Mood Lighting

Rema Chaudhary uses an interesting play of light and shade to draw the viewer in.

What took you from the stock market to photography?

RC: I picked up photography as a hobby in college. I had my point-and-shoot on me all the time and took pictures of everything, but I never considered it as a career option. I started working in the stock market and two years later I knew it wasn’t for me. I had to reassess what I wanted to do with my life and instinctively gravitated towards photography. I didn’t even have to think about it. I invested in a camera and started doing portraits of people at work and shooting on my commute to work every day. Eventually I started to share my work with some friends and family and got good feedback from them. That’s when I thought of giving it a shot. I went on to do a 10-month certificate program from the Hallmark Institute of Photography in the US.

What was that experience like?

RC: Hallmark was a very important time for me. Besides all the general technical skills, the environment and the space the school provided was very inspiring. There was so much learning and experimenting and I got to explore all the different aspects of photography. I was constantly being challenged to push forward and raise the bar for myself. I wish I could find the same kind of motivation and enthusiasm now. There were times there’d be a snow storm outside and we’d go out and shoot and edit until morning, even sleep at school!

The one thing about going to any kind of art school is that it puts blinkers in your head which go off every time there’s a scene that checks off all the rules; everything becomes systematic and I was not shooting for myself anymore. It took me a long time to kind of unlearn that and shoot on my instinct again. I think that was the most liberating feeling for me as a photographer.

What type of photography do you lean towards?