| Description: | Built between 1631 and 1653 by Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan as a mausoleum for his favorite wife, Mumtaz Mahal. The Taj Mahal is justly famous and definitely not over-rated. The building assumes an almost magical quality – always changing its mood and color with the constantly changing quality of light as the day progresses – even into the night, when the white marble glistens ethereally in the ghostly light of the full moon.
Although the Taj is one of the most photographed buildings in the world, I have never seen another photograph published that was taken from this spot – on the banks of the Yamuna River (a tributary of the sacred Ganges River) at sunrise. At a distance of just over one mile, I used a 75-300mm telephoto and walked up and down the muddy bank in order to place the rising sun behind the towers. I used a spit and graduated neutral density filter to even-out the light intensity between the sky and reflection. No color filter was used. |
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