'TENTACLES OF VEGETATION'

Till the other day, I used to walk in quite fast pace. Then,  my left leg decided not to co-operate with me. I was compelled to stay  put in Kolkata during 2013 . My visit to  Rajasthan/Delhi in November, 2014 was two years after my  Bangalore/Mysore visit in 2012.It was only the 2nd half of my 2015 visit to NJ/Helsinki when I started regaining my confidence. that too quite slowly.

Puistola, Helsinki is a typical Finnish suburb - a lot of greenery , undulated  topography surrounding the houses, schools and other urban amenities. I have taken lots of photographs of nature , colourful during the Fall and then bare & dry as the winter approached. A few berries,  both black and red took on the weather with all the resilience they had. Otherwise, bare branches, dull- yellow dying leaves littered on the forest ground was a common scene.

 I took photos to familiarise myself with my new Nikon camera and explore the surroundings as I have never seen anything like this earlier, not even at Banbury. And .... to insert a few pauses during the walk to catch my breath.

While editing the photos after six months or more during this hot summer night in May'20 Kolkata, this photo of dead branches ( tree trunk on viewer's right not in the photo ) attracted my notice. Just like tentacles. I photoshopped  and arrived at the B&W version which is at the top of the post. No one 'liked' the photo which I posted  in my flickr.com page.  Nor in FB, anyone noticed it but for my wife and a friend/poet. But, I believe this is a strong composition - not by me, just another 'one' of nature.

the original photo, before photoshop is here. Just count the numbers of branches creeping inside this photo's 'frame' !! They almost seem to be of an animal, not of vegetation.

EVERYDAY VIEW OF NEW YORK , TWEAKED.....

ASPIRATION

Morning sky @ Hackensack,

 juxtaposed with scenes from New York. 

Time to say 'good-bye' to the current phase of our stay in the USA. Our stays here have so far been underlined by  serious events. When we reached  here in 2010, soon after our elder son's marriage, father of our daughter-in-law expired. This time - it was just the opposite - we were here to witness arrival of our grand-daughter. A girl for the 1st time in our family's lineage after two generations.

IN THE SHADOWS

(Street scene ,Broadway)

We were mostly indoors during the first part of our stay. Going out was either for shopping or to  hospital. During the later phase of our stay, went around to various locations for photography, the last one being a night  through streets and avenues of New York. Here is a collection of  my photos tweaked by Photoshop.

TOWARDS THE LAST LAP

(Street scene ,Broadway)

It is difficult to photograph street scenes in night. From moving cars, hindered by traffic ahead. And... without tripod. And... when one section of the frame is very bright, the other is not. Another problem I faced was garbage on footpath and vehicles for their  removal parked here & there.  

 CITY REFLECTS....

View across Hudson river ,from North Bergen

MONOCHROME SKY , GREEN EARTH ........

@ POCONO  STATE PARK, PENNSYLVANIA 

 Earth covered with green grass, wild flowers blooming. 

Sky covered with slate-coloured cloud.

This park on top of Camelback Mountain, Pennsylvania is at about 1980 ft height. The view reminded me of Mahabaleshwar, though the height of this hill resort of India is more than twice that of Camelback mountain.

Sun-set's splendour we missed.

An orange glow lit up the gap between the mountain range and cloud.

The observation point offers nearly 300 degree view, with Rim road, clearing at the top,walk-arounds. The observation point is a good picnic spot too, which benches and tables placed  facing both the visible ranges of hills on western and eastern sides.

View of mountain ranges,  winding road at a distance and 

a few glimpse of the Water Park among the trees near by

 This 'Mountain Back' is about 1 hour 45 minutes drive from our residence @ Hackensack - 82 miles or 145 Km. We drove along I-80, sometimes quite free, clogged with traffic occasionally. Crossed Delaware water gap - difficult to photograph while the car was speeding .The road up the hill was winding, as expected. We had little traffic during our climb up. There were traces of rain during the evening and many car owners started descending one after the other.

 Cars descending the winding path 

as the evening cloud threatens shower.

An arch-shaped cross-over seen from I-80, 

captured @ 65 mph (and PSed !).

