Posted in Uncategorized
Click on any image in the below posts (esp. photography ones) to view in its original size & enjoy its clarity! 🙂
All Images & Content Copyrights Belong To Me Unless Mentioned Otherwise, Hence Kindly Do Not Copy!
08 Thursday Jan 2015
FD had been sick for a long time & he finally passed away on 27th December. Words cannot express the sadness my family & I have been through. However of late, in my moments of grieving I’ve been feeling like I should be doing something to help out other animals & came up with a plan. I’m still yet to work out all the details but I feel that it would be an ultimate way of honoring & remembering FD!
A few words dedicated to FD:
“You’ve been a joy to us,
A loving, most obedient pet anyone could ever ask for!
Out of your 5 years, we have had 3 wonderful years with you…
You have comforted me when I was down/lonely,
You have made us laugh with your antics that were unique to you,
You brightened our days with your love!
RIP my baby, U will forever remain in our hearts!“
08 Monday Dec 2014
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags
Christmas Sweets, Copyright, Copyright Infringement, Goa, Goan, Goan Christmas, Goan sweets, Image, Image Theft, kormola, Kormolas, Kuwait, Neureos, Neuris, Neuros, Photographer, Photographer's Rights, Photography, Photography Copyrights, Restaurant
So the other day as I was scrolling through my news feed on Facebook, I came across a familiar looking image. One friend had posted a comment which was an advertisement by a Goan restaurant located in Kuwait advertising their Goan sweets for Christmas. Since it looked very familiar, I went & checked in my albums & was in for a total shock. My heart started beating faster & my hands began to turn cold! This could not be happening to me! But there it was, my image (click here to see my blog post featuring the image) which was a plate with Goan neureos & kormolas neatly & beautifully arranged & which was taken back in 2011 being cropped, stolen & used without my permission for commercial advertising purpose! After my initial reaction, once I calmed down a bit, I questioned my friend who posted it how did he get it, as I had searched the restaurant’s Facebook & website for this said advertisement & couldn’t find it. I needed to find out that this copyright infringement was really done by this particular Goan restaurant. It turned out that the restaurant had circulated the image through Whatsapp. I was stumped, how do I approach them when I had nothing in public visibility? I decided to sleep on it, consult a bit with some friend photographers & take a small break from it.
Now this incident started on the 1st of December 2014, as the next day which was 2nd December, was UAE’s National Day, I was disconnected from Facebook & enjoying the holiday. On 3rd December, in the morning, I decided to just send an email to this restaurant, notifying them that the advertisement being circulated on Whatsapp by them contained my image & was used without permission. However before I could post an email to them, I decided to recheck their website & Facebook page. The advertisement was up on 2nd December & gaining likes & a few inquiries of potential customers, thereby potentially generating income through advertising for 2 days. So thus began our email conversations..
I emailed them, informing who I am, giving them links to my blog post of my image, their advertisement on Facebook with my image, my blog post on photography copyrights & two more featured & page blog posts (one & two) which warn against using my images without my permission. I ended the email giving them two options:
Either take down the advertisement using my image ASAP & post a formal apology on their Facebook page acknowledging their mistake
Or continue to use my image for the month of December 2014 only, provided I’m credited on the advertisement & compensated for my image [inserted my demands for compensation if they wished to use my image].
I received a reply in roughly an hour’s time, thanking me for bringing it to their notice, mentioning they would need to verify the claim with their designer & inquiring which advertisement was I talking about.
I quickly sent an email back with the link of their Facebook advertisement again. About half an hour later that advertisement was taken down [luckily I took screen shots], no apology posted or email sent to me. I sent another email asking them which option would they be choosing.
I waited for four hours before sending a final warning email to inform me of their decision in choosing option one or option two, or that I shall presume they choose the first option & shall expect a formal apology on their Facebook page by the morning of 4th December (Noon UAE time), failing that, I shall deem it fit to write blog about this entire sour episode on my blog.
Noon came & passed & I saw neither an email nor a Facebook apology. I began drafting my blog on 4th December, but I took a small weekend break & was offline for a major part of the weekend. Anyway all this time I saw my blog stat views which showed me that they were checking my blog. Yes! I know you have been stalking my blog! And now everyone else knows that too! Hope you are happy that I am finally blogging & posting it today. You couldn’t do the right and professional thing & give an apology & just be done with it!
