For 20-year-old Rishabh Thomas pursuing a career in medicine or engineering just didn't sound appealing. Thanks to his mother, he soon discovered a career path that clicked.
A final year student of Audio Visual Production at Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communications, Pune, Rishabh interned with veteran photojournalist Pradeep Chandra in Mumbai. Pradeep Chandra has worked with big names in Bollywood like Amitabh Bachan, for instance, even releasing a book on the actor as well. Working under Pradeep, Rishabh got a taste of Mumbai's Page 3 life.
Photo shoots
He was also able to assist Pradeep in his exhibition ‘50 Faces of Maharashtra' – photos of famous personalities such as Aamir Khan, Lata Mangeshkar and so on, who have contributed to the growth of Mumbai.
Other events that he got a chance to cover during this period were Dilip Kumar's 88th birthday celebrations, Dr. Batra's Health Awards that was attended by Aishwarya Rai Bachchan and Abhishek Bachchan, Katrina Kaif launching Mattel's Barbie doll version of herself, an annual dance programme organised by Sreela Prabhupada, where Hema Malini, Sonal Mansing and so on danced, and a photo shoot of Shekhar Suman and his actor son Adhyayan at their Lokhandwala residence.
Says Rishabh: “Towards the end of my internship, I did a photo-shoot in Bandra of some walls that have outstanding graffiti done by foreign graffiti artistes. I noticed that some of the walls have been white-washed and a lot of this graffiti had been lost. I wanted to capture it on camera before they were lost forever, so, I planned a graffiti shoot there with two models.”
He also made a few lasting friendship and made acquaintance with some of Mumbai's glitterati during his time there. Moving around in the so called Page 3 circles gave him a glimpse of what the high life is all about. “It was good to see how friendly they were. They do not shy away from the camera which made my work much easier,” he says.
Rishabh's has also interned with Rosebowl Channel, Invis Multimedia and Chilla (a shelter for children of sex workers) in the city. He aspires to make some short films and documentaries later this year as a part of his course work, and would love to do more in photography as well.
