Human Pyramids

Merry Christmas everyone! Hope the holidays are treating everyone well. I am finally getting time to catch up on images I took, well, in September!

I woke up this past September 2, and a friend told me to take my camera and go outside. Someone had strung wires between the apartment buildings and hung clay pots from the wires. The previously deserted streets would suddenly be swarming with hundreds of young men wearing colorful uniforms. As I stepped out of my apartment holding my camera, a woman on a scooter stops and says, "Are you looking for the pyramids? Get on! I'll take you!"

The street is blocked by the massive crowd of young men. Everyone's attention is on the center where men are climbing on top of each other and standing on shoulders. Faces grimace and everyone yells. They are trying to make a human pyramid tall enough to reach the clay pots. This is Dahi Handi!

The festival celebrates the birth of Lord Krishna.

The pyramid collapses and everyone rushes to leave; it's on to the next competition. In the rush, a man grabs a hold of me and tells me to get on his motorcycle. "Wait, I'll go get my bike and follow you," I tell him. When I return with my motorcycle a man jumps on behind me, "Go!! Follow them!" he yells into my ear.

I spend the rest of the morning and most of the afternoon photographing one pyramid competition after another, all over the northern suburbs of Mumbai.

Just another day living in India.

More Photos After the Break!

The Look

Two Posts in two days?!? I know, I'm on a roll. I just got back from New York on Monday after shooting an event for Jansport. On Friday I spent almost 4 hours in the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art). I like going to art museums, but I find that, especially when by myself, my mind starts to gloss over. I can't concentrate on the art. Frankly, I get bored. To entertain myself I like to watch everyone else enjoying the art. This series came from this boredom.

More photos after the break.

Last Red River Gorge Trip of the Year

Andrew Osnach climbing "Synchronicity" at the Roadside Crag. 5.11a trad.

I didn't go straight home to Indiana after landing in the US from my time in India. I stayed three weeks here, a week there, and so on till I met several friends in Red River Gorge, Kentucky for a weekend of climbing. I've always struggled balance my time between actually climbing and photographing climbing and decided that I have to say, "Today I am climbing" and "today I am shooting." Otherwise I end up carrying 100lbs of gear with me all over the cliffs and valleys and taking only one or two photos.

Two of my buddies left on Sunday, but Leigh and I stayed on Monday specifically to take photos. Having not made prior plans I decide on Roadside Crag because of its popularity and varied route difficulties. Approaching the cliff I find two guys preparing to climb a trad route (traditional climbing using your own protection gear instead of bolts in the rock) to the left of a beautifully pocketed climb. I don't have a guidebook, but I think it looks about like a 5.9, which I should be able to climb with no problem. I scamper to the top just as the first climber finishes the trad route. I end up hanging out with them the whole day.


George Makaronis cleans the trad route Five Finger Discount, 5.8.


Andrew Osnach climbs "Andromeda Strain", a beautiful 5.9+ trad route.



Andrew Osnach and Eric Thomson work on Fadda, a nicely pocketed 5.10a.


George Makaronis contemplates Fadda as Andrew practices placing trad gear on Motha.


Andrew Osnach climbing "Synchronicity" at the Roadside Crag. 5.11a trad.
Take note of the no-hands knee-bar taking place on the image on the right!



Climbing in the Red in mid-October is the best time. Not only do you have perfect temperatures (highs in the 60'sºF), but you get to enjoy the amazing fall foliage. It's good climbing here most of the year, but the scenery is not the area's strongpoint. But watching the trees change from above is, well, the only way to see it.

Rebecca

I swore off doing weddings. I had had a few bad experiences, and I was making enough money in other fields of photography that I didn't need that extra income (and sometimes frustration that comes with it). But now that I am effectively starting over from scratch, weddings are a great way to survive while getting settled in a new place.

When I first arrived in New York from Mumbai at the end of September, my good friend, fashion photographer (www.jeremiahwilsonphoto.com) Jeremiah Wilson asked me to be his second shooter for a wedding near Queens on Long Island. I am so glad he did.

Jeremiah working his magic with a 4x5 large format camera while Max assists.

