Bangalore Photography Workshops - No dearth of choices!

I wanted to give the hubby something different for a birthday gift this year. For how long can one surprise the man with mobile phones, watches, electronic stuff… and cards? You will agree that it is a daunting task to come up with innovative gift ideas year after year, especially for men (while for women it is the easiest thing - there are so many choices. Now whether the woman will actually like your choice is another matter!). So there I was, wracking my brain a good one month before his birthday searching for bright ideas, when I remembered how he always claims to be a better photographer than me. Voila! My gift idea reared up and stared me in the face.

Why not actually make him better at the art than me? And while at that, learn the tricks of the trade without paying for it (by threatening the man with dire consequences if he doesn’t remember and repeat word for word what he heard at the workshop). Send him to a photography workshop!

The next obvious step was of course to search for such workshops in and around the city. And man, I tell you that’s when I got oh so totally floored. In the last three years while I was sleeping, the photographers in the city seem to have made photography workshops the “in” thing to do. A simple search in Google turns up so many results and choices. And it becomes really difficult to sort the chaff from the wheat. That’s when I decided to make the list below for easy comparison. Exactly like the comparison list I made for buying my two pathetic cameras (in retrospect! But they were the best choices at that time!!).

Being the good samaritan that I am, and to have something to fill the “achievements” space in membership forms, let me share my list of Bangalore based Photography workshops and their details. Before you proceed further, read the disclaimer at the bottom once. And twice. If you still find any of the information listed here to be untrue for this timestamp, just email me. I will get it corrected as soon as I can.

Name	Conducted by	Next/Last scheduled	Where	How much	Duration	More details
Photography workshop	Amoghavarsha	Next one on 13th and 14th June	Usually in a nature camp called Forest trails at Bannerghatta Reserve Forest but this time inside the city	Rs.3500 (inside the city)	2 days	Here
Photography workshop	Kalyan Varma	Next one on 13th and 14th June; Usually conducted every month	Usually in a hotel	Rs.4000	2 days	Here
The Contrarian Photo Workshop	Mahesh Shantaram	Next one on July 11th and 12th	Photographer's house at Murugeshpalya	Rs.3500	2 days	Here
Elephas Photography Workshop	Sudhir Shivram (Elephas)	Last one was on May 23rd and 24th	Usually in a hotel	Rs.3850	2 days	Here
Weekend Workshops in Basics In Still Photography	Bangalore School of Arts and Photography (Anand Sharan)	No information on the last workshop this year; Is not very regular I think	Studio at Koramangala	Rs.4500	Spread over 5 days - roughly 4 hours each day	Here
Introduction to Photography and Camera	Active Canvas	Last one on June 6th, 7th & 13th	Active Canvas, Jayanagar	Rs.750	3 days - 3 hours each day	Here
Photography on the Move	getoff ur ass (Hellmuth Conz)	No information on the last workshop this year	Field	Not revealed	Maybe 2 days	Here
Theme-based photography workshop	Canon/National Institute of Creative Communication (NICC)	Last one was on May 23rd	Canon Image Lounge on Brigade Road	Rs.1000	1 day	Phone: 65337001, 65337002

Some of these photographers also conduct out of town workshop like the interesting Agumbe Rainforest Photography expedition by Amoghavarsha and Anamalai Tiger Reserve/Valaparai Photographic Expedition by Kalyan Varma. There are also more technically focused workshops like the digital Photography workshop by Sudhir Shivaram. And I heard from a friend that Jayanth Sharma of Wildlifetimes.com also conducts workshops – but sadly his Website is down so I don’t have any details. Here is another one I came across very recently i.e. today! – I saw it in the Timeout Bengaluru Magazine - An Online Photography workshop by Mahesh Bhat. Online workshop, isn’t that cool? I am sure there might be more folks offering workshops but these are the reliable ones I know of. If you have heard of any other workshop you want me to include here just leave a comment or email me.

So which workshop did I send my husband to finally, you askth? Wait and Watch. I will hear his experience and maybe blog about it!

Disclaimer: All the information here is collected from the websites, blogs, and forum/groups of the photographers/organizing companies. I did not take the effort to get any of it verified by emailing them. So this information is applicable only for this particular timestamp. The photographers/organizers might update their site any minute and revise the offerings or its price – for which obviously I can’t be held responsible. Did I say this is time stamped? I don’t lie so rest assured this is information you can rely on and of course, I am not associated with any of them. No marketing gimmick, this one.

