My little brother spent some time taking pictures at ICNA this past weekend. Here are some of the pics he took:

• ICNA Day 01
• ICNA Day 02
• ICNA Day 03

Geek Pride! — Some of you may know that I’m a bit of a geek when it comes to technology and when something interesting in the practical sense comes along I get totally excited!

My man Basil (http://www.basilgohar.com/blog/) recently made a post on his blog about “hack” he applied to his Canon Powershot A550 digital camera that enhances the camera’s abilities…kind of like how a Power Ranger morphs into his power suit (told you I’m a geek) and gives the camera abilities that are beyond your normal digital camera abilities.

The “hack” give the digital camera features like HDR, timelapse, and other things. My friend Usman (whoisusman.com) a little while back did the same thing. You can see the results of this “hack” below.

Usman’s Pictures: http://www.whoisusman.com/wp/category/pictures/photoblog/

(this is one of the pictures that Usman took)

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What excites me isn’t the technology and geek factor, rather the practical aspect of this. Cameras are getting smaller and smaller these days. How much easier is it getting to shoot a movie on devices so small. Heck…Spike Lee’s been contracted by Nokia to make a movie using Nokia cell phones.

Basil shot some time lapse footage using his Canon Powershot A550. You are going to need VLC Video Player (download it here: http://www.videolan.org/vlc/) to view it.

Basil’s Timelapse Footage: http://www.basilgohar.com/blog/2008/05/16/time-lapse-photography-with-chdk/

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If you watch the footage, you will see that they are amazing mashaAllah. I didn’t realize that digicam video resolution has become so high. I wonder what the max resolution for making a timelapse video is (Basil and Usman, I’d like to see some stuff from you guys).

What I’m thinking is get one of these lens attachment adapters for the Powershot and attach a wide angle lens along with a polorizing filter and have it take some awesome shots.

What would be really cool is to rig the camera on top of a motion control unit and end up with some time lapse footage like what photographer Ollie Larkin does.

Below is a video titled “Lapses in Light” by Ollie Larkin.

I highly recommend you see the high quality version on his webiste.

Click here to view the embedded video.

I’m currently taking an English class that focuses on the news media called, “Who’s Watching the Watchdogs?”

One thing we covered this week which I found extremely interesting was how photos – a lot of the time – are not a proper representation of reality. If you disagree, perhaps you want to see the examples I’m about to give you. Depending on what instance you decide to capture a photo, it could make a world of a difference as to the emotional reaction people have when seeing it.

Below, is one of the most famous pictures in American History. It’s a picture of soldiers raising the flag at Iwo Jima, Japan during WWII.

This is one of the most reproduced images of all time. I want you to stop and analyze the picture for a minute… what type of emotions does this picture evoke? What is the story or the message this image tells you?

Well, most of us see the representation of struggle. The soldiers placing the flag amidst the rubble. Patriotism. That they are exhausted yet determined to raise the flag of victory… correct?Now, look at the video of the same incident. See if the photo evokes the same emotions as the video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s another:

This image was altered for no other reason than to create drama. The man who altered this photo was later fired from the Los Angeles Times.You know what gave it away? Look closely in front of the soldier’s leg.. you’ll see the back of the Iraqi man that is sitting behind him also in front of him.

If you are interested in photography or plan to make films – specifically photo journals and documentaries- make sure that you are depicting reality for what it really is. Don’t take a picture of the one kid at Islamic school sleeping, while the others are captivated by the teacher and say that Islamic School is not of the same quality as public schools.

WAllahu ta’ala alem.
~Shirien

MashaAllah, La Qowwita illa Billah.

Seeru fil Ard… “Travel in the earth”

Again, any project you want to produce- feel passionately about. And do it for the sake of Allah ‘az wa jal. A long time ago I make a rinky dink video called “Jannah How Badly Do You Want It?”

Click here to view the embedded video.

Not only was it done with windows movie maker, but the grammar! Anyway, the point is that this was something that I wasn’t doing for the sake of making a video but rather, I did it because at a time when my iman was high and I wanted to express that. Little did I realize later, that people were actually sending the video around. Ironically, my brother-in-law sent it to my sister when they were engaged and my sister was like “Hey wait a minute… my sister made that…”

Anyway, I decided to demonstrate the video that was tripod-less and shaky that I mentioned in my previous post. Be creative… This is accompanied by recitation from Salman Al ‘ataybi from my favorite surah in the Quran- Surat Ghaafir.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Bismillah,

If you want to produce films, Islamic commericals, make stories or even just be a photographer you should always carry your camera around with you. I can’t tell you the number of times I regretted not having a camera with me to catch a priceless moment.

