Marketing Ganga

Author: Shabbir Chunawalla

  • Mario Miranda — Celebrated Cartoonist

    Mario was born in 1926 in Daman as Mario Joao Carlos do Rosario de Britto a Miranda, better known as Mario Miranda. His family moved to Goa when Mario was eight.

    Miranda first began at Current at the instance of Karaka. Mario joined the TOI group in 1953, and worked for the Illustrated Weekly of India and other publications. He was in his twenties. Mario was to the magazines of  the Times of India what Laxman was to the daily paper . It was really remarkable that two great cartoonists were working together in the same publishing house — Laxman handled the newspaper and Mario the magazines. Laxman was primarily a political cartoonist and Mario excelled in the social cartoon. Mario did his schooling at St. Joseph’s High School, Bangalore and did his B.A. in history at St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai. He attended the Sir J.J. School of Art in 1943 only for a day and decided not to take any formal training for the rest of his life. He left for Lodon in 1960 and returned to Goa in 1961. He then rejoins the Times group. He married Habiba Hydari in 1963. She was from one of the noble famililies of Hyderabad. He has painted murals on the walls of Mondegar Cafe, Mumbai. He regularly travelled abroad in the 1970s. His works then were based on his observations there. He produced by far the largest and most influential images of Goa of all the artists.

    Mario Miranda expired in his ancestral home at Loutolim, Goa in the early hours of Sunday, the 11th December, 2011, at the age of 85.He is survived by his wife Habiba and two sons Raul and Rishaad. Raul is a hairdresser who lives in New York.

    I had the privilege to meet Mario at Loutolim village  in 1987. He was a very vivacious person.

  • Mario Miranda — Cartoonist, Gallery and Website

    Mario Gallery is located seven kms north of Panjim close to Alto Povorim. It is next to the Museum Houses of Goa. It is an off road on the main Panjim-Mapusa toad. The Gallery has 2500 visitors each year. It now carries 10,000 works of Mario. The Gallery sells prints and postcards of Mario’s work. There are plans to turn the Gallery sells prints and postcards of Mario’s work. There are plans to turn the Gallery into a full-fledged museum into a full-fledged museum in the the future.

    Online Website

    Mario’s works were collected and digitised into an offline repository. Mr. Bhatt has now put all this on the website http:// www.mariomiranda.com. It is in fact an extension of the Gallery. It also sells Mario’s works.

  • Refund of the Signing Amount

    A signing amount is a token payment made in good faith where both the producer and actor agree to work together. In normal course, if they do not work together, the artiste is liable to return the amount. But the actor blocks the dates and the project is dropped a month before the schedule.In this case, the actor’s dates go waste. Both the parties will have to settle the matter by refering to the terms of agreement or by negotition. However morally the actor is within his right not to return the signing amount if the project is called off by the producer. If the actor walks out of the project, then he/she must return the amount. This is a question of ethics involving two parties. The producer may avoid the spoiling of relations with the actor by asking for a refund. According to Vipul Shah, no actor ever returns any money.

  • Shrinivas Khale : Musician Par Excellence

    Shrinivas Khale was an employee of Akashwani Mumbai Centre. He was assigned the clerical work in the library of radio tapes. He used to issue and receive recorded tapes. He was a musician par excellence. He composed a tune for a children’s song Tap tap padti angaavarti parajaktachi phoole written by Mangesh Padgaonkar at the instance of Mai Warekar. Later he composed a tune for Shukratara mand waara written by Mangesh Padgoankar . The original song was a solo but was made a duet as per the request of Khale himself. It has become a very famous bhavgeet in  Marathi. Padgaonkar also joined Mumbai Centre of Akashvani later and Khale became his colleague.Padgaonkar never liked a musician of Khale’s caliber doing the clerical work. Khale then got an offer from HMV ( now Sa Re Ga Ma ) to work as a recording officer.He was to get the authority to select the songs to be recorded. His talents would be utilized in this position. The salary was thrice the salary he got at the radio centre. He was to get the authority to select music director for the song. He could himself compose the tune if necessary. This in fact was the beginning of a  new chapter in Khale’s life.

