The Lomo winks

[1]

The Madness Within

If vibrant colours, dream-like images and blurred elements grab your attention, then Lomography will take your imagination beyond what you see. An emerging community of photography enthusiasts and photographers — Lomography is reviving analogue photography. With the ubiquitous digital photography market, those who work with Lomo cameras are slowly creating a niche for themselves.

Recently, when Shibu Arakkal’s show opened in Bengaluru, visitors seemed to be transfixed by the black and white blurry images of small town Magadi. What most of them knew was Shibu had shot the pictures with an usual plastic camera from the 70s. But they did not realise that this unusual camera was the Lomography Diana F+. A chance discovery of Lomo images on a website led Shibu to explore more. “It is an absolutely incredible experience. Once I got the camera in 2008 from the US, I was just discovering the flexibility and versatility of the tiny plastic tool. It has a plastic lens, a plastic view finder and a plastic body. But clicking pictures with an old world notion of photography is like celebrating the art in its actual form,” says Shibu.
The magic of these pictures lies in the pop-colours and the blurry effects. Unlike digitally shot sharp images, Lomography pictures are like canvases that have been created by the photographer. The challenge for the lensman is to click the best of compositions he or she can see through the view finder. “It is like an art form. If I want to present something that is my idea of a subject, then the dreamy image helps me achieve that. The clicking of pictures has to be done then and there. There isn’t any post processing to make the pictures look different,” says Nishi Chauhan, architect and designer who has been clicking Lomo images for a long time.
Though in India, many are trying to recall the concept of analogue photography, Lomography is a way of life in the US and Europe. “To call it a technique is incorrect. Lomography is more of a lifestyle in the other countries. It is a sort of art movement — it promotes an analogue style of living — you wait, stop, take a look at things and capture the beauty of daily life,” says Mumbai-based independent photographer Akshay Bhoan who earlier worked with the two-year old Lomography India organisation.