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Hello photo clubbers! A few weeks ago, we challenged you to tell a visual story by crafting a photo essay. There were so many beautiful, compelling essays, and we decided to feature one of them.
iReporter Shahsazzad spent months in his town of Dhaka, Bangladesh, capturing reflections in water . He strived to show reflections of truth. Shahsazzad explained that reflections in the water, much like those in a mirror, don’t lie.
“Throughout my images I have tried to interpret water as a pure form reflecting the heritage, achievement, issues, and dreams of Bangladesh lest they are forgone and forgotten,” he said. While ripples or disturbances in the water distort the reflection, once the water settles, you can see the truth again. And your mind can again see the truth, following with his metaphor, he said.
Shahsazzad struggled with heat and monsoons as he tried to get the perfect shots. Getting the photos he wanted was also a challenge in terms of technique. He shot multiple frames of the same shot, slightly modifying the f-stop: He adjusted the amount of light coming through the lens until he got the exposure he wanted.
Everything came together after three months and he finally got the images he was looking for. Shahsazzad is about to finish a degree in photojournalism. He’s switched careers a lot, but he’s realized photography is “where I’ll stay all my life.”
We’re hoping to feature several photo club submissions on the blog. We invite you to leave us some suggestions for what you’d like future photo club challenges.
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doll houses ? sorry im a bit nuts on them these days!!
Excellent work, Shahsazzad. Truly beautiful and inspiring. :o)
Some theme suggestions for future challenges:
Childhood Challenges
Coming of Age
The Struggle to Fit In
Individuality
Job Searches
Silent Communication/Expression
Daily Rituals
Personal Heroes/Inspiration
Meaning of Success
An Animal's Perspective
Public Transportation
Amusement Parks
Life-Long Dream
First Encounters
Independence
Community
Contrasts (age, social classes, colors, light and shade, etc.)
Growth/Change (personal, spiritual, physical, etc.)
Family Ties
When I'm alone...
Time
I could go on and on. I hope this helps.
Personal Heroes/Inspiration - I plan to submit next. Sanchita is my hero(ine). She works for the mentally disabled. The prob is that the preface is long and I find no suggestions on how many words I can keep. Can you help me here ?
My elder sister Jessie sensing my frustration in my struggle for a career advised me that I should be satisfied with small happiness in life. She used a french terminology (I cannot recall exactly) but something like 'petit bou '. She died a few years back.
Now this blog and the others exposures is slowly but surely paving my way for a career at my age of 49 (all I can say is that I am glad of the experience and it enhances my thought on a whole lot of important issues,and mostly I plan to juxtapose the issues with reality (here the way it is)and beg to reconsider strategies of planning) I cannot thank you enough and now at a loss for words ... :)
Pictures of brick buildings in our cities, especially older ones.
@JoyfulGypsy- Thanks for all the suggestions! The themes of change and contrasts really stand out to me. So many choices, I'll have to pick wisely.
@everyone - It seems like themes are interesting subjects for photo club. Would anyone want challenges based around particular photography techniques? For example, the challenge could be to use a fish eye lens or trick photography.
@Shahsazzad - There's no limit on how long your text is. As the focus is the photography, I'd try to go for a few paragraphs.
It was a pleasure talking to you. We were thrilled to have featured your work. Actually, I went on CNN.com Live yesterday and did a segment on your photo essay. Watch it here: http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/ireports/2009/05/15/ireport.photo.essay.bangladesh.cnn
@zdan - Thank you for the link featuring Shahsazzad's photo essay. Terrific work! I'm inspired.
Challenges based on particular photography techniques would be great, too. I was just coming up with ideas that I thought CNN would find more relevant to current events. Photography techniques challenges would be great fun. I can't wait to get started. When will the next challenge be announced? In the meantime, I'm charging my extra batteries... ;o)
Glad to hear the excitement! I need to chew some of these ideas over with the team. Look out for a new challenge sometime this week!
@zdan - Thanks. The pleasure is mine. I am actually thrilled that you have decided to feature a segment of my photo essay. Thank you so much again.
hi iim bunnyboo i think that ur work smells and that goeorgia is emmence and peter is very annoying and i do not like him!!!!!!!!!!!LOL
i would like to see diversity. the face of this country is changing...
Faces of people who are american, but do not look the "part". By doing this, we can also help eliminate the concept of "looking american"
I think it also fits in line with Gypsy's "struggle to fit in" but i think we are trying to fix the problem from the other end.
I would also like to see
Neat I love it. Now I have to try to beat it. lol
@adriana71 - Be my guest and if you are a practicing photographer I am sure you can and much better. Thanks for liking it.
Zdan, i belong to a great photo site and they have the best photo contests! Go here for ideas: http://contests.fotki.com/
Hey photographers! The new photo challenge for Photo Club has been announced. Check it out: http://www.ireport.com/ir-topic-stories.jspa?topicId=248294
We can't wait to see the new crop of pictures!
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