     

     

  • Breaking of Convention by SLB

    Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation puts on air old Hindi film songs in the morning in a programme called Purani Filmonka Sangeet and this programme conventionally ends with a song of K L Sehgal. On 3rd September, 2011, the anchor Jyoti Parmar announced the sad demise of music director Shrinivas Khale and paid him a tribute, and put on air Desh hich maata….desh dharm majha song of 1967 Jivhala film sung by Krishna Kalle. This broke the convention followed in the programme since 1955 of ending the programme by a K L Sehgal song.

  • Shooting a DSLR Documentary

    This write up will give you the steps and tips to shoot a documentary with a DSLR camera.

    • Choose a DSLR camera, e.g. Nikon D3 100. Enhance its memory by a memory card. The lens should capable of depth-of-field effects. Have kit lenses ready.
    • Juggle with styles. Deviate from the standard styles. nofilmschool.com is a good starting point.
    • Audio recorder ( external ) is used to record sound . As a clap, it records sound on location. Audio and video are brought in sync later. As an alternative, one can have PluralEyes from singnularsoftware.com to sync automatically.
    • Keep in mind the frame rates when audio is recorded separately. Or else there would be sync problems.
    • Content is the king. A DSLR is used just to tell the story. The secret lies in identifying a proper theme.
    • Light works beta provides the professional open source free editing suite. It is used to cut The Kings Speech and Mission Impossible. Apple’s priced editing suite is Final Cut Pro X.
    • A laptop Samsung Series 9 or Apple Macbook Pro 15 in is a good help.
    • Rotolight from rotolight.com is a circular LED ring lamp which gives even light with adjustable while balance.
    • A camera stabilizer for light weight cams to help you take smooth planned shots. It could be Manfrotto 585 from mainfrotto in. You have to forget the tripod. When moving around, Audio Technica Pro 24 from provisualaudio.com.in can be run into H4n for superb audio, and can be fixed into the camera’s hot shoe.

    Digital film cameras and DSLR ( digital single lens reflex ) are used by the film makers too. Arri, the German film camera major producing 35 mm cameras, will stop manufacturing film cameras. The films shot on digital cameras are experimental one and low budget films. Bengali and Marathi films are among those which are shot through digital cameras. Motion picture cameras in digital format record the footage on hard disk and film is later downloaded on the computer. Cameras like Arri Alexa, Canon 5 D ( DSLR ) are available or rent.

    Digital cameras do not capture warm colours like red consistently. Sometimes, the same colour looks brighter. We have to work on these aspects in post-production.

  • 89 Years of Radio in India

    23rd July, 2015. Radio will be completing 89 years in India and next year it will be completing 90 years.The organized radio broadcasting started on 23rd July, 1927 in Mumbai by Indian Broadcasting Company. It is an audio medium. Akashvani has started a new era of broadcast journalism.It transmits 300 plus news bulletins through 40 plus centres everyday. there are additional channels — FM and News-on-Phone. These bulletins are heard. That is the reason why the diction and pronunciation are very important. It believes in simple sentences, rather than complex long-winding sentences. Akashvani has witnessed many important events including the broadcast of the mid-night Tryst with Destiny speech by Pt. Nehru when India got freedom on 15th August, 1947. These bulletins have been broadcast for more than 84 years. Radio reaches where no other channel could reach.

  • Mirrorless Cameras in Photography

    SLR or Single Lens Reflex camera’s were a signature style of all professional photographers. It ruled the market for four decades. However, it is now threatened by the mirroless cameras. Since the birth of photography, for almost 100 years, it remained a hobby for the rich. The cameras and printing were expensive. The SLR  technology came into vogue in the 1970s. It brought the cameras within the reach of the upper-middle-class. In the 1980s, the cameras became just aim and shoot or point and shoot  type. Hotshot was introduced in India. It took the camera to the common people. There after, we witnessed the digital revolution. Everyone felt that this is the climax.But then came the mirroless camera technology. This camera retains its image capturing power in spite of being compact. At present even digital cameras are compact. However, their lenses cannot be changed. D-SLR cameras are available where lenses can be charged. They are bigger. D-SLR are used by professional photographers. The images are clear and good. They use a big sensor for it. As mirrors have been removed in mirroless cameras now, their weight and sizes have reduced. The sensor is bigger. It takes the direct image. The image is clear.

