“And then I thought, perhaps the Alchemist resides within yourself.”
This photo was clicked by me in the sand dunes of the Sam village, Jaisalmer, on my solo backpacking trip to Rajasthan. I clicked it using my iPhone 6 camera by simply lowering the exposure. Call it an amateur’s attempt at photography without knowing anything about it!
The fascinating part about this picture is that it captures not just a moment in time, but a frame from my imagination — a frame that I had visualized in my head for years before actually taking this picture.
The image you see here has been slightly processed to make the sand darker and to recreate what you would’ve seen with your naked eye. But what’s interesting to note is that this particular version—one of about 15 back-to-back takes—was my very first shot of the scene. Usually, it takes at least four or five shots before I get the framing and lighting to my satisfaction. But in this case, none of the subsequent shots could capture the essence of the moment the way it got caught in the first one.
When I look at this picture, I imagine a large, expansive, and empty desert with absolutely no one except the people in this picture—a woman, her young child, two camels and the guy navigating them.
I’m compelled to think of this one as of my favorite pictures of all time.
