Streetside Tussaud's

4 PAGES I A SUPPLEMENT OF SUNDAY TIMES OF INDIA SUNDAY I APRIL 15, 2012 Shaadi photos Modern couples are ditching predictable wedding photographers, preferring to pack their guests off Robin and Amrita Nakai with quirky props into photo booths to build an unconventional shaadi album. Would Saif and REMEMBER AMELIE? in a box The 2001 French romantic comedy, Amelie, popular even among Kareena consider it for their January wedding? non-French audiences and nominee for 5 Oscars, had a famous sequence with Amelie’s love interest, Nino Quincampoix reconstructing torn-up photo booth pictures in his free time. Anjana Vaswani WENTY-SIX- year-old Ramneek friends who spent more time inside the “PEOPLE TEND Kang, who is set to play bride this booth than at the party. TO LOOSEN UP December, is likely to have an oddly cheerful wedding album if Boo boo! to posed pictures ONCE THEY ARE T BEHIND THE photographs of her recent engagement Wedding photo booth photography, say are anything to go by. The young woman industry hands, is catching up especially CURTAIN INSIDE from Chandigarh who works with a among young couples looking to shed the Sheena Dhabolkar THE BOOTH. women’s welfare organisation, decided weight of tradition. Traditionally, it in- HEY KNOW that instead of having her guests line up volved a vending machine fitted with an T on stage in firing-line-squad fashion, automated coin-operated camera, film THEY ARE NOT she’d send them off into a silken fabric- processor and a seat for patrons. The mod- BEING WATCHED. lined booth pinned with hand-twisted pa- ern version is customised, includes live WHEN WE per flowers, one batch at a time. The re- photography, and is high on interactivity. REVIEW THE sult? Robin and Amrita Nakai, an elderly When a Mumbai five-star hosted its an- couple flashed their freshest smiles, while nual wedding fair to showcase the possi- SHOTS IN THE holding up a tangerine frame against bility their venue could offer couples, they SEQUENCE THEY their faces, mildly reminiscent of called photographer Sheena Dhabolkar ARE CLICKED IN, teenagers rather than seniors. “The re- to set up a photo booth. Rubani Marwah, WE NOTICE HOW sults were wonderful. I couldn’t have got marketing communications profession- those pictures any other way,” says Kang al with the hotel says the technique can GUESTS GET about the wonders of the photo booth. whip predictability out of wedding pho- CRAZIER AS tography. “Not just visitors to the fair but THE EVENT Mannat and Namrita Pick your prop residents of the hotel were also busy get- PROGRESSES Kismet Jewell Nakai and April Sher Bhai- ting clicked,” remembers Marwah about ” ka run The Unreal Bride, a wedding re- the April 2011 event. — Kismet Jewell Nakai of The Unreal Bride source blog. The two were hired by Kang It was three years ago in Japan that (extreme right) to set up a personalised photo booth, es- Dhabolkar, who now sets up photo sentially a cosy, covered nook, stocked booths at neighbourhood carnivals and with uncanny props which guests can parties in Mumbai, was struck by the pick before they shed their hang-ups in the idea. “In Tokyo, you can digitally em- privacy of the ‘box’ and pose like divas. bellish your pictures before you “People tend to loosen up once they are print them,” says the 25 - Guests at a 5-star’s wedding fair behind the curtain. They know they are year-old. “It’s great fun to not being watched. When we review the add a moustache here or shots in the sequence they are clicked in, bunny ears there. I know we notice how guests get crazier as the I don’t have the technol- event progresses,” laughs Nakai. ogy to click a picture and It’s only been a couple of months since instantly let the client al- they launched their service and have al- ter and print it, so, my ready been commissioned to shoot at five props make sure I Iqroop Singh Sekhon and Tara events; two of them unfolding within a can offer them Grewal, visitors to last year’s span of three days, including a Hawai- something Vanity Fair, a popular annual lifestyle exhibition held in ian theme bachelorette for which Nakai