NZPhotographer Issue 24, October 2019

We headed outside and wandered about. The
sun had gone behind some clouds so I was
feeling better about the outside shots now. We
found a nice cliff edge and while we discussed
compositions and posing one of the ladies sat
down and looked incredibly beautiful with soft
light around her. She’d finally relaxed and I turned
to take my shot. Sometimes it’s the moments
between the moments that provide the best
images and I think the photo 'A Moment To Relax'
is still my favourite shot from the few days I spent
in the village.
Next up, I wanted an environmental portrait
of a Dropka man and two women so as to
showcase their traditional dress. Dropkas wear
such elaborate costumes with each piece having
significance beyond aesthetics or practicalities.
Silver and turquoise amulet boxes are worn
around their necks, sometimes filled with the
ashes or fragments of ancestors. The silver reflects
evil away from the body not letting it enter and
turquoise protects from demons and is a poison
detector that was traditionally used to line the rim
of tea cups.
The headdress worn by both men and women
that you see in ‘Telling the Story’(next page) is
called a Ko. The Ko is adorned with flowers both
artificial and real, coins and silver, again for
purposes of protection. Men wear a crimson tunic
called a goucha and women wear a tunic called
a kuntop, loaded with beads, coral, shells, and
silver over which sits a goatskin cape.
I feel that placing your subjects in their ‘natural
environment’ can really help form a story to
support your photography.
The following day we visited a 400-year-old house
with a mud-packed floor and I felt like I had gone
back in time. The woman of the house, Dolma
had never had her photo taken before so I had
to sit with her for some time chatting via my
translator asking all sorts of questions getting to
know her, and even then it was hard to get her to
relax in front of the camera. All she wanted was
for me to photograph her most prized possession,
a copper ladle.
Kitchens are the most important rooms in Ladakhi
houses, some can fit up to 50 people and are
where the family lives, eats and sleeps during
the bitter winter months as they’re the only
rooms with a fire. I sat with her on a filthy, matted
goatskin, and admired her ability to prepare
any sort of meal at all in this rudimentary space.
Photographing here was perhaps the most
difficult of all as it was very dark indeed. Even with
my Lume Cube, a reflector, and some light rays
from a side window I had to up my ISO and to be
honest it still wasn’t sufficient. I hate high ISO so
didn’t want to go any higher than 800. Yes, ideally
a speedlight and a softbox would have worked
well, and in the future I may well travel with one
for my groups, but on the flip side, you do lose
some ambiance when using too much artificial
light.
While I had been photographing Dolma, her
husband had started spinning a prayer wheel
in the back corner of the kitchen. The adjacent
window was now letting in some brighter light and
I noticed the highlights on part of his face. He
looked very photogenic. I chatted to him about
the conversion from animism to Buddhism that
some of the Aryans are going through and this
helped to focus his attention and for him to relax.
Getting to know your subject, spending some time
talking with them, is integral and a nice way to
build rapport before you start pointing a camera
in their direction. Dolma’s husband continued
to spin the prayer wheel and I took a number of
shots attempting to get just enough blur on the
wheel as it spun in order to show movement. The
lighting was beautiful, but still quite contrasty
against the darker side of the room.
Three days later we left the village and headed
back to Leh and I thought to myself how
privileged I had been. I captured a moment in
time that may never be seen again. As remote
tribes like these have more contact with the
outside world it will undoubtedly impact their
culture. It’s quite a dilemma in fact, as the act of
recording culture also aids in its demise.
While there I looked hard at them and thought
how unconnected and unchanged they were,
but in actual fact, change has come, is coming
and will continue to come. When you have the
opportunity to do something like this you feel
humbled but also curious for more. In order to
complete this chapter in my own photographic
exploration I plan to visit their original home in
Gilgit, Pakistan in the not too distant future.
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October 2019 17