    Right now, Lyka, Olympus, Panasonic and Sony have put mirrorless cameras in the market. The technology has also enabled the companies to price the cameras economically. Lower prices, excellent imaging and ease of operation are the factors which will make even the professional to go in for the mirroless cameras. It is estimated that 30 per cent of SLR market share will be cornered by mirroless cameras. Still there are no standards for this technology. The companies must evolve the standards. Canon and Nixon are likely to enter this field.

    Single Lens Reflex cameras throw the rays of light on the mirrors inclined at 45 degrees . The image is seen there first. There is a penta-prism at the top. The image gets reflected there. That could be seen through the viewfinder. When we click the camera, the 45 degree-inclined mirror is shifted up and the shutter opens up to capture the image. Because of the penta-prism, the SLR cameras are bigger and weighty. In mirrorless cameras, they remove all the mirrors. The rays of light fall upon the sensor directly. The image could be seen on the backside LCD screen. This is the direct image capture.. The professionals can change the lenses in the mirrorless cameras. The lens is the crucial element of the camera. The photographer keeps a lens kit to suit the different needs. There will be new lens kits for the mirrorless cameras. The lens included are from the wide angle type to zoom and micro type. In the coming days, there will be special lenses called fish-eye.

  • Ramp Modelling in India

    In 1964, payment for a ramp model per show was a measly Rs. 150- Rs250. In 2011, the figures have reached the sky with payments for a show being Rs. 45000-50000. To begin with modelling was not a profession. It was just a hobby. Those who modelled held full-time jobs. They were drawn from the Parsi and Anglo-Indian communities. Choreographers doubled up as designers. Fashion shows featured the latest fabrics created by top mills in India such as Bombay Dyeing, Simplex, Khatau, Tata Textiles and Binny.

    The reigning ramp queens were Pamela King, Shirley Kennedy, Erica Lal, Laila Mehta, Parveez Rustomjee ( now Agrawal ), Zarine Katrak ( wife of actor Sanjay Khan), Iona Pinto Vaz and Katayun Baxter.

    In the mid-60s, the ramp models were the late Persis Khambatta, Caroline King, Shobha Rajadhyaksha ( new De ), Marcel and Lise Jones, Sheila Jones, Salome Aaron and the late Anjali Mendes ( Pierre Cardin’s muse ).

    The 70s and 80s had names such as Anita Reddy, Veena Prakash, and the Bredmeyer sisters- Indira, Anna and Ulrika.

    The Ensemble opened first fashion store in India, and with that from 1987, the era of high fashion designers started. The curves were replaced by tall and slinky models like Nayanika Chatterjee, Madhu Sapre, Shymoli Verma, Achala Sachdev, Marielou Philips, Svetlana Casper and Mehr Jessia.

    Lubna Adam, a choreographer and model trainer, walked on the ramp for top designers between 1983-91 and modelled for Vimal, Raymond and Kodak. As a beginner, she drew Rs.250 per show. She was paid Rs.10000 per show when she left. Achala Sachdev, now a choreographer, in her days between 1990-2000 received Rs. 15000 per show. She was the winner of the Navy Queen contest too. She was a Pan Am air hostess. She also acted in the film Kamasutra.

    In the 60s, 70s and 80s, models could hardly live on their modelling assignment’s earnings. In 2000, the Fashion Weeks arrived. Models have now become independent professionals.The top names in the business charge Rs. 45000-Rs. 50000 per show. The top names today are Candice Pinto, Carol Gracias, Sonal Rawat, Kavita Karaiyat, Binal and Pia Trivedi, Joe Mathews, Sanae Shaikh, Himadri and Rachel.

    Anchal Kumar ,the winter of the Gladrags Mega Model (1999 ) is very much in demand. Sucheta Sharma too is much in demand. Sucheta Sharma too is much in demand. Reha Sukheja is the first runner up of the Miss Universe India 2010 contest organised by Sushmita Sen. Anjum Fakih hails from Saudi Arabia. Sheela Tiruchi is an established model in the fashion world.

  • Conflict in Screenplay

    Conflict is the heart of drama. If there is no conflict or problem, there is no story.Nothing happens. And the audience has no reason to sit in the hall. There is a strong desire to get something. And there are obstacles on the way.You can call them roadblocks. These may be common for the hero as well as the villain. The obstacles can be physical or emotional. There may be an internal conflict in the protagonist. That too will be resolved when the goal is reached. This inner turmoil is called demon or ghost. It may be a wound or dard.