During my trip to Egypt last summer, I took my video camera with me everywhere. I usually go to Masr every year and always regretted not bring my video camera. I know it looks “touristy” but, I didn’t care… because I wanted to show all my friends what I do over there and the places I go.

My problem? I didn’t have a tripod with me. I shot some great footage (really funny moments and all of which I will never put up here to bring shame to myself) but it wasn’t professional; It was shaky. So what do you do when your footage doesn’t turn out the way you want it to be? Turn it into a photo journalism project by freeze framing the footage at the right time. And i’ll demonstrate this with some of the footage I took this past summer. The key to a photo journal are the captions. If you take 3 photos and you put a caption, those pictures should represent everything that story is telling. So I want to share some of my favorite moments from my trip to masr… and remember with every project you do, feel passionately about it. And do it for the sake of Allah ‘az wa jal:

Click the pictures to view the captions and the slideshow, inshaAllah. 

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Assalamu Alaikum wa Rahmitillahi wa Barakatuh,

Recently, Br. Belal sent me a request to be a contributor to the Leechon Films blog. You may have seen the “Press” section of the blog which contains some of my work for the upcoming documentary “Tufaan.” Since I was already considering creating my own blog for just this purpose, I agreed. But as a disclaimer I never claim to be an expert and so I would encourage you all to take what I say with a grain of salt.

To introduce myself: I’m a Mass Comm Student concentrating in Public Relations. I’ll be doing a lot of the media work for Leechon Films and more specifically, “Tufaan.”Insha’Allah we have big plans for the documentary, and bi’fadhlillahi ta3ala it will be a changing point for Islamic media in the West. I’ll be blogging about various media topics including: how to pitch your stories and projects to reporters. And how we have the ability-and yet most don’t realize it- to change the image of Islam at our fingertips.

I want to dedicate the rest of my first post to a topic I thought was very interesting while taking a Visual Communication class. We talked a lot about ethics in media. However, this concentrated primarily on photography.

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I remember in 2004 hearing a news report in which a photographer described her experience in Iraq. She said one of the hardest things for her to do was to take pictures of grieving widowers- Putting a camera in their faces while they just found out their husbands have been killed.

Seeing this picture made me think how this aspect of ethics (photographing people’s personal tragedies) is virtually non-existent in our curriculum.Why? because they consider it an aspect of taste. ETHICS VS TASTE. They teach:

Ethics: Issues of deception or lying

Taste: Blood, sex, violence, etc

We as Muslims need to look beyond what our curriculum teaches us and more deeply into what is truly ethical and not ethical when it comes to our Islamic values.

I agree, sometimes we need to take pictures of people in distress to show the world that they need help and to show their conditions. Societal issues sometimes will outweigh personal tragedy.

They say that publishing gory photos is ethical only if you have a compelling reason and if it is a fair and actual representation of the situation.

This picture of a girl on the verge of dying from malnutrition and hunger while a vulture hovers over her, won a Pulitzer Prize in 1994. It was taken by photographer Kevin Carter:

There is a documentary about him HBO did which also highlighted the ethical standpoint of taking this photo:

“The photo became instantly famous after it appeared on the front page of the New York Times, while Carter himself became notorious. He embodied a classic dilemma facing journalists: whether to be witness to, or savior of, the subjects they depict.

Many critics asked why Carter didn’t “take off his photographer’s hat” and rescue the child from a dangerous situation. Haunted by all that he had seen – as well as the decisions he made both as a photojournalist and a human being – Carter committed suicide a few weeks after receiving the Pulitzer Prize. .”

WAllahul Musta’an.

Umm Ayoub

Eid Mubarak everyone! The above picture is one I took of the windows of the Teaneck Armory from the inside. The sun was just right…burring everything else around.

See more pics from the Eid prayer in my Picasa Gallery: Eid AlFitr 1428

A pictures can tell a thousand words, but with motion picture you have twenty-four thousand words every second.

If you have followed this blog from is earlier days you may remember a post on the Lumiere Brothers. These guys were photographers who invented “motion picture.” Filmmaking and videography is fundamentally photography. That’s why I’ve added a new “photography” category where I’ll be sharing tips on photography that I know, will learn in the future, as well as well as an occasional “photoblog” entry InshaAllah.

A little while back I had started a photoblog called “Sheesha” (it means “glass” in the Urdu language). I’ve decided to move it into this blog.

If you want to see some of my photography I’ve done in the past, you can check my picasa-gallery.