Anyway I made this blog post to create more awareness about images being taken through Google or any other search engines or social media sites & used without permission (in other words stealing images) & how photographers have to deal with such unnecessary sour incidents, wasting our time & energy to fight for our rights! We have to suffer stress which affects our moods, potentially adversely affecting our creativity! Now I do not claim to be a great photographer or anything as such, but sometimes I do create a few images that are really worthy. And this can be said of any amateur or hobby photographer. Also we may or may not be doing photography commercially. It does not mean that anyone can steal our images & use them for commercial purposes!
PS: I haven’t actually mentioned the name of this particular Goan restaurant (which is located in Kuwait) cause my main intention is to promote awareness of images thievery but just in case you need to avoid this unprofessional restaurant you can easily figure out which restaurant I’m talking about with the key words.
And just to reiterate, this restaurant used my image in their advertisement without my permission & potentially generated income through advertising, without any compensation to me! Two days Facebook advertising & an ongoing Whatsapp advertisement (which once you send an image you cannot take back, also other Whatsapp users sharing the advertisement).
Key words :
Goa
Goan
Restaurant
Kuwait
Image
Image Theft
Copyright
Copyright Infringement
Goan Sweets
Christmas Sweets
Goan Christmas
Photographer
Photographer’s Rights
Photography
Photography Copyrights
Finally the advertisement below
Goan Restaurant Located In Kuwait – Stolen Image
17 Monday Nov 2014
Posted in My Life
It’s funny how when you are staying in one place, you tend to go exploring to far-off places & then when you shift home to one of those far places, you return to explore the old place!
We shifted from Dubai to the capital city of UAE, Abu Dhabi back in June this year. I noticed since then we started exploring more places of Dubai, like JLT, Atlantis Aquarium, Al Barsha Pond Park, also traveling by the metro & shopping in Dubai as usual since we are familiar with the shops. But we are also exploring Abu Dhabi bit by bit & have visited the Marina, Corniche, more of Yas Island, Bahya shoreline & the Bahya Sanctuary as well.
Sharing a few images for now, have a great day!
JLT Building
Bahya Sanctuary Open Day
Feral Cats – Bahya Sanctuary
Pony – Bahya Sanctuary
Dog – Bahya Sanctuary
Pony – Bahya Sanctuary
Dog – Bahya Sanctuary
16 Sunday Feb 2014
Posted in Photography
We celebrated Valentine’s Day by doing a small formal photoshoot at home & then heading off to enjoy Yas Leisure Drive in Abu Dhabi where we had another casual photoshoot. 🙂
PS: Check out how to make the heart props here.
Hope you had a great Valentine’s Day! 🙂
16 Sunday Feb 2014
Posted in DIY
Tags
DIY, Hanger Heart, Heart, Hearts, Paper Heart, Photography Prop, Pom pom, Red Hearts, Tutorial, utility knife, Valentines Day, Yarn
Hey everyone, I’m back after quite some time. 😀 Anyway after watching Kayleigh’s video, I got inspired to do some crafting for my photoshoot on Valentine’s Day. I liked her hanger heart prop, however, as I didn’t have anything similar to the red scarf, I choose to make some pom poms & glue them instead.
Rather than cutting out two circular cardboard & “sewing” the yarn around it, I came up with a different & easier idea to make the pompoms.
You will need yarn obviously, scissors, some tape & a utility knife/razor like the one shown in the below pictures.
First tape a long length of yarn to the back side of your utility knife.
Take your yarn & start rolling it around a couple of times. (I rolled around 60 times, if you want it fluffier you will have to roll many more times.)
Slip the tape yarn loose & tie it around the rolled yarn, the tighter the better!
Hold all the 3 loose strings like shown.
Holding it everything in the previous way, start cutting through the gap in the utility knife. (Obviously I do not have 3 arms so I had to keep it down while clicking.)
After cutting & removing the utility knife it should look like this.
Snip off the strand (connected to the yarn ball) to the correct length.
Fluff it up & there’s your DIY Pom Pom!
One thing I feel about this method is you may not be able to get it as fluffy as you would with the circular cardboard method. But again, since I haven’t tried rolling it extra times I can’t say for sure!
If you are interested in the paper hearts on the wall you could check out this tutorial. It was used to make the 2 large hearts. The medium hearts were simply cut & bended a bit (as shown in the picture) along the yellow line. I recycled a tear out calendar page for the hearts & colored them red using a white board marker.
Paper Hearts – Large one, 3D & with red glitter, Medium one, folded upwards along yellow lines to give some texture.
Check out my photoshoot pictures here.
Have a great day! 🙂
SeptemberWildRose 