My Work: Traders of Kochi

One of the scheduled photo-shoots during the Theyyams of Malabar Photo~Expedition was in the streets of old Kochi, or more specifically, Mattencherry. This area offered opportunities to photograph the bazaar-like alleys, with traditional godowns and stores stocked with all types of rice, dark brown nutmeg, red and green chillies, earthy ginger, black pepper and other spices.

From the walkabout in Mattencherry is the Traders of Kochi gallery.

Many of the local people I spoke with, and photographed, were Muslims, descendants of the Arab merchants who propagated their faith along the Malabar Coast. A significant community was created through the marriage of local women to these Arab sailors, and are still known as the Mappilas or Moplahs. The Arabs merchants and mariners are believed to come from the Red Sea coastal areas, and the Hadramaut region of Yemen.

Nice people, hard-working and welcoming.

POV: Larger & Simple

My two posts today are inter-related. This one is about my long-standing view that photography web sites which display large photographs do a better job in getting them sold (or getting their makers hired), and the second (above) puts this belief into practice.

In one of my posts on Photocrati, I made the point that “larger is better”, and used the example that some of the most popular photography blogs such as The Boston Globe’s The Big Picture and the Wall Street Journal’s Photo Journal, display large photographs (around 990 pixels by 640 pixels).

In fact, Rob Haggart, the former Director of Photography for Men’s Journal and Outside Magazine, is now the founder of A Photo Folio. His mission is to create “websites that get you hired.” If you drop by his website, you'll find his creations are indeed huge. Haggard is an industry insider, and knows what he's talking about.

I believe the era of dinky little "almost thumbnails but not quite" photographs is over for technical, aesthetic and for commercial reasons. The two news photography blogs I mentioned earlier also made sure of that. A few moments of research amongst the web designs currently offered by liveBooks, Neon Sky, FolioLink, SiteWelder and the rest, will unanimously reveal that large is good.

As for simple, well...I've posted earlier about The Photopreneur article which said it very clearly: "Despite the whiz-bang features and slick animation offered on so many sites, simple is usually best. Editors are short of time, and faced with a large number of images they want to gain an understanding quickly of what the photographer can do. They’re less interested in what the photographer’s Web developer can do."

So if you want to sell your photographs, consider making your websites simple, and your photographs larger. It's a no-brainer.