Tag Archives: fatehpur sikri

Patterns of India (Part 2: Agra and Fatehpur Sikri)

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While travelling in India, I became fascinated with the variety of patterns in its architecture. Historically, they’re mostly a legacy of the Sultanates and the Mughal Empire, and Islam’s tradition of non-figurative art. But interesting patterns can also be found in Jain, Hindu, Buddhist, Sikh and modern architecture, and also in natural forms.

These galleries collects all the photographs of patterns I took during my visit. I’m releasing these into the public domain. They are far from comprehensive, and others can be found in various places such as Wikimedia Commons.

Part 1: Delhi
Part 2: Agra and Fatehpur Sikri
Part 3: Rajasthan
Part 4: Chandigarh
Part 5: Miscellaneous

AGRA

Itimad-ud-Daulah

The tomb of Mirza Ghiyas Beg, a chief minister of the Mughal Empire, the Itimad-ud-Daulah was built in the 1620s and was a strong influence on the design of the Taj Mahal.

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Stereoscopic photographs of India

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When I was in India last year, I did a bit of experimenting with stereoscopy.

Stereoscopy is a technique for creating 3D images. By taking one photograph of a subject, then moving position very slightly to the left or right, and taking a second photograph of the same subject, you end up with a stereoscopic pair of pictures. This pair replicates the two slightly horizontally displaced versions of the world seen by each of your eyes. All you need to do then is place the two photographs side by side, and cross your eyes so that one eye is looking at one image, and the other eye is looking at the other one. Your brain then combines and interprets the two images in the way it normally does, to reproduce a 3D perception of the subject.

I used to play about with this technique when I was younger, and visiting some of the forts and ruins of India, I realised they might be particularly good for stereoscopy. I’ve just got around to editing the photos into pairs, so here they are.

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Fatehpur Sikri

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Agra is a stinking cesspit of a city that no human being should ever have to endure… and none ever would, if it hadn’t had the undeserved luck of containing the Taj Mahal.

It does have some other nice monuments too, which is why people say Agra’s beautiful, but if a dog ate a few gemstones and did a poo, you wouldn’t call the poo beautiful.

A pig eating from a pile of unutterable filth in an open sewer, at a food market in Fatehpur Sikri, Agra

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