Monodrama…

Again, a quick wrap about this week. I've been busy this week (and up till Friday 17^th) as I've been working with the group on documenting the Monodrama festival here in Kuwait starting from last Saturday. Many celebrities, local and Arabian in general are attending this festival. It is a good practice and better than being idle with my camera specially with the arrival of Summer (remember, Kuwait has no Spring season!).

The official poster of the event

Personally, I didn't imagine that I would love the shows performed on that stage. They do indeed have a philosophical questioning and impact, and sometimes I do feel like putting the camera on the side and enjoying the show myself. All shows were good (to my taste), though I did skip one show because of the severe headache (which later turned into a migraine as usual); but I do feel somewhat touched deeply by 2 shows mainly: The Story of Yesterday [قصة الأمس], by the renowned Kuwaiti actor Abdul-Aziz Al-Haddad [عبدالعزيز الحداد], which gives a glimpse into the life of the late Egyptian poet, Ahmad Fat'hy [أحمد فتحي]; and the other show was Foreignness [غربة], by the Iraqi dramatist Sami Abdul-Hameed, PhD. [د. سامي عبدالحميد], which speaks about the experience of a man estranged away from his homeland (and I do firmly believe that it does have a glimpse about his own personal life as well).

Abdul-Aziz Al-Haddad
الفنان الكويتي القدير عبدالعزيز الحداد

Sami Abdul-Hameed
الفنان العراقي القدير د. سامي عبدالحميد

Probably these two specific shows do relate to something about my personal life. Who knows. After finishing those sessions I need to sit down and filter out the images, and after filtration I need to pick out those that are supposed to be good shots, for the contest which is related to this event. Frankly, up till this moment, the contest's rules and conditions are still fuzzy and I'm not sure what are the requirements. Generally speaking, I'm having it as a practice and not as a big deal and I'm enjoying my time there regardless of the tiresome and exhaustive posture (standing all the time). The images are mostly taken in an ISO no less than 2000. Hence, I'm not so optimistic about having a good series here. I've been trying out my barrel or mirror lens as well (Rokinon 800mm) but I didn't take it seriously. The extreme zoom and the manual focus (beside the large diameter) makes it hard to follow an actor on the stage with it and re-focus. Hence, most of the shots were taken with Sigma 70-300mm, and sometimes with Bower 2x teleconverter.
Till next week, let's hope I get at least ONE good image of all this mess. There will be some big deal sitting in front of this monitor to delete and filter more than two thousand shots (if not 3K).

Mawahb 5 Expo…

A tiresome week had gone and I'm still following up with its consequences - as usual, sleep deprivation. I can call it a successful week with all the positive feedback we received for our booth in the latest Mawahb 5 Expo; and my own panoramas specifically got large base of attention, starting with the Minister of Cabinet Affairs, Sheik Mohammed Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah.

Explaining Ludendorffs Wirklichkeit to the minister, and on the far right appears the Kuwaiti actor Abdul-Rahman Al-Aqil. Frankly, didn't know he's there until I got this image from friends!

It was a funny chat, and I didn't know he is a photographer too! Turned out that he is a Nikonian, while I'm a Canonese! He started the chat with a statement:

I saw your photo and I wanted to see this man in person, now I see you're wearing a Canon around your neck, you made me sad. 

Oh well, it was the usual strife between Nikons and Canons! At least I did a job that people kept, keep and probably will keep talking about! Up till that moment, I really didn't know he is a photographer as well. It was a pleasant encounter and the beginning of a robust engine. The only thing that kept me annoyed in the duration of the expo is the quality of the prints we've made, and they are supposed to be printed at the #1 print shop here. In one of my discussions with the people working in that print shop, I've realized that the term "calibration" never crossed the dictionaries of those people, yet.

Quick glance at our booth

In this expo, I didn't run around doing a documentation for the whole place as I did 3 years ago. But simply dedicated my efforts for the stage (and man, what an awful legs' pain it was). I didn't have a good lens with low f-value (wide aperture), but the maximum zoom I could do was with my Sigma 70-300mm, and adding a teleconverter (x2) to double the focal length was another definition for "Disaster!" And because the dark atmosphere, there was no escape but to raise the ISO somewhere in between 1600 to 2500. Most of the shots were taken in ISO2000 in fact. Viewing these photos in small size (and after processing) seems fine, but sure not for printing on a large scale.
Taking shots at this events and specifically from the stage is something somehow important for me personally. This is because I'm not a portraiture fan at all, and while a photographer must expand his horizon to other fields other than his, I find it hard to work with portraiture, mainly because of some introversion traits. Thus, the stage is a suitable environment for someone like me to work on capturing gestures and emotions without having to deal in person with the subject. Needless to say, I don't have to plan anything related to the lighting of the scene; it is just all there waiting to be captured.
Well, the work is not over yet with these photos but I will leave you now with a show of some of them which are processed so far, in hope that you'll like them. Keep in mind that the light conditions beside the lens' conditions were NOT to be appreciated! Sorry for the low quality of the slideshow though; this is the only way I got to upload it here!
Note: Music is Soulmates by Lee Rosevere, and can be downloaded for free from freemusicarchive.