Sandeep Mhatre, product photographer, has worked on all types of advertising photographs. He has been in this field for twenty years and is particularly known for his table-top photography.

What made you want to be a photographer?

Being exposed to visual communication since early childhood (my father was a commercial artist), I had 2 strong choices;
(a) to be a designer or
(b) to be a commercial photographer.

I always liked the candidness involved in photography. Erasing and redoing what is once done isn’t my style. It had to be photography.

“Erasing and redoing what is once done isn’t my style”

What are your favorite subjects?

Still life, food and products. This covers all that I shoot! To be a successful commercial photographer one has to be genuinely interested in objects, forms and functions to do justice to every assignment. I’ve never really looked at any particular subject and treated it as my favourite.

” … one has to be genuinely interested in objects, forms and functions to do justice…”

What do you normally use when shooting Ice Cream?

While I shoot ice-cream pictures for my clients, I personally do not get greatly involved in the making of artificial ice cream, which is the food-stylist’s territory. I’m only concerned about the shape, texture, colour etc. However, I suspect it to be mixture of many substances that form a dough like material. It is then scooped out like any actual ice cream and garnished as required.

Some of your outdoor images have exotic locales. Does travel influence your work?

Most of my outdoor images have been shot in Kerala and hence the exotic look. Though I do not specialize in location work I’ve discovered the joys of shooting good location images and I hope to do more trips and images in the future.

” … I’ve discovered the joys of shooting good location images …”

What’s your favorite picture?

It’s a portfolio picture. In this picture I’d shot a close-up of an ant looking at a heaped spoon of sugar. I’d attempted to depict our human obsession with wealth. Surprising the ant simply refused to pose when I placed it on the spoon and I just managed to get a single frame out of twenty exposures. I had learnt an important lesson in a most graphic way:
An ant’s obsession with sugar isn’t the same as a man’s obsession with wealth!

How extensive is your body of work? Would you like to publish a coffee table book on food or table top photography?

My work in still-life is very extensive since being specialized in still-life, I’ve had opportunities to shoot all subjects, which has been greatly satisfying as well as challenging.

Yes. I’d definitely consider shooting for a coffee table book if some publisher has budgets big enough. Right now, I’m happy undertaking assignment for ad-agencies. The agency assignments give me tremendous creative stimulations since I get to work with many art-directors.

In all my years of advertising, I’ve come to a conclusion that most ad-agencies, clients and publishers often work on a shoestring budget while hiring creative talents. This is unfortunate, since on all such projects staying within the budget becomes the goal rather than achieving excellence in quality, content and trend setting. Most of my work is hence inspired by styles that exist abroad simply because experimentation and innovation takes a lot of time and money.

What are your other interests and pastimes? Does photography leave you room for other hobbies?

Photography does leave me enough room to enjoy time with friends, family, travel etc.
My profession is not my obsession and I believe in leaving my photography back in my studio once I finish and go home.