Capturing Movement

Photo Stories, 80 Comments

My attempts to capture movement owe a lot to serendipity.

Out of a dozen or more photos clicked while hubby fed these frenzied carp on the Chao Phraya river, I was confident I would have at least one half way decent shot.

Feeding Carp on the Chao Phraya river, BangkokDepressions in the Bay of Bengal (during the North East monsoons) bring cyclonic storms over the East coast of India. The shot below was clicked during one such storm, as I watched with awe – and quite a bit of fear, I must confess – gale force winds shake these palm trees outside my window like they were rag dolls! The one in the background is certainly having a bad hair day.

Wind bashed palm trees - Chennai, IndiaShot in Hiroshima station, I aimed for a frontal view of the worlds third fastest train – the platypus nosed Japanese Bullet train – but I underestimated its speed and wound up with this. The idea of anything faster boggles the mind!

Bullet train, HiroshimaHave a great week ahead y’all.

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Madhu is an Interior designer turned travel blogger on a long sabbatical to explore the world. When not crafting stories on The Urge To Wander, she's probably Tweeting @theurgetowander or sharing special moments on instagram.com/theurgetowander

80 thoughts on “Capturing Movement”

  1. Pingback: On The Move In Venice | The Urge To Wander

  2. I did the same thing with the sacred fish in the pool of Abraham (Sanliurfa) – just kept snapping away hopping to get a half decent shot of them feeding! I did capture one with a perfect pout in the end 🙂

  5. Great shots as always 🙂 I have one of the carp in the sacred pools at Sanliurfa – so determined was I to capture an open mouth nibbling a morsel I clicked away until my fingers hurt!!

  8. I really love your amazing photography and post as always Madhu ,
    Thanks for sharing my friend 🙂

  9. All of these are serendipitous successes, but the train really (wait for it) blows me away ———–
    Whoosh!

  12. congrats, that you won the book up to the bronx by stephen baum!
    I wrote to him:
    I’m happy, that Madhu won your book – I like to visit her blog daily!
    Bumba / Stephen Baum = an example for MOVING himself: from New York to Jerusalem to Los Angeles – from describing criminals (NYC) to learning religion and rituals (Israel) at last to playing the blues (L.A.) and blogging – a long creative, courageous journey!

  14. Congratulations on a great interpretation of movement. I’ve never seen a feeding frenzy with fish before. Wow. The picture of the palm trees is brilliant. I’ve never seen palm trees bending over like that over here in S. California. That is a major wind storm! But its the train that really captures movement. Good grief that’s fast

  15. Reblogged this on World Changing for Optimistic Dummies and commented:
    It is interesting to me how intrigued we as humans are at the idea of “capturing movement.” In the very phrase we outline the goal’s impossibility. To capture can mean to hold or stop, which directly opposes the idea of motion. We can capture a moment, but motion is not in a moment; rather it is the transition from one moment to the next. So why the determination? Perhaps because our lives are in constant motion, and so often to long to return to specific moments in time. It is important, though, to understand, that in stripping a moment of its context, we lose part of what makes it beautiful.

    1. That is interesting! Each of these shots were meant to capture their subjects – the carp, the trees and the train. This weeks theme required something that ‘suggested’ motion and I delved into my archives to hunt these down. So the ‘capturing movement’ thing wasn’t intentional at all. No Freudian longings here, believe me 😀

  17. Indeed Madhu, you have captured the moments in a way that only you can!

    My favourite would be the frenzied carp shot and I am curious about what the feed was that was turning the water pink.

    Shakti

    1. It was just scraps from a loaf of bread Shakti The pink is the carp’s flank I think 🙂

    1. It was a fierce storm Anu. I still haven’t got used to the East coast cyclones, they make me very uneasy 🙂

  20. I love the bullet train shot, Madhu. One of my recent photo classes took us out at night on a bridge. We shot photos of cars speeding by – their car lights seemed to go on forever in the setting I had. Great fun!

