The Sigma 150 journey

I always did aspire to have a decent equipment, to be specific, a power packed lens which could give me the ultimate level of satisfaction as that of gulping a pint of chilled draft beer, especially after traversing down the sliding rubble topped paths of Sinhagad. For almost 3 years, till Aug 2009, my F65, D80 bodies were gratified to have themselves merged and synch up with Sigma 150mm Macro F2.8. I was spellbound looking at the majestic results delivered by the Nikon-Sigma combo. Convinced and contented, all thoughts that raised heads to contemplate on other lens were slaughtered then and there. Now, I decided to concentrate of flowers, insects, water droplet art, and anything and everything that was macro. I did stick to this principle for monsoon and one winter. A day sometime in Feb 2007, I came across a Mont Blanc catalog. The pictures were extremely fascinating. The golden tips with a black background got my eyes sparkling with a gesture of smile. This resulted into a drizzle of ideas to set up a studio simulation with lights to cover some trinkets and ornaments. Patience is something which I am always in deficit of. Immediately, was on shopping spree to do some stationary like black marble coated chart papers that will serve as a background and some other stuff like thick clips to lock the position of papers once they were spread on a drawing board which i managed to smuggle from my dad’s office. I must have donated more than Rs. 600 to Venus Traders. After coming back home, the broken tripods were taken out. Mounted umbrellas with reflecting coat on it and placed them at 45 degree angles on each side. Suspended a 200W bulb which was to serve as source of light. Mounted D80+150mm on my operating tripod and then my setup was done. Now, the only missing thing was a subject for trial. Looked around and picked my Samsung handset. Was about to remove the battery and dissect it in order to expose the circuit. But, then suddenly realized that I could use a simple fountain pen nip which was readily available in my sis’s drawer. Anyways, the drawer was full of trash. Eventually managed to get it and placed it in the center for a trial. Focused the camera with center weighted metering @ F8 with 1/250 flash opened. Clicked. The resultant was a photograph developed by technicians of FotoFast. It was bright white which sliced all the gloss that the nip was to deliver. Now the question was do I switch off the 200W bulb? Or do I eliminate the flash? Applied all principles and decided to go with the ingalhalikar technique by eliminating the 200W bulb. Changed to F16 with flash popped @ Aperture priority and clicked. Voila……. Bright and white FotoFast effect was not there anymore. But still, wasn’t impressive. The chart paper reflected traces of flash and thoughts just didn't seem to get ideated as to how do I get this going. I had already lined up some of aai's jewelry to be used as subjects. Distressed, i just wrapped up everything and dumped them in the closet. But i was determined. The following weekend, gave it a try again, this time with jewelery. And since then, there was no stopping. The Sigma 150mm macro is a gem to play with. Portraits, macro, gestures, action shots. Its an amazing piece of glass.

Birds of Dandeli

Tweak here and a queak there. Berries on trees are an absolute treat for birds in Dandeli. There is some or the other tree bearing fruits across the year which hosts hornbills, parakeets, pigeons, myna's etc. Hearing bird calls in the morning mist rejuvenates your soul completely and is a blissful experience

The Kali River provides food in abundance for Kingfishers, River terns as well as other migratory water birds.

Was in dandeli on 1st & 2nd Nov. Was able to spot almost 40+ species of birds along with naturalist H Shashidhar. Highlights of sighting were Blue fairy bird, Nilgiri wood pigeon and the Great Malabar pied hornbill. Could capture some of them in lens,as record shots at least The rest of the list is as follows.

*Right click and open in new window

shekhru (nikoned)

1. Yellow footed green pigeon (nikoned)
2. Pompadour green pigeon (nikoned)
3. Nilgiri wood pigeon (nikoned)
4. Jungle myna (nikoned)
5. Brmahni myna
6. Cloropsis (nikoned)
7. Rufous wood pecker
8. Plum headed parakeet
9. Lesser flamed backed woodpecker (nikoned)
10. Golden backed woodpecker
11. White necked stork
12. Bronze winged jacana
13. Sparrow Hawk
14. Yellow throated sparrow (the one which Salim ali had cut) (nikoned)
15. Juvenile (yellow throated sparrow) (nikoned)
17. Asian Fairy Bluebird
18. Heart spotted woodpecker
19. Three toed woodpecker
20. Serpent eagle
21. Paradise fly catcher
22. Pied Bushchat
23. Malabar Grey horn bill (nikoned)
24. Malabar pied hornbill (nikoned)
25. Small minivet (nikoned)
26. Rqt tailed drongo
27. Spangled drongo
28. Small blue kingfisher
29. Pied kingfisher
30. White breasted sea eagle (nikoned)
31. Crested lored tit (nikoned)
32. Green beeeater
33. Iora (nikoned)
34. White breasted munia (nikoned)
35. Dabchick
36. Lesser Whistling Teal
37. Golden Oriole
38. Black hooded oriole
39. Night jar
40. Cormorants
41. Sandpiper (nikoned)
42. Darter
43. Common Wood Shrike (nikoned)
44. Hoopoe
45. Malabar whistling thrush

46. Bramhni Kite (nikoned)

47. Kite (nikoned)

Equipment:

Nikon D80-Sigma 150mm prime+1.4TC (210 F4)

Lalat-Dhanashree..the mystic blend

On 19th Oct, Sanjeev along with Ashiwini Bhide-Deshpande performed at Tilak Smarak mandir in Pune. In the first half, both of them performed solo where he presented a powerful Miyan ki Todi. His voice was extremely sharp and mesmerizing which aggravated the curiosity to hear him in jugalbandi or in jasrangi jugalbandi. Ashwini B-D took over Nat bhairav and in parallel Sanjeev intercepted her with Madhuvanti. It was a fabulous attempt and was extremely fascinating to hear. The duo did not stop over here.
After quenching this thirst, the audience was yet to come out of this aroma, they started with Lalat(Ashwini BD) and Puriya Dhanashree. Imagine either of them located in Japan(Sun rise) and the other one performing in the USA at the same time. i.e. Sunrise and Sunset. Bandish...maie re shyam shyam shyam japat enthralled the audience. Not only the vocalists, but tabalji and harmonium also joined the jugalbandi and was absolute cherry on top of cake.
They ended with Bhairavi. It was a different experience of hearing morning raga and evening raga in the afternoon at 12:30 pm.......
enjoyed it thoroughly...
-Ameya Godse