similar.” Chandigarh, pose at The and Bhaika hand made grass skirts and Continued Unreal Bride photo booth coconut bras for the bride-to-be’s sassy on page 2 Man behind India’s streetside Tussaud’s The starstruck are thronging a promenade in Mumbai to be photographed with Bollywood’s biggest names, a hand on their shoulder. Fans in Gurgaon, Dubai and London are next in line. Purba Dutt tracks down the man who made it happen EPLICATING the hook of a nose swish sea-facing promenade of Bandra friend, admits to working at breakneck or the stoop in a shoulder is every- Bandstand, also home to some of Bolly- speed at his Chembur workshop for the day business for sculptors. But wood’s biggest names. project that kicked off two years ago. It Rwhat does it take to inject an in- The two-kilometre stretch that was was Tagore’s palm impression that the tangible trait in a life-size statue? For inaugurated on March 28, is expected sculptor started off with, for which he Nilesh Powalkar, it was watching seven to be scattered with several ‘star’ bench- flew down to Delhi to meet the actress. films of a single star, back-to-back in loop. es, with icons Amitabh Bachchan, Ra- “Sharmilaji was mourning her hus- “Shammi Kapoor’s most defining trait jesh Khanna and Dilip Kumar on band’s death. Despite the huge person- was his restlessness, I realised. He could Powalkar’s sketching board. The walk- al loss, she was graceful and coopera- never sit still,” says the 33-year-old. Which way also features 19 hand impressions tive,” remembers the Sir JJ School of is why India’s Elvis Presley was cast in of a total of 60, including those of ac- Arts alumnus. But it’s working with bronze, his body lifted just centimetres off tresses Kareena Kapoor, Shabana Azmi, young actor Imran Khan that cracked the bench he is vacating to leave. and Sharmila Tagore, besides signatures him up. “We used flavoured clay, and Kapoor, his brother and famed actor- of late veterans Meena Kumari, Sunil Imran sniffed it, realising something director Raj Kapoor, and the late demi- Dutt, Kishore Kumar and Guru Dutt. was smelling yummy. When I said it was God of romance Dev Anand have found Powalkar, who heard of the channel’s mango-flavoured, he instantly scooped that we could spot an error. In the case of rine Drive neighbourhood, and another Nilesh Powalkar spends a permanent home, and tribute in UTV plan to launch a project modelled on up a dollop and licked it. Obviously, it Raj Kapoor’s Shree 420 statue, the crane, representing a tyre brand at Worli, are no a moment beside Raj Stars’ Walk of the Stars at Mumbai’s Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, from a didn’t taste of the fruit! It was only used for mechanical pouring, snapped, match for the glamour the current proj- Kapoor at the Walk of the Stars at Bandra meant to smell good,” he giggles. forcing me to carry out the process manu- ect has offered him. “We love our film Bandstand in Mumbai If research was intensive, sculpting was ally. The metal is heated to 1,800 degree stars, and I’m part of a process that al- Shammi Kapoor’s most defining trait was laborious, starting off with a clay model centigrade, and the mould along with sup- lows our people to take away starry followed by a round of moulding, creating plementary contraptions weighed around memories. Could I ask for more?” smiles his restlessness. He could never sit still. a poly-resin cast, piece moulding, re- 600 kilos. Here I was doing the procedure Powalkar, who will be busy with a simi- Which is why India’s Elvis Presley was cast moulding, furnace dewaxing and finally by hand!” Powalkar says. lar plan scheduled to roll in Gurgaon in bronze, his body lifted just centimetres pouring the metal into the final cast. And yet, this is his most satisfying as- next, followed by Dubai and London. “Each statue took six months to make, signment yet. A mermaid that stands at I TIMES NEWS NETWORK off the bench he is vacating to leave and it was only at the final pouring stage a busy junction at Mumbai’s famous Ma- [email protected] SHANTANU DAS SHANTANU.

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