    1. Thank you Judy. I have seen photos with squiggly lights like that. Shall have to try my hand at it sometime 🙂

  22. Le palme sferzate dal vento e anche le carpe danno davvero il senso del movimento, ma la terza foto è davvero impeccabile 🙂

      1. I don’t normally reply to a reply – but you gave me a chuckle, Madhu – speed of thought. LOL.

        Well, I’ll be logging off soon and to do justice to the JD waiting for me 🙂

        Have a great evening (here in Singapore)
        Eric

  26. You got me with the exciting carps. I saw a few at my recent trip at the Hill Country but this one just have lots of it. Happy Mother’s Day.

    1. Thanks IT. I think too many people stop at this spot. They look rather overfed too 🙂

  27. Very nice Madhu! I remember the carp when we were there. The frenzy was amazing. I wasn’t happy with my shots tho. Good for you!!

    1. I agree Frizz. But there is something about a cyclonic winds that makes me very jittery 🙂

  29. With opportunity such as the carp Madhu, while camera settings are the most important the rest of the great capture of this type of movement relies on two things…luck of the draw and anticipation. Did you have your camera set to continuos shooting while holding the button down? There is no anticipation with the carp as you know what they are doing and what they will do next. Also, the carp were not bringing enough of them selves out of the water to photograph…mostly there back. If you could have zoomed in a little tighter the results would have been different. However, if you remember my photo of the fish crane ( http://wp.me/p2Z0cG-1RU ), I had to watch the birds body movements and anticipate when it would make its plunge plunge for the fish. I had my camera set on continuous shooting. When the birds body language let me know it had it’s focus on catching his fish, I mashed the button and didn’t stop shooting until it came up out of the water. Once I could see the fish in it’s beak I stop shooting. Bingo! I got the shots I wanted. As for the train which is moving, there is no anticipation required unless, you wanted to catch the train at a certain point. Then you would have to anticipate, train speed (visual), and about how soon a particular part of the train will be at the location (focus & capture point) you try to catch. You probably couldn’t use continuous shooting for the train shot because of the slow shutter speed. For what it is, the carp is good. The palm trees definately show or indicate moving, nice. The train… PERFECTION!!! 🙂

    1. Thank you so much Jerry. The problem with the carp was that we were on a wobbly boat and hubby kept throwing the bread too close 🙂

      1. Well that’s just not right! 🙂 I do teach how to feed carp, you would you like to enroll hubby my next class. 😉

  30. Very interesting gallery … the carp … the storm and the speeding train …. Great photos and lovely to have the little story to go with them. I love trains, waiting passengers, stations and rails as subject.

  31. Madhu, I can hear the whoosh in that fabulous train shot! Love the splashing water and the wind through the hair of the palm tree!

  32. I was trying to take motorbikes today and they are gone before you’ve opened the camera… that bullet train is so much faster!!

    1. That is 275 mph!! Now think of the two trains that are even faster 😀
      The German Transrapid TR-09 at 279mph and the Chinese speed barrier breaker at 302mph!!!

  33. Love your ‘bad hair day’ palm tree, Madhu. We get those a lot in Florida. 🙂 Those carp really look desperate for food. I wouldn’t like to be too close to that train. Good shot.

  34. I really loves your words – a tree with a bad hair day – you’re so right… 😉

    Excellent captured photos for the theme… 🙂

    1. Yes those fronds were being blown all over the place Ledrake. Glad you liked them 🙂

  35. onderful take on the theme of movement. And I love the contrasts – those beautiful fish and the lightning speed of the train. Fabulous post, as always, Madhu.

  36. You did a great job of capturing the Carp Madhu and yes, I am not crazy about those “bad hair day” storms either. I always worry about the birds and their nests and the monkeys in the mountain. 🙂 I prefer soft rains. That train sure is fast Madhu. That was indeed a great capture hon! Thanks for sharing. Loved it. 🙂 *hugs*

    1. I guess it didn’t turn out too badly considering we were on a wobbly boat. Thank you Sue 🙂

    1. The downside of blogging is that we get too busy clicking photos to enjoy these moments fully. My husband did kindly leave some scraps for me to feed the carp at the end 😀

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