Creative writing workshop

My creative writing classes are coming to a close after eight weeks. Today will be the last session and we will be discussing screenplay. The last few sessions have been amazing. In fact, come to think of it all the sessions were amazing. I will write a detailed review a little later. For now, I just wanted to let you know that the next workshop is coming up in case you are interested. Here's what Still Waters (Vijay Nair's (the person who is conducting this workshop) company) has to say about it:

' “Still Waters” announces a weekend workshop on “Creative Writing” commencing April 12, 2009, at Hotel Ramada. The workshop covers the craft of writing novels, plays, short fiction, poetry and screenplay writing. For more details write to stillwaters@vijaynair.net / vijay@vijaynair.net. '

So go on and register if you want to give creative writing a shot. I'm sure you won't regret it - I don't.

Creative Writing

I chanced on an ad for a Creative Writing Workshop at Bangalore in DC sometime back and immediately got intrigued by the idea of attending one. The ad gave very little details except for the start date and the name of the company (Still Waters) that is conducting it. Though I was clear about pursuing something related to writing in the long run, I was not sure if creative writing is the field I wanted to get into. And I had never heard of the company either. I toyed with the idea of actually calling up the contact number that was given in the ad for a day or two. For the past month or so, I had been looking at taking the diploma course in writing offered by Indira Gandhi University or Symbiosis but unfortunately, I had missed the term this time. So with a few more months to go before the universities took their next set of students, I was feeling kinda impatient to get started with something related to writing. So when I saw that ad, quiet accidentally at that (I never read DC - my household peruses ToI!), it seemed like serendipity!

I eventually rang them up and after seeing the workshop agenda, quickly decided to enroll for the session. The 8-week long workshop is conducted by Vijay Nair, author of "Master of Life Skills" and will cover "craft of writing short stories, novels, playwriting, poem and screenplay writing." The fees for the workshop was Rs 7000/- for working professionals. Deciding that it's a small amount for learning a life skill (ya, that's what I am hoping it will become, at least partly!), I signed up.

The first session of the workshop happened this weekend and the experience was humbling to say the least. The participants were all from diverse backgrounds - engineer, architect, doctor, housewives, college kid, teachers....you name it, we had it! There were a couple of writing exercises (obviously!) after which we were supposed to read aloud our pieces and the others were invited to comment on them. I had thought I was decent at writing but well the feedback from the others hit right where it mattered. Ouch! Oh ye Ego of mine, quiet now, quiet. Ha! That's like a good girl. Good.... I digress!

The workshop has put the idea of serious writing into my idea and I'm happy for it. Over the next few weeks, I expect we will be doing more of these exercises in different forms of creative writing and also doing some reviews of books. So at the end of eight weeks, if nothing else, I will come out far more wiser on whether I really want to pursue creative writing. Here's to humbling experiences!

Shortlived hobbies, passions... call it what you will...shortlived sure they are!

One such hobby was Glass painting. I gave it up after I found out that glass paints release fumes which may not be good for the developing baby inside the womb. And am sure it will be a couple of years more before I pick up another glass to paint!

Surviving

"One of the chief obstacles many creative people face is how to cope with the intersection between our creative and our professional lives. Is drawing, painting, photography, music, whittling, just a hobby? Or are we serious about it and wiling to throw ourselves over the cliff's edge and base our livelihood up on it? Anxiety over this issue is what derails a lot of us when we are young...."
http://www.dannygregory.com/2006/02/post_7.php

Forgotten hobbies

I always loved to paint as a kid, though I was not too good at drawing perfect imitations! So I decided "modern art" was the one for me and went as far as hanging my "first pieces"all around the house! Then puberty stuck and pooff.......

Now I am thinking of taking them up again! Who knows? Maybe I can create my own masterpiece? But before that, I've got one beautiful artwork on its way flying across cities for me! Yep, Anita's painting for me is ready! I had a sneek peek at it and it is fantastic- blue flowers(my favorite color) sprinkled with white ones. Soon I shall be the proud owner of a painting for the first time in my life!

Wow, blogging does pay, in its own way!! ;) Does it rhyme?