Not only was the couple and family a blast to work with, everything about the wedding was exceptionally beautiful, including Rebecca.















Perfect location. Perfect light. It was an amazing day.
Can't wait to do more like this.

Website Redesign!

I have updated my website with my new logo and changed the menus to flow better in the design. Let me know what you think of the new design. I will continue to edit the website as I go.

Click on the image.

Rajasthan Part I: Jodhpur

Friday, Sept 17th

The golden Fort, Jaisalmer, Western Rajasthan

I can hardly fathom that I left for the airport a week ago; it seems like ages. But a week ago I started my last foray into the vastness of India, at leas for now. And it's crazy thinking that, with this train's departure, I am beginning my journey back to the United States. It will take me from Jaisalmer – the edge of the Thar Desert – through Jodhpur and Ahmedabad before my flight leaves the ground late Sunday night from Mumbai. With the tires final touch of the tarmac my great Indian adventure will effectively end for the foreseeable future.

It has been a crazy ride. One year and three months before I stumbled off my flight from Chicago only expecting the unexpected. My plans stopped at the Hyderabad airport. I wanted to work internationally. I wanted to travel. I did not want to be in Indiana (note: commonly confused with India). But to me India has been many things: A great love, a great wonder, and a great frustration are among them. I experienced many things: great friendship, journeys, sicknesses, hunger, joy and depression. I found love, but might have lost something I've known to be true for 25 years. In the land where everyone is spiritual, India has left me with lots of questions. But I finally found a focus.

I decided to spend my last week in India traveling to one of the many areas I had not yet been. I picked Rajasthan because of the unique landscape and the distinctive people. I wanted this to be a trip solely about photography. I feel like I have failed to really capture my experience in India with my camera. There is always more.

But there is always next time. I may return someday: India seems to have that effect on people.

Saturday, September 11
In a mix-up of planning I end up taking an overnight bus from Ahmedabad to Jodhpur instead of a train. In India you can expect one thing: the road will be bad. You will not sleep on a bus.

Sunday, September 12
Jodhphur, Rajasthan
A rickshaw drops me off at the clock tower, a central market of sorts in Jodhpur, and I wander off in the shadow of the immense fortress to find a guesthouse among the blue colored buildings along the ancient streets.
"Come to my guesthouse. Very good. Cheap."
"My hotel is highly recommended by the Lonely Planet"
"I have great views of the fort,"
men call out to me as I walk past in the early morning light. I enter Anil's Sunrise Hotel and take a small, bare room. And with breakfast in my stomach I pass out for several hours making up for the sleep lost on the bus.

Jodhpur is a magical city where your imagination can run wild. You can almost put yourself back to the time when the fort was not just a tourist attraction, but defended against attacks from foreign invaders.

[[[Side Note]]] People that snore should not be allowed to sleep, at least not in a public setting. They should either be arrested for public disturbance or rough up enough by the annoyed bystanders that they wouldn't dare utter another snore.[[[]]]




Jodhpur is called the Blue City because many of the buildings are painted blue, apparently to keep out the heat?



More Stories & Photos After the Break! Don't Stop Here! ---->

Part II The Real Adventure Begins!

Wednesday, September 15

A lone tree on the dunes near the village of Khuri in Western Rajasthan.

I get started late Wednesday morning after renting a small 135cc Bajaj Discover and taking care of some things in the city. I clear out of the 'storage closet', asking the man with the red paan stained teeth and immature 14 year old's bowl haircut, "Where can I keep my pack till I return?"
He snidely replies, "Take it with you on your bike."
"Yea, it won't fit and I don't need it. You have storage for people's luggage. Where is it?"

Background: This man manages the Jaisal View Hotel, the place I am staying, NOT the Rajdhani Hotel, which is a completely separate hotel with no connection. They had deceived me to get me to go to their hotel. The man with the bad teeth lied about the Brit's camel safari and about getting me an actual room. I have a very hard time trusting anyone with bad teeth, especially tobacco stained. I had purposefully avoided a handshake with this man and he had rightfully taken offense to this and cursed me.

