Mumbai has the glitzy marine drive, Hyderabad has the pretty necklace road and my home has a little strip of garden that is a treat to the eyes. While I am not particularly interested in gardening, I enjoy photographing the flowering plants. In the morning the plants seem organized like little school kids when my mom brings out the watering can.
The plants maintain their own routine and one day they simply decide to give out flowers of stunning beauty. I just put aside my morning coffee and rush inside the house to get the camera.
I just use a low-budget Nikon camera but with the right settings and good lighting conditions, these low-cost cameras can rival the best SLRs in the market.
There is no post-processing involved when I am photographing plants and flowers. I just use the RAW images from the cameras, but I try to get it right many times before I am satisfied with the results. It seems tempting to remove the glare after I take my photographs in Photoshop, but for now I decided not to.
The morning light seems to have a magical and fresh quality to it; it enhances and brings out the pure colour in the surroundings so I photograph mostly in the morning.
To top it off, my house overlooks a gang of palm trees and the palm tree climbers take out the toddy in the morning and evening. Could I ask for more?
In search of my mother's garden, I found my own.
- Alice Walker - author, poet and activist.
