A must-read guide to the basics of photography

May 16 2011 under caught online | 1 Comment

Today, I came across a really fantastic guide to the basics of photography. It’s a post by a guy named Wasim Ahmad at visual journalism site called Journographica.

The link: Basic Photo Tips: Framing Your Shots.

The tutorial covers such concepts as the rule of thirds, dealing with hotspots, ensuring you’re aware of surroundings and especially backlighting, framing and utilizing unusual perspectives, focal length, catching that perfect moment, and quite a few others.

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Thimphu to Tehran? -Three hours on Google Maps

Apr 22 2011 under bhutan | 1 Comment

Click to enlarge.

I haven’t written here in a while. Between a few different projects that I have on the go, I’ve been crushed under deadlines. That doesn’t mean that I haven’t made time to procrastinate, though.

Anybody who knows me knows that I love to travel and I love to plan trips. I have routes planned for the east coast of Africa, the west coast of Africa, down through the deep south of the United States, up through Kashmir, back and forth across South America -wherever.

Here’s a road trip that a guy here named Kyle and I came up with over a bottle of whiskey. Between a slow internet connection and the fact that Google Maps is utterly useless at calculating routes through any country between India and Turkey (who would have guessed?), that graphic took us three hours to create.

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Unexpectedly in Bangkok

Jan 26 2011 under thailand | 2 Comments

Bangkok. Nowhere else is it so easy for a young man to find trouble.

Like Singapore at the turn of the nineteenth century, Thailand’s capital city not only allows for the breaking of certain laws, it flaunts its industrial illegality as a local culture that is to be celebrated.

A relentless influx of tourists well aware of Bangkok’s notoriety for vice has made drug abuse and excessive alcoholism seem compulsory. Hard liquor is served by the bucket, psilocybin is sold over the counter, and euphorics can be found mixed with however dangerous a substance is desired.

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Playing with cameras at the Mahabodhi Temple

Jan 7 2011 under india | 4 Comments

Eating dinner a few nights ago in Bodhgaya, I overheard the guys next to me going on about the adventures that they’d had taking photographs over the years. I’d been having a bit of a problem with a new lens of mine and so I asked if they would take a look.

The next morning, one of the guys, David, walked into the same little restaurant where I was then eating breakfast and asked if he could join me.

The next thing I knew, I had spent the entire day receiving lessons in photography from a veteran film producer and camera operator for the Discovery Channel.

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To each their own

Jan 6 2011 under india | Leave a comment

These four Swedes were staying at a hostel in Bodhgaya just down the road from me. The photograph was taken inside the Mahabodhi Temple complex, at the foot of a stupa just a hundred feet or so from the tree under which the Buddha attained enlightenment.

The girl on the right was deep in meditation. The girl on the left was playing a computer game that involved firing a slingshot at monkeys.

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Never trust anybody over 30

Jan 3 2011 under india | 1 Comment

When travelling, I’ve always had good luck with local teenagers. Never trust anybody over 30.

This morning, I found myself trying to get out of a town in northwest India called Bodhgaya. It’s a holy place, sacred to both Buddhists and Hindus. It was under a tree that the town has since been built around that the Buddha attained enlightenment.

I didn’t know that when I was trying to get away from Boddhgaya (Gaya, technically, where the train station is). It was 7:00 a.m. and I wanted to be on my way to Calcutta. But the the man at the ticket window had other ideas. And so like it or not, I was spending the next 13 hours where the last train had left me.

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Back in Delhi

Jan 1 2011 under india | 6 Comments

Back at the Navrang for $3.00 a night. Back to its peeling walls and stained pillows and blankets that are filthy to touch. The Navrang’s rooms have always reminded me of the kind of place that Colonel Kurtz would have stayed before he descended into madness on his way up the Nung River.

Out the ally and across the street, it’s back to the rooftop restaurant that I’ve eaten at so many times before. Eggs, potatoes, toast, and a coffee for $2.50. And a decent view looking down Main Bazaar, to the crowded streets and millions of colours, smells, and faces, four stories below.

Delhi took a while to grow on me. But it did.

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Beijing was cold

Dec 31 2010 under china | 2 Comments

Beijing was nice enough. Clean, mostly quite modern, not really crowded. The traffic wasn’t bad and the subway system was real easy. I liked it.

It was very cold, though. Actually, if I never visit again, 20 years from now, that’s probably the only thing that I’ll remember about Beijing. It was cold. That, and that at the McDonalds there, they come by your table and make sure that you have all the free coffee refills that you want. But that might be it. The rest of the time, it was just cold.

From the airport, I caught the very first train into the city. It was dark for the first hour or so, the temperature was -10C, and there was a wicked wind blowing down every street I walked.

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The plan and a shout out for contacts

Dec 27 2010 under canada | Leave a comment

San Francisco, May 2008

Details on what I’m up to are overdue, I’m told.

Long story short, I’m looking for work in Africa. But more on that in a minute.

On December 30, I leave Vancouver for India. On December 31, I’ve got just over 12 hours in Beijing and, if I manage to get any sleep on the flight, hope to venture into the city. Then on to Delhi, where I think I’m scheduled to land sometime just before midnight.

From Delhi, my trip is fairly wide open. I’m supposed to be in Bhutan from January 8 to 22, and will be taking the long road up to the capital, Thimphu. The plan is to head down to Calcutta and spend a week or so there, before taking the train north to Jaigaon, which I expect is a fairly lackluster border town. A night or two in Jaigaon and then on to Thimphu. (Bhutan doesn’t sound crazy about letting foreigners enter the country via land (as opposed to air), so cross your fingers for me on this one.)

No real plans for Bhutan, yet. Hopefully it won’t be too cold and I’ll be able to make the hike to the country’s renowned Taktsang Dzong. There’s also talk of a camping trip out in a district (town?) called Dagana. But we’ll see what happens.

And then January 22, I’m back in India and planning the next move. I’d like to see Darjeeling and Sikkim province and will likely spend some time there. And I might hang out in Mumbai for a couple of weeks. Again, we’ll see what happens.

Then it’s down to Africa and on with the search for meaningful employment. More than anything, I want to find work with any sort of media outlet, whether foreign or local. I’m sending feelers out in those directions now and we’ll see what I can come up with. If anybody knows anybody, I’d love to hear from you. I’m not set on any one country or region, yet. I’ll go pretty much anywhere where there’s work. Right now, I’m thinking that Uganda might serve as a nice home base for a while. Rwanda is another possibility. But I’m looking at a few countries on the west coast as well. More on all this later.

So that’s the plan. If anybody’s got connections anywhere where I’ll be passing through, I’d love to get contact info. Always nice to find a common friend. Other than that, stay in touch.

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