Indian Man Portrait Photo

Photographer’s Note

An environmental portrait of a man working in Madurai, South India.

I wandered down a small street and discovered a world of activity - and took this proud looking man's portrait. Im not sure exactly what he's doing - anyone from India know what this vegetable is or it's use?

While I was in Tamil Nadu, I was inspired by Oochappan's daily life shots of this region, and tried consiously to shoot people at work in their street life. Sometimes it's intimidating and hard to approach people, but after you force yourself to do it a bit, you start to feel comfortable and used to it. I guess that's the case with all portrait photos.

japiey, siolaw, Bruno40, abulafia has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

siolaw (25882) 2007-09-28 22:20

Hi David,
A fine Indian street portrait of the Betel seller, with good framing of the man on the side letting us see the colorful background with Tamil scripture adding exotism to the scene! Warm colors and fine sharpness.
TFS
Laurent

pcp (3368) 2007-09-28 23:59

Hi David,

Nice picture and good portrait, suited sharpness in this picture

TFS

Senthil

japiey (9531) 2007-09-29 0:37

Hi DL.

Good shot, and a timely capture.
His looks are straight at us too..

The green leaves in the foreground are beetle leaves and the man is cutting an inside portion of the banana plant, which in called BANANA TREE STEM, known also as vazhathada in Malayalam.
The interior portion of vazhathada is always wet, so the leaves if kept inside makes in ever green without getting dry. The sellers use this method for keeping the leaves wet.
Another important thing is, inside this vazhathada, there is the VAZHAPINDI which is medicinal, and is used to make dishes for diabetic persons as well as others too. Plantains are of many use, natures gift to man, as the COCONUT TREE.

VAZHAPINDI is used to make dishes in South Indian homes. I'll give a link for a recipe: PACHAKAM
Pachakam means cooking.

BEETLE LEAVES are used for chewing.
The leaves are folded over the beetle nut to make a small packet. Then the whole pack is chewed slowly over a period of time to get the buzz. The chewing also coats the tongue with firey red color. Over a long period of abuse - this combination leads to oral cancer. No wonder oral cancer is so high in India.

Good shot, dear friend.
Salutes.
Enjoy the WE.

JP

ribeiroantonio (22056) 2007-09-29 1:07

It is a great portrait with a stunning sharpness and beautiful colours. The DOF is very good and the blurred background gives the necessary context without being distracting. According to my fellow colleague working here on the rig in my office, the gettable the guy is chopping is a king of cucumber which is eaten raw in salads. Well done.
Antonio

crckt (7102) 2007-09-29 20:22

Hi Dave,
I like the expression on this man's face. The quality of the shot is really nice.
Well done,
Shaeri

Bruno40 (6442) 2007-09-30 2:50

Hi David
Good portrait, excellent DOF and framing. The sharpness is fine, but the skin looks unnatural. Did you reduced noise or softened the skin?
TFS
Jorge

prumod (8264) 2007-09-30 4:41

hi dave...
a good daily life scene... timely captured shot! colors and his expression are interesting...
greetings...

Joffre (527) 2007-10-01 6:19

Hiya David, wonderful colours and details, nicely framed and composed, perhaps there is a tad too much filtering on the face, what I love is the supercilious expression on the sellers face, priceless, great capture!

abulafia (4802) 2007-10-06 9:03

Hi David
Again these extreme details, specially in the mans face, and the colors are also very special, a bit like in the tea buddies post, maybe a little undersaturated. I like that effect a lot.
Also it is good to hear that you sometimes feel uncomfortable to shoot people in the street, then it isn't just me, I can not seem to cross that barrier:)
Regards
Harry