The man with the red stained teeth and bowl haircut says, "I do not like you. You Americans are very mean."
I calmly respond, "Well, that's alright. I do not like you."
"Actually I hate you," he added. "You are a bad man (Take note: He said this because I wouldn't shake his hand). I hear you talking bad about me with the other guests."
"You lied to me. Everything about this place has been completely dishonest. If you do not respect me enough to deal truthfully then I will not respect you."

I think only a dishonest man will get upset at the truth being stated.

I grab my bags and head across the street to the Prithvi Palace Hotel, where they agree to hold my bags and rent me a nice room for a good price when I return. Lesson: When in Jaisalmer do not stay at the Jaisal View Hotel or trust men with bowl haircuts and red stained teeth.

I take off on the bike in the direction of Khuri Village, asking directions along the way. One man I ask says he needs to that way. I say, "Get on. You don't mind holding my backpack?" I drop him off at a huge resort under construction made to look like a large fortress. Not five minutes later a young man, named Sitah, hiding from the sun in the shade of a tree flags me down. He needs to go to Khuri. "Get on."

More Stories & Photos After the Break! Don't Stop Here! ---->

Rajasthan Part III: Out of Gas & In the Sun

The spectacular Sam Sand Dunes in the late afternoon sun in western Rajasthan.


After taking care of some things in at the hotel I take Sitah to get a drink. I can't find any juice stands nearby so I go to the nearest restaurant, Café Trio. It is a bit classier than I was expecting and the two of us stand out wearing our dirty, trail beaten clothes in the elegant eatery. Sitah acts nervous, looking around. I hand him a menu, "What do you want to drink?" He stammers a response, "I'll, uh, have what you have. I really…I, I don't know what to do. I've never been here before. I've never been in a place like this." It hadn't really occurred to me that this would be a new experience for him. I love Lassies (yoghurt whipped and mixed with ice and sugar), so I order two without much thought. Only after do I think about it. That forty rupees I flippantly spent on a cold drink to be downed in ten seconds could easily have paid for two meals for Sitah. I know he appreciated the gift of the drink, but I can't help but feel that I was somehow being flashy with my money.

More Photos and Story After the Break! Don't stop here! --->

Quick Redesign

If you haven't noticed already I did a quick redesign of the blog to incorporate my new logo. Let me know what you think.

Mountain Workshops 2010

Last night concluded my first Mountain Workshops, a photography workshop focused on photojournalism. Surrounded by amazing coaches, photographers doing amazing things in their field, I had a great experience. It was a challenge, it pushed me, but I had great support. I was frustrated by the story (or lack of apparent story) that I drew out of the hat, but after two rough days I had a breakthrough, both shooting and with figuring out what my story was. This was my first time doing a photostory in the pure journalistic sense. I am proud of the result, and will publish it on here sometime soon.

It's been a crazy month since I've been back in the US. This week just added to it. Almost a month ago I bought a used car, a 2005 Scion xB. I really loved it; it was the perfect car for me. Just the right amount of space, great gas mileage, and fun to drive. Wednesday, in search of a feature story in the morning light of Elizabethtown, Kentucky, I did something stupid and this is the result.

So ends the story of Carlos, my perfect car for a month. He is totaled, but I'm lucky to be uninjured, as are the two guys and a dog from the other car. I am sad to see him go. But I can't wait to find Carlos, Jr.

Indian Celebrity Magazine Shoot

Sorry it's been a while. A lot has happened in the last month. I went to Rajasthan, I moved back to the United States, I stayed in New York for three weeks, bought a car, drove to Massachusetts, climbed two mountains in New Hampshire, and tomorrow I finally drive back to Indiana. Oh, I also changed my logo.

New business cards are printed, and I'll get my website updated. The old web address will still work, but my new official address is www.dscottclarkphoto.com. There are just too many Scott Clark photographers.

I'll leave you with a shoot that I did way back in June of the Bollywood star, Dino Morea. It will be a fitness feature in an Indian celebrity magazine (hopefully it will be published next month). It was a great experience and Dino was fun to work with. My good friends Sharad and Vinay helped me out on the shoot, and Sharad secured a set of studio strobes with a 60 inch octabox for me with an additional lighting guy!

