Simba

Last Friday was rather bittersweet. We won a short film competition and I stood first in a photography competition and was extremely happy until my brother sent me a picture. It was a picture of a grave inscribed with the name "Simba".

Simba is my cousin's cat and he was honestly one of the best looking cats around. Unfortunately, he had to be put down because his health failed him and he couldn't recover.

Now I doubt Simba was really 'my friend' but he was the one cat that made me want a cat. I loved the way he purred when you played with him or the fact that he was easily attracted by you scratching the couch cover. He will most definitely be missed.

This is one of the very last pictures of this handsome fellow.

Gleam

It's been far too long since I was last online. Getting caught up with all the emails, messages and comments might just be the hardest part.

Anyway, it's Valentine's Day and since I realised that too late to create a picture specifically for today I decided to process one of my pictures to mean something for today.

So, how about some much needed warmth and glow that generally comes with the feeling of being loved?

How do I know this? Easy! God's love really warms you up and I know those of you in relationships can attest to that fact but let me tell you that the love of God supersedes anything you've ever know before.

I hope you're having a great day and I hope you have a great week ahead. I shall not keep you any further :D

Phantasm

Oh wow! It's been a while since I last posted here. My inbox was flooded with emails and notifications and I promise I'll get to them in time. I apologise as I haven't been online lately because of my exams and other work but hopefully I'll be more active now that I actually have holidays

After posting so many pictures of people I think it's time for a break.

Anyway, I just finished working on this image and I think it's one of my favourite images I've worked on yet. This was taken in October but it's been lying on my hard drive just waiting to be processed.

It wasn't until I came recently read Proverbs 3:6 which says "In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths." that I actually knew how to process this image.

I used a couple of different techniques to add the additional light to this image and make it look like something right out of a dream. My computer could barely keep up and what should have taken less than an hour ended up taking more than three hours to finish.

Anyway, let me know what you think. If you want more details I'd be happy to post a "layer Breakdown" video for this image on Youtube. Just let me know :)

Take care!

Aglow

Looks like I should transition into taking portraits and not landscapes since I've been doing a lot of that lately and people tend to enjoy that a lot more.

Anyway here's another picture that I experimented on with the tones and colour grading. Also I tried out this new technique which I used to add light to the top right of the picture. If you want to know how it's done let me know and I'll get back to you :)

My friend was taking pictures of some of my other friends and the light just looked amazing behind her so I asked her to hold her pose and grabbed this shot.

Hitch

Wow! It's been quite a while since I uploaded anything and I kind feel guilty because this is what I've always wanted to do and I haven't been spending much time with my camera or even editing.

A few days back a friend of mine got in touch and asked me whether I wanted to go to take pictures. How could I decline that offer? So we spent the better part of 4 hours on a bike and spent quite a bit of time taking pictures too.

We missed the sunset but I did get some pictures of the trees among other things.

Anyway, I promised him a picture of him and his bike so this is really for him.

The editing on this one is something completely different. I don't know why but I just felt like taking this route although I've never done it before. What do you think?

Ardour

Thank you all for the birthday wishes. It's been an amazing year and God has been so very faithful even though I've failed Him more times than I can count but I've been reassured of His promise to never leave my side this year.

On that note I would like to share today's picture.

These are my juniors in college and they've been together for more than 5 years (or so I've been told). This was taken at a local park - the only one worth going to in the city, IMO.

Anyway, why did I choose "Ardour" as the title for this picture? One of the meanings of the word is "a great intensity or passion". I think, all of us can relate to this at some level whether we've been in a relationship or just dream about one.

For me, the best relationship I've ever had and will ever have is the one I currently enjoy with my God. He loves me (and all of us) with an unbeatable intensity and passion. So much so that he even gave us His son so that we can be free. All you have to do is believe. That's not it. He will continue to love you like no one else can.

Sure, the love of a fellow human being is amazing but God's love surpasses anything you've every known or imagined.

I've been experimenting with my editing a lot lately and this is one of the results. It's not a proper fall edit but I quite like the way it turned out.

Ominous

I'm guessing (rather, hoping) you saw the sneak peak I posted to my Instagram yesterday.

Last year I decided to do a Halloween themed picture for Halloween. It wasn't meant to be very serious and was meant to have a touch of humour as well.

This year for Halloween I decided to do the opposite. I decided to do something seriously creepy and use techniques I haven't used before. It had it's challenges but I really learnt a lot creating this image so I'm quite happy.

I showed it a couple of my photographer friends and they seemed to like it too so I guess that's a good sign.

Halloween isn't celebrated here but this is something I've wanted to work on for a while now and what better time to upload a creepy/scary picture than the 31st of October, eh?