Photograph of the day (Nature)

This image is extracted from one of the photographs posted earlier. The earlier image is cropped and the area surrounding the bud is defocussed using Picasa.

Camera: Sony DSC H1

Photograph of the day - Nature series (The Spider)

The photo on left was taken at the Dutch Fort itself. The tiny spider had climbed on the sunglasses I had kept on ground. Combination of green grass, green glass and the reflection of the sky in the glass was tempting enough to give it a try.

Later when I was going through all the photographs taken, along with my friends, Vivek and Gaurav, we came up with one improvised version which is the photograph on the right side. The original photograph serves the purpose of showing the excitement of photographer but viewer keeps feeling that size of the spider in the photo is very small and there are other unnecessary things like the small branch on the left side, the date that too in red letters. Then this photo was cropped closely from all sides. In the new photo the spider occupies a signifcant area in the centre of the photo thus making itself the sole object of the photo. Moreover this photo gives enough hint about the existance of sunglasses. The second picture clearly shows that the spider was well focussed in the original photograph.

Photograph of the day - Nature series starts with a Busy Bee

This is an effort do improvise the photograph posted earlier. It's just to demonstrate how much details a 5 Mp camera can catch in macro mode. Just by making the composition tighter the photograph start looking much differant. Here the key is to show a very big image of a very small object. Remember "Honey... I Shrunk the Kids!!!"

Befriending the Nature

Images captured at the Ruins of Dutch Fort in Sadras. This place is 60 km southward from Chennai.

Camera used: Sony Cybershot DSC-H1 5.1 mega pixel, 12x optical zoom






I feel that there is a lot of space in the right side fo the flowers and on the left the leaf is cropped. Equal space on both side of the object was desired. But when taking picture the bush was shaking due to breeze.


I was expecting a more blurred background. Perhaps a snap from a lower angle will have the background grass distanced from the honeybee and the flower and it will give the desired 3D effect. But then... honeybee may have to wait till you find the right angle!


These butterflies made me run beind them for about fifteen minutes. When they saw me crawling on the ground - I'm assuming that they saw me despite their 'business' - perhaps taking pity on me, they settled on a small branch of grass and I could catch this moment.

All the images are taken in macro mode. This mode allows you to take your camera as close as 20 mm from the object. This way the object relatively looks larger to the lense. As the camera is to be focussed at a very short distance in this mode, every thing in the background of the object becomes defocussed or blurred giving the main object an virtual elevation normal to the plane of the image. This effect also is called as the 3D effect. Camera was set on centre weighted focus and ISO200.

Many thanks to Amol for lending his camera for this excercise.

A Cat in the wing


Looking for greater grazing ground


Hanumant mee ithe asa

Machismo Back in Action - Story of the Breakfast at Mahabalipuram

The wonderful morning started with reaching the parking area on bicycle at six am. In no time I was on the way to Adyar on Machismo. I joined ECR at Thiruvanmiyur in the next couple of minutes. I was getting a flat spot when opening up the throttle but the bike was doing well when cruising. It was pretty early and the road had sparse traffic. It took some twenty five minutes to reach Uthandi and I found the road further was almost empty with vehicles occasionally crossing me on their way to Chennai. My speed had reached almost 80 km/h and it was sufficiently high to overtake most vehicles going in my direction.

I increased speed carefully only after a while. I was cautious for many reasons. Stiff wrist of my left hand which was injured exactly three months back in Ichalkaranji was first reason. I was on ride (not exactly a long one - but it's matter of keeping the throttle pulled for a few more hours and any of the ride can become long ride!) after a long time and bike had regained its shape just two day back. It was the second reason. The third reason was the frame of my mind in recent days that made me, perhaps, even more cautious. What ever be the reason one has to be careful all the time when one hits roads.

Anyway on the way I had to stop near Toll Gate to attend a phone call and then to make one. I opened throttle to full after Kovalam. By the time I crossed Crocodile Park I was cruising between 115 to 125 km/h quite comfortably. I thought, at that time, the wind was assisting me probably. I used my sitting posture to control the speed. Lean forward flat on the petrol tank, you gain speed. On the other hand, sit upright and the increased wind resistance slows you. At seven am I was in Hotel Mamalla checking the carburettor which was spilling petrol through the overflow vent. I closed the fuel valve and the leakage stopped. It was sure that I had to get the carburettor overhauled as the float operation was not going well. Albeit I had a good brakefast comprising of idlie-sambar follwed by tea.

I left the hotel at seven thirty with a steady speeds of 70-75 km/h. On the way back I had to meet my friend Amol who was flying model aircraft on one of the grounds near ECR. After spending some twenty minutes with the group I left the place. By that time the road had become busy slowing my speed down. I directly reached REL's Service Centre on Kalakshetra Road at eight fourty five am only to know that it opens at nine thirty am. On the thought of going to another mechanic who was just nearby, I left the Kalakshetra Road. I was to take a left turn after taking a U turn near Thiruvanmiyur Bus Depot. On this left turn I saw a motorcyclist in my front suddenly applying brakes and at the same time two cyclists turning to their right from the wrong half of the road. That meant they were coming into me. I applied brakes. I avoided motorcycle, which was almost standing by this time, stopped just in front of the bicycles. Rear brake is never useful for such occasions whereas front brake locked the front wheel and the bullet skidded (on tar road!). There is one thing about this machine from REL factory, that is, you can balance this machine only as long as it is bearing its own weight. The result was, in a second, the bike was flat on the road on its right side and I was sitting on it with my right leg trapped between bike and the road nicely twisting it at the knee. But soon I got myself standing on my legs. A gentleman lifted bike. Some oil spilled from the air-filter container over the hot silencer. Petrol also started leaking from carburettor. I quickly closed fuel supply and signalled all telling everything was fine. I started the bike and left only to see the mechanic's shop still closed. I had felt deep pain in the right knee when kicking the bike. Despite that I decided to go to REL's station again in order to leave the bike for a general checkup and reached there. It was still five past nine in morning.

Although it was a minor fall without any major damage, it emphasizes the need to remain careful at all speeds and at all the places. Nothing happened at 120 km/h and I had a fall at 20 km/h. It was my first fall in last six years of riding a little more than 53000 km.

I was told where I had the fall, the motorcyclist in front of me was driving with side stand on. Somebody pointed it to him when taking the left turn. He reacted to it by quickly slowing down. Then servicing centre I could press my thumb against the tyre. The air pressure in front was lower than required. And there was no air-filter in the box enabling me to drive at that 10 km/h extra speed! ... hmmm... I'm learning. :-)

The Bullet Effect

Again it has been a long while after I have posted on the blog... almost six weeks they are. Anyway I had not much to share except a weekend trip to Chenkottai (Shengottai) with Radha Mausi and Neeraja a week back. I will put a link to some photographs here if I get permission from Neeraja to do so. Any way it was a great time there.

One of the reasons for not writing here was the condition of bike. Somehow transport people managed to drop some unknown consignment, probably a heavy one, on the bike and the bike needed some attention. Last week I got most of the problems on the bike fixed. What a great feeling it was to get the shape of the machismo back! I am feeling rejuvenated. (So much that on Saturday I went on a quick ride to Mabalipuram but the ride ended at the Servicing Station. I will write about this ride a little later.)