I shot this on the roof of the gym with ambient light and two speedlites.



The feature includes Dino's trainer helping him with his workout.




I am excited to see it in print. Hopefully I can get my hands on a copy.

I am overloaded with images from shoots I haven't been able to edit yet, so lots of updates will be coming soon!

Malaysia!

I stopped in Kuala Lumpur on my trip to Indonesia last September, but besides a blissful sleep on comfortable benches and a bus ride around the airport, no time was actually spent on Malaysian soil. After Amy and I had a mediocre (read: frustrating) experience traveling in Gujurat, we started looking into destinations nearby India for a taste of something different. We found cheap flights from Mumbai to Kuala Lumpur, and our next adventure was set.

A maddeningly slow rickshaw driver starts off our journey taking us to the airport at 20kmph, but we arrive in Kuala Lumpur with no other hassles. KL, in contrast to the insanity of Mumbai, is incredibly clean, orderly and functioning. An express train runs straight from the airport to the Sentral Train Station and many busses offer even cheaper means of getting to downtown. Amy sleeps for the hour and half trip and I entertain myself with the badly subtitled english movie. We had set up with a couch surfer to stay at their house, but we realized when we arrived at their train station that they are pretty far from the airport and far away from everything in the city, so we got back on the train and found a small room in Chinatown. The market in Chinatown is overflowing with activity, vendors selling everything from fresh fruit to footwear.




More photos and story after the break! -->

Orangutans!

When my girlfriend and I were discussing where to go in Malaysia, she said we, without question, had to go to Borneo. I honestly hadn't looked into Malaysia any further than Kuala Lumpur, so after looking at what Borneo (Malaysia's eastern two states) had to offer I was sold. Amy's main reason for wanting to go to the island was Orangutans, their only natural habitat.

While in Kuching, in the state of Sarawak, we took a day trip to the Semenggoh Nature Reserve. Twice every day workers put out bananas, coconuts, and other fruits on a platform and call out into the deep jungle letting the primates know "Dinner's On!"



More Images after the Break! -->

The Rat

Sorry, it's been a while. My girlfriend and I have been traveling in the south of India and Malaysia since the beginning of August. The trips were amazing and I'll post some photos shortly.

I just moved into a beautiful new apartment my friend rented in the suburb of Mumbai called Santacruz. I will only be here a month before I fly back to the states (I'm bought my ticket, I'm coming home 20th September! Well, "home" being NYC for a few weeks), but glad to be out of my old apartment that only had running water about 2 hours a day (mostly while I was sleeping) and was very far from all of my friends (with terrible traffic). This apartment has a few things that need to be fixed: it leaks when it rains, the bathroom sink refuses to drain, and the airvent in the kitchen is broken. The last thing seems to be in the most urgent need of fixing. The fan will not spin and there is a rodent sized hole in the cover.

We had been finding rat feces scattered about the kitchen since we moved in, but had never encountered one of them (and I have only been here since Wednesday). Thursday we came home to a pot full of water mysteriously fallen off the counter, sitting on the floor in a puddle. "The wind must have pushed it off the stove?" Amy said trying to convince herself. That night, with a loud crash, the same pot found its spot on the ground again. I turn on the light to catch sight of the creature bounding from the counter to the fridge and out the broken vent. I try to tape the vent shut, but its a poor job and the rat came back in that night when I was asleep.

We buy a metal live trap and some wire to fix the vent. With the vent securely shut, we're still finding feces, so we hope the rat will find the trap. That evening we find the trap on top of the refrigerator caught its intended prey. I reach my hand up to grab the trap and...the little bugger bursts through the spring door, jumps to the counter and then behind the fridge.

I reset the trap and put it on the floor, hoping the rat is dumb enough to get caught in the same trap twice. Luckily, when I woke up I found him curled up in the cage. I put the door against the wall and went back to bed.

As I prepared to dispose of the rat I thought, I can't not take a photo of this occasion. So I pulled out two flashes and went to town. He was a real trooper.



More Photos after the Break! -->