Call of the wild

Lucky to have grown up in the lap of nature — the Western Ghats in Karnataka — photographer Ganesh H. Shankar believes that photography has always been in his blood. The winner of the BBC award for best wildlife category (birds) 2016, Ganesh has a history that goes far with wildlife. The ace photographer who has been part of the field for over two decades doubles as a software engineer. He reveals that he uses photography as a means to express his emotions.

“The idea is to depict emotions and feelings through my images the way artists do with their paintings,” he shares, adding, “I also like to draw parallels between different ragas in music and frame and colours in photography — a muted tone can depict a sad sombre mood, while bright colours can depict happiness or even rage among several other emotions.” 

A lover of everything in the field of arts, Ganesh has also started an online platform with his friends, who are art lovers as well. “Creative nature photography is an online forum where we try to draw parallels between all other fields of art and have debates and discussions about paintings, illustrations, music and photographs,” informs Ganesh.

Not new to the award category, Ganesh has previously won the first place in the Macro category at the NPN Editor Pick Award, which is an international forum for nature photographers. Ganesh explains that getting the right shot requires both time and patience. He shares, “Once, I captured more than three hundred pictures in a series, of the bird and lizard, over the course of three days, in order to get the perfect frame.”

Explaining about the way he likes to work when behind the camera, he says, “I take pictures because they are highly satisfying. I don’t like capturing images and clicking pictures for others because it’s my way of expressing myself. And whatever constructive criticism I receive, I take the feedback to improve my own self and hone my skill set as a lensman. However, when it’s just plain criticism, I don’t give much thought to it because not everybody understands art,” Ganesh says sounding content. Ganesh has also been the winner of the 37macro category at the NPN Editor Pick Award, which is an international forum for nature photographers and was the winner of the 37th National Wildlife Federation in 2007, in the other wildlife category.