IN CONJUNCTION WITH MY NEW WEBSITE MDMAULANA.COM I DECIDED TO MOVE MY BLOG TO MDMAULANA.TUMBLR.COM 

Over the past few years I saw a wave of people converting photography as a new hobby. Other than being happy that these people try to explore their creativity and what not, I notice that most of their pictures are made by editing tools more than by photography techniques. In fact, some people applied so much excessive effects that it looks more and more like fabricated collage instead of organic photography. It’s as if the pictures are not saying a thousand words but more about a thousand layers applied on top of the original picture. And that the quality of the photo (especially colors) is prioritized before what is actually in the picture.

I’m not a photographer myself but like anyone I occasionally enjoy looking at beautiful images and IMHO photography should essentially be about capturing moment, isn’t that why camera was made in the first place? That’s why I adore Matt Stuart works. This guy is amazing when it comes to freezing moments whether it’s funny, amazing or just simply random. Surely he did some retouching in his pictures too, but you can still get the impression that even without any effects applied to the photo, you still see what the picture is all about. But then again it’s a matter of personal preference, certainly there’s nothing wrong with adding effects to pictures in order to get it closer and closer to perfection. But a line needs to be drawn somewhere, that’s all I’m saying. If any of you knows other photographer with similar style, give me a heads up will you. Thanks.

There were countless times when I looked at other countries’ tourism ad during commercial break on TV and felt anxious. Not because that those commercials bother me, but largely for the reason that coming from a large tropical country (on the hemisphere, I might add) such as Indonesia with god-knows-how-many exotic locations why can’t we have one of those commercials? Not only for the sake of tourism and economy but just the fact that we haven’t had one whilst neighboring countries continuously bombarded travel channels with their depiction of their natural resources that is actually similar to ours. Some debates even emerged due to controversies of the similarity of that depiction. Fortunately, just last week, a friend of mine showed me an ad that was recently made by the Culture and Tourism Ministry of Indonesia. Along with the logo, the catchphrase and moving images I found it profoundly satisfying (as a beginning). I’m really looking forward to see this ad aired on local and foreign TVs and let people see of what Indonesia has in store. We have more than 250 million people with various cultural backgrounds, thousands of island and an abundance of natural resources that most of the countries in the world don’t have. We may not be one now but we are a great nation and a force to be reckoned with.