Hello lusers,

This is a photo of a young bride to be the day before her wedding. She is having henna applied to her feet in preparation for the upcoming ceremony. It was taken with a Leica M6 and 24mm 2.8 ASPH. It's one of my favorites from a series on the Sikh community. Hope you like it.

Best, Tom

-- Tom Gallagher (tgallagher10@yahoo.com), February 13, 2002

Answers

Sorry, don't know why but I can't seem to post photos. Here is the link. http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=574200

Regards, Tom

-- Tom Gallagher (tgallagher10@yahoo.com), February 13, 2002.

Tom,

The photo's caption on the photo.net site says that it was made with a 21mm lens, while the narrative in your post says it was made with a 24mm lens. I'm not being picky, but I am thinking hard about a 24mm lens for my M6, and just want to make sure I am seeing a correct example.

Thanks!

-- Al Smith (smith58@msn.com), February 13, 2002.

It is indeed the 24mm. Sorry for the confusion but everytime you add a photo on photo net they ask for all the info. I no longer own the 24mm so I just plugged in something to get the photo uploaded.

Best, TG

-- Tom Gallagher (tgallagher10@yahoo.com), February 13, 2002.

It's nice Tom. it's sharp, well composed, but i think it is a little "National Geographically" framed. Most National geographic photographers with their 17-35mm lenses are doing this in your face close up photography of people in their surroundings. While it relates the person to the environment, while getting close to the subject, it also looks a little unrealistic, and distortion takes effect, which is a little unflatering to people at times. not so much in this case, but on the verge.

I personally prefer the 35mm or widest 28mm for this kind of work, though Rob Appleby might disagree as he's been longing for such a 24mm lens. Anyway, that's just my opinion and I actually liked the image. My advice is to take these pictures, but don't try too hard to mimic the new styles of journalistic photography. These types of shots are never usually remembered.

good work though. i enjoyed loking at your image. PS. obviously i am biased against this new age photogrtaphy- call me old fashioned, but not old...I am 23.

kristian

-- Kristian (leicashot@hotmail.com), February 14, 2002.

I haven't been longing, the 24 is one half of my 2 lens set up!

Excellent picture Tom. Very good.

-- rob (rob@robertappleby.com), February 14, 2002.

Very involving. I really liked this. The composition maybe isn't perfect - a couple of distracting hightlights - but there's a great sense of emotional involvement - I feel I might know her, if you know what I mean. I think it's probably quite National Geo in a way but that's not necessarily a bad thing - it's a picture that quickly and compellingly gives a lot of information about a story. I'll shut up now. Obviously I thought it was very good. BTW, I don't think there's sufficient distortion to uglify things.

-- Steve Jones (stephenjjones@btopenworld.com), February 14, 2002.

Tom,

Great picture! Wonderful!

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts about color vs. black and white for your Sikhs project.

Also, where can we see more pictures?

-- Mani Sitaraman (bindumani@pacific.net.sg), February 14, 2002.

Lovely shot. The only part I dislike is the small black pocketbook in the bottom left corner. It's vaguely distracting, but I say that only in the context of "trying" to be critical. My sweeping first reaction is, Cool!

-- Patrick (pg@patrickgarner.com), February 14, 2002.

I'll have to respectfully disagree with Kristian about it being too "national geographically"-framed. Perhaps a way to alleviate that would have been to move the left just a bit so that the bride wouldn't be so close to the edge of the frame (though as far as distortian goes, it's not much). I think it's a very nice shot. It really feels like part of a larger story and makes me want to see more of the series.

-- Richard (rvle@yahoo.com), February 14, 2002.

Hi, Tom:

Good photo, indeed.

That said, I would suscribe most of Khristian's opinions. And I wouldn't call myself old fashioned though I'm 54.

But one easily sees why this could be a favorite image: because it certainly deserves it.

Regards, Tom

-Iván

-- Iván Barrientos M (ingenieria@simltda.tie.cl), February 14, 2002.

Hey i wasn't trying to be rude....I guess i can't type in the same way i'd would have preferrred to say it in person. Anyway I agree with Richard's advice. Keep it going though......I am sure you can do better than NG.

-- Kristian (leicashot@hotmail.com), February 14, 2002.

Thank you all for your comments, much appreciated. I chose black & white for this project because I was shooting color for all my other assignments and I missed black & white. I was doing it for myself so I didn't have to worry about restrictions.

I am hoping to post more photos from this project soon on photonet.

Thanks again for your posts,

Tom

-- Tom Gallagher (tgallagher10@yahoo.com), February 14, 2002.

I like it, it has a great feel. The wide angle look fits well with the framing.

Here is a link that can be clicked to see the photograph.

-- Jeff Spirer (jeff@spirer.com), February 14, 2002.

Tom,

As a Sikh, your photograph was more than just a well-composed image to me. The black and white picture conveyed more than its intrinsic composition and MTF quality, yada yada. That a Westerner could do this with another culture is a testament to your understanding of the emotions that a bride to be is going through.

This gets me thinking about another thing. I have the Leica M Brian Bower book, and I find the compositions in there to be very insightful, and having actual examples of pictures is good to see. However, the two books that are my favorites at the moment are the out of print "Cartier-Bresson in India" which I just happened upon recently in a Borders bookstore while out of town, and "Rivers of Colour" by Raghubir Singh. I mention these two books because I am an Indian and the images have a deeper meaning to me than their compositional value, which is terrific. I really appreciated the set of pictures (in the website) by Robert Appleby, all the more so because he succeeded in crossing that line, from being an observer to actually being part of the scenes. That is a great skill. To go beyond just being a technically good shooter, and capturing the emotion, *and* being able to tansmit that emotion to a viewer. Ok, so not every viewer will react with the same emotion, but you get what I mean.

I saw the book by Allard, on the American West. I think it would resonate more with someone from the American West, than even someone from New York. So that intangible, the circumstances from which one originates, have a lot to do with the attraction of a picture. Some pictures generate a lot of emotions.

Some emotions are the same no matter what culture one comes from, but some are more appreciated by those from that culture.

My favorite Mapplethorpe picture is the USS Coral Sea. I don't know if anyone has seen it, but it is a powerful picture for me; and most of it (almost ninety percent of the frame) is just gray. Who can tell what it is about a picture that will strike a chord with someone? Is that a random thing?

Thanks again,

-- Vikram (VSingh493@aol.com), February 14, 2002.

Hello Vikram,

Thank you for your kind words about my picture, I appreciate it. As for photos that strike a chord. Recently I found a first edition copy of the book 'A Greek Portfolio' by Constantine Manos. The book represents an impromptu pictorial account of Manos's travels through rural Greece and the Greek Islands. For me it is books like this that make photography so magical.

If your a fan of Raghubir Singh and Bresson's India book you might want to check out Steve McCurry's book 'south southeast', another great monograph with incredible photos from India & South East Asia.

Best, Tom

-- Tom Gallagher (tgallagher10@yahoo.com), February 14, 2002.