OUR NEIGHBOURHOOD @ HACKENSACK ( NJ )

Sun rises above  eastern horizon while  neighbourhood at Passaic Street sleeps

View of south east horizon

View from our balcony here is awesome . Specially, when the sun rises in the morning. Again when the sun is near the western horizon , a part of Hackensack is sunlit, yet in the distant south-western horizon, the tall and very tall buildings are under part shadow, part lit-up.

 A closer view of our neighbourhood.

Greenery spreads  till the horizon.

Our block has Prospect Avenue in its front -cannot be viewed from  our balcony. What we find is a slice of Passaic Street and nice cottages along its eastern edge. Then lot of greenery till the eastern horizon. Not many buildings can be viewed surpassing the green canopy of trees.

  For a few minutes every clear evening, buildings acquire a blazing tint 

The western horizon is blocked by the neighbouring buildings. The south-western horizon has a completely different 'personality. Trees, buildings, cars running along Expressway 80 ( connects Hackensack to  George Washington Bridge ) . Still further away are the sky-scrappers of Manhattan.  Different at different hours of the day. Different under different conditions of the sky.

Manhattan as the sky pours over. 

Neighbouring buildings in RH side block the Western sky

Lighted buildings in the south western horizon 

on a clear evening/night is a view beyond description.

( Courtesy - Ruby Chatterji)

This sky-line looks so wonderful at night. Can be hardly captured in my DSLR camera, as we do not have a tripod here.Miss a  binocular very much.

Rain-soaked neighbourhood.Bad photograph- re-touched

Wonderful was the day (11th August) when it rained since morning.The sky was covered with thick cloud. Manhattan often invisible. The very 1st few photos were spoiled because I messed up the 'Focus'( AF) setting .

Neighbourhood under canopy of cloud.

PHOTOGRAPHERS AMONG US !

AND THEIR CANDID MOMENTS !

Family photograph on top of Chamundi Hills - 

the spread of  Mysore city in the background.

A photo album published by my friend Kanad  Sanyal  during Durga Puja ,2011 had a very interesting subject - he took photos of photographers in Durga Puja pavilions. The photographers were seen mostly using mobile phones - outstretched hands  holding their mobile phones  in front of the eyes, raised a bit to have a good image of the the deity made a good study by Kanad.

Kanad's collection motivated me to capture photos of fellow-photographers in Puja pavilions in 2011 - what I  got were  not very presentable ! This year, I tried once more and met with partial satisfaction. But, most interesting ones were taken during visit to places of tourist interest.

 Patient photographer,awaits the umbrella to move away.

Udayan Sangha, Naktala.Puja - 2012.

During February,12 visit to Konarak, I was waiting  to take a photo of  the chlorite door frame of 'Jagmohan' without any tourist in the frame. Another person was seriously engaged in doing the same, except for that he was keen to have only his companion in the picture frame . I waited patiently for him to get a photo-frame of his choice and move away.  Dissatisfied with his clicks, he kept on trying ! Slightly irritated because of waiting , I pointed my camera to capture the scene, which is here. If by any chance, these photos come to the notice of either of the persons mentioned in this anecdote, let me assure them - no offense meant.

  Waiting for a crowd-free frame to capture his friend against 

Door-frame, Jagmohan, Konarak.

During  my visit to Belur/Halebid/Mysore in November,12, I found young men very fond of clicking photos of their friend/s - often more than that of the architecture/sculpture ! But, what I notice these days that clicking has become easier and therefore 'treasures' can be  preserved for posterity ! Hope my young friends will maintain a good scrapbook to go back to.

Capturing 'legs' !! 

In front of Ravana, Chamundi hills,Mysore.

 Here is an exception :

 Kesava temple, Somnathpura.

The 'fun' element of these types of photographs can be fully obtained when the person/s in the photograph are  not conscious. I am learning the tricks of candid photography. I shall end with an anecdote on my learning curve. This February,12, when we were at Konark, I found  four young men ogling at a wall-relief in a niche , one of them was having a mobile/camera in his hand. As soon as one of this group found me  focusing my camera, two broke away. Here is a photo of the couple which the group's attention and two friends who stayed back to brave my clicking.

 I dedicate this blog to Kanad Sanyal. Look forward to many more of such candid moments.

Before closing, let me assure once more  all the persons in this blog - I intend no offense.