Holy Shoot, that was fun!

27th March. 2013. Chennai. (Yes, Holi in Chennai.)

Woke up at 5 am(*Achievement Unlocked*) and set out with a bunch of college mates for Sowcarpet, the North Indian hub of Chennai. This was the first time I was going to shoot holi and so I did a lot of research on how to protect your gear and how to shoot in testing conditions. I will share some of those with you later.

If it's your first time, it is going to be a very memorable experience shooting holi because it's about two things that photographers love the most: Colors and Smiles, all over the landscape.

Here a few things that you need to take care of before you set out to shoot:

1. Protect your gear:

It's easier said than done as I witnessed first hand that however you protect it, a little bit of powder will always slip through the smallest of openings. But powders are easy to get off of your camera, it's water that does most of the damage and you should do well to not let that happen. There are professional solutions for this such as this. But if you cannot get it before your shoot, you can always make such a thing yourself. Here's what I did, actually @enthupotato was the one who made it for me so I guess conjuring up a sister works well, if you don't have a one.

Don't let rubber bands over your focusing ring or your zoom ring.

2. Reach deep into your wardrobe

And get em' old clothes. Nobody cares how you look, at the end of the day you'll be all purple, blue, pink, yellow and green only. If you have old t-shirts that are white, use em, you'll have something to keep as a souvenir from your first holi shoot.

3. Mustard oil helps

I hate mustard oil's smell but if you apply it on your face the night before holi you'd have an easier time removing the rang off of your face. Didn't do this myself so I can't vouch for it personally, especially because it's mustard oil. But hey, if you are a office goer then it sure will be nice to get rid of the color ASAP.

4. Don't carry all your lenses

For the simple reason, you won't be able to change them while you are shooting with all kinds of colors splashing around. All your hard work will go in vain if you let even a little tinge of water seep into your sensors. If you happen to have a couple of cameras, that'd be awesome. You can mount each one with one lens, a prime lens and a wide lens would be my choice. Some people prefer telephotos, I don't really see its use. Also, make sure you have charged your battery fully and have spare memory cards.

5. Evaluate the situation

When you get to the location where you are shooting(In my case, it was sowcarpet.) evaluate the environment and situation before you start shooting, talk to the public on how they usually celebrate, where you could find more action, which places work well as aerial vantage points of wide shots of the crowds. For all this, you need to reach a little early and do some groundwork.

6. Stay safe and enjoy

After all, HOLI HAI! :) 

As for me, I live in Chennai and went to Sowcarpet, North madras, to shoot this year and had a wonderful time. We reached at around 6 am, which is too early the land looked deserted, no one was awake, yet. We all had a cup of tea and some biscuits and headed to "Mint Street", where we found some children just getting ready for the day ahead. We took some shots of people who had celebrated holi the previous night and were sleeping, all tired. You know I can keep going on about how great it was, but a picture always says more and so here are my best pictures from the shoot. I do feel a bit sad that I couldn't get more shots of holi in "action." but nothing I can't rectify next year. Cheers. :)

Done and dusted.

Poser.

Burst of yellow.

Captain Planet.

Krishna.

Odd women out.

View all photos at:

https://www.facebook.com/shotsrk

or

http://www.flickr.com/photos/innovation_station/

What a bummer, Amish!

Har Har Mahadev.

Feb-March 2013. Chennai.

Hey are you guys able to sleep at a proper time like 11 pm or so and wake up at like 6? This question has nothing to do with what I want to write, I am just asking.


Okay, Amish bhai, to be very honest with you, I have only one question to ask you: WHAT THE F was that man? 2 amazing books and then a 500 page crap. Yes, the crap had its moments but on the whole, what a bummer!

First of all you tell me why you named it "Oath of the Vayuputras" and didn't even dedicate 100 pages to them? All they do is give one bomb to Shiva, that too, just like that.

"Hi, I am neelkanth, give me pashupathiastra." "Here, take it and go."

Could have named it "The tragic ending to my Shiva trilogy".

Also, Bhrigu is one Maharishi who is a mind-reader means all he should have done is meet Shiva once and look into his eyes and give clearance for destruction of Somras. And because one important girl called Sati dies he automatically changes his views about Somras? what raa..dei!

What about Brhaspati and Shiva bro, were they ever good friends again? You dedicated on whole passage to Brhaspati feeling sad about Shiva not being as close with him as the times before the destruction of Mount Mandar but after that, nothing about them. Also, terrible narration bro. One girl I know is not even able to imagine Karthik fighting.

Okay, fine, you decided to call it a day on Sati, why so brutally da? what she did nu she deserves 4 fingers to be cut off of her and all? You could have made her a Naga in the first book itself for this kind of brutality at the end. :'(

Pashupatiastra should not be used no and Shiva used it, but no repercussions? Not even one letter from Vayuputras telling Shiva, "Bro, that was so uncool of you." Poda dei!

WORST THING OF ALL, throughout the book I am expecting to see the battle of all battles between Parveteshwar's army and Shiva's army. The Meluhan's tactical acumen versus the Neelkanth's warrior spirit. The love for homeland versus the love for greater good. BUT NO!

Awful bro, awful.

Maybe all this rant is because the story didn't end the way I wanted it to or maybe it's because whoever I come across who has finished the book tells me it sucked. Also, with so many sub-plots not taken care of and how the other 2 books were only like 300 pages, one feels you made a mistake by calling it the Shiva "Trilogy". I mean, there is so much more you could have told us, there is so much more we wanted to hear.

Anyway, it's over. On the whole, it is a series I would recommend people to read, at least for the first two books which were absolutely fantastic.

At the end of book, neither Shiva nor me, smiled.

Also this is a rant, not a review.

P.S. Spoiler alert. Oh and Devagiri is turned to ashes by Shiva because he uses nuclear bomb on the city because one irrelevant prince orders a bunch of Egyptian assassins to murder Shiva but instead they kill Sati.

Ok, bye.