India – even President Obama agreed, as he spent the better part of the day with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, having been invited as Chief Guest for the annual Republic Day Parade. President Obama is honored to be back in #India to celebrate Republic Day and to begin
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Chennai by Night: Bhogi
I have some interesting photos and videos to share since I last posted in mid-December – but first, some information on the current happenings in Chennai! It’s Thai Pongal, the four-day harvest festival and one of the most important holidays in Tamil Nadu and for Tamil people in general. Â The festival actually begins tomorrow. Â But
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Varanasi: The View from Mother Ganga
Varanasi, India is, one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world.  Also known as Benares, Banaras or Kashi, the city’s identity is inseparable from the River Ganges, along whose left bank the city of just over 1 million residents is nestled. If you visit Varanasi, one of the experiences not to be missed is
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Camera Test: Ansco Readyflash
The Ansco Readyflash – so named because it’s “ready for flash” (but I don’t have one) via two connectors on the camera – is about as simple a box camera as you could probably come up with. Â It’s made of sheet metal and plastic, and takes 8 exposures on a roll of 620 film, 6
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Varanasi by Night
We finally had the opportunity to visit Varanasi, India – also known as Benares or Kashi – one of the seven holy cities of Hinduism and Jainism, and also important in the development of Buddhism. Â Varanasi, a city of 3 million on the western bank of the Ganges River, is said to be one of
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Day at the Beach
Marina Beach, Chennai, India