SECOND YEAR AT THE INSTITUTE

We all eagerly awaited the start of the second year as we will be handling the movie cameras for the sake of which only we have enrolled in the Motion Picture Photography course at the Institute. Meanwhile I got hostel accommodation and my room mate was none other than my batch mate K.R.Murthy. I was happy to be living among the friends in the same building and that too inside the campus.

Hostel Building

In my Room

The start of the new academic year means, new comers and the right time to take your revenge for the Ragging undergone by you during the last year! Any how it was not very serious, just mild fun in the hostel. Some of the newcomers who became friends afterwards are Peer Mohammed. P, G.R. Menon ( Direction), A S. Kanal , Narayana J. Kondra, Sudhir Choudhary, Satish Aima ( M.P.P) Vijay Arora, Raza Murad, Manju Bansal and Jameela Malik from Kerala ( Acting)

With Peer Mohammed

Peer Mohammed after graduation joined Doordarshan, Chennai and later on became the Director of Doordarshan Kendra, Trivandrum. But he was suspended on some graft charges and I do not know about his present whereabouts.

Kanal always keeps in touch with me over e-mail and I used to meet him while in Pune or in Mumbai. Recently he had sent me his excellent and very useful book – The Cinematographer’s Hand book, Film and Video 2^nd Edition for which I had also contributed an article on Miniature Photography. Kondra had assisted me in Mumbai, during the shooting of my Hindi feature Film PATITA (1980) in which Mithun Chakraborty did the leading role.

Many years after the incident packed Strike of the Seventies, I worked with Raza Murad in the Hindi TV serial – Bible in which he did the role of Noah. ( I will come to that when I write about the Final Year!)

Jameela Malik

Jameela Malik’s first film in a leading role was RAGGING ( Malayalam – 1973) for which I was the Cinematographer. She later on did some insignificant roles in various other films and just faded out from the limelight.

Portfolio making

Acting students were more friendly with us Cinematography students for the simple reason that most of our practical classes were with them only. Also they required our help in getting themselves photographed and making their portfolios. When they pass out from the Institute they showed these portfolios to Producers to catch their attention. Instead of going to Professional Photographers who charge huge amounts, they can get it done for pea nuts. Just buy some film and printing paper, and your friendly cinematography student will get the job done for you.

An interesting thing was I never owned a camera during my entire period at the Institute. I used to borrow the cameras from K.R. Muthy ( Yashica 635 - which can be used with 120 as well as 35 mm film) Prem Upadhyay ( Asahi Pentax with 135 mm Tele lens) and K.K. Jaiswal ( Kodak Retina Range Finder Camera with 55 mm lens) .

I had taken the Portfolios of Tshring P (Danny) Denzongpa and Anil Dhawan, but I do not have the negatives of Danny with me.

Anil Dhawan ( 1970)

Asha Chandra was working as Part time Instructor in Acting at that time and on her request I also took some photographs of her for her portfolio.

Asha Chandra

Bhaskar Chandavarkar was the Assistant Professor of Music and he used to give Sitar recital programmes too. For a brochure for Engineering College Past Students Association (EPSA) Poona,  he needed some photographs and I took some photos. I recopied them on sound positive film to make high contrast prints . which was used as the cover. Later on he did the Music Direction for K.G.George's Debut Malayalam Film SWAPNADANAM for which I did Cinematography. For the film SWAPNADANAM Chandavarkar got the Kerala State Award for Best Music Director (1975) and K.G.George for the Best film of 1975.

Bhaskar Chandavarkar

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Inside Page

Being a Malayalee, though she was my junior, I had taken the photos of Jameela Malik (1971) too. Later on she had acted as the main lead in my Malayalam Film RAGGING ( 1973)

Jameela Malik (1971)