The many hats of a nature photographer

Deepkamal Kaur

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, September 17

It all started with his passion for nature photography. Initially shooting only with the help of phone, Kunwar Raj Singh had his moment when his photographs were picked by the National Geography Channel. The next day, his father Sarabjit Singh, a businessman, surprised him with a DLSR camera. He started shooting one-minute films, which later drove him towards attempting short films.

In 2016, during an international short film contest organised by the SikhNet, his film ‘Bute da Parshad’ won him the first prize. There was no looking back since then and he then set off on a journey to filmdom. He directed more short films. He also won Dadasaheb Phalke Award for his short film ‘Rang Daari’ in 2016.

His Bollywood moment

In 2017, during his internship as a student of bachelor of the multimedia at the Apeejay College of Fine Arts here, he appeared for an interview with the T-series, which selected him as an assistant director for the Ajay Devgn-starrer thriller ‘Badshaho’. Diljit Dosanjh’s ‘Soorma’ came next and then was John Abraham’s ‘Romeo Akbar Walter (RAW)’.

His much-awaited project as an assistant director and writer is ‘Attack’, a film with John Abraham as actor and producer. It is set to hit the theatres in January next year. The film has Jacqueline Fernandez and Rakul Preet Singh in the starcast. “I am especially waiting for this one as I will essay the role of a doctor in it,” he said.

Meet his Jalandhar mates

A resident of Jalandhar Heights, Kunwar Raj says, “I have a team of friends from my college who have been a part of each of the short film directed by me. We call our team ‘Filmy Boys’ and we recently released a song ‘Oceana’ by Rashmeet Kaur under Sony Music India, which is making waves. We have also collaborated with artistes such as Bollywood star singer ‘Badshah’, The Landers, Arman Bedil, Lisa Mishra, Ikka and Karma to name a few Kunwar and Subeg Singh Bhogal, who directed the song, said, “Our Jalandhar mates have been looking after all departments of film making such as editing, script writing, concept building, art and production. While Priyanshu Solanki does script writing/concept building, Robin Singh Randhawa is the editor, VFX artist and colourist. Prateek Arora takes care of production and Yogesh Singh takes care of the art and graphics. All of them did their schooling and college from Jalandhar. Subeg and Priyanshu are qualified engineers from DAVIET whereas Robin, Prateek and Yogesh are still studying at Apeejay. “We needed just one more person, a costume designer. I am waiting for my sister Khushi to complete her graduation in fashion designing who will soon be a part of our team, said Kunwar.”

Kunwar’s tryst with short films

In 2016, during an international short film contest organised by the SikhNet, Kunwar Raj Singh film 'Bute da Parshad' won him the first prize. There was no looking back after this and he then set off on a journey to filmdom. He directed more short films

In 2017, during his internship as a student of bachelor of the multimedia at the Apeejay College of Fine Arts here, he appeared for an interview with the T-series, which selected him as an assistant director for the Ajay Devgn-starrer thriller Badshaho