<i>Behind the lens </i>

Soumen Guha (R), a Bangladeshi cameraman working for the ESPN, captures a victorious moment of the Tigers' during the ICC World Cup. PHOTO: Anurup kanti das

People who have got the opportunity to watch the matches of the ICC World Cup from the stands are the lucky few to have witnessed a mega event from close quarters. But the rest us around the world who watched on television were no less privileged to feel the thrill and excitement, as if they were there at the arena, due of excellent modernised screening of the games.
Thanks to the men behind the scene who worked relentlessly for making the matches more exciting and attractive to the television viewers. They are the expert camera crew because of whom the broadcast was made possible. And it makes the people of Bangladesh especially proud when we come to learn that two Bangladeshi cameramen had contributed to the broadcast of the biggest cricket event that was staged for the first time in Bangladesh.
One of them is Soumen Guha whose duty was to sprint throughout the stadium with his camera to put the faces etched with varieties of emotions before the world.
"From the gallery to the president's box, I rushed with my Radio Frequency camera and put the lens on the crowd; how they reacted when their favourite batsman hit a boundary or when they got dismissed," he told The Daily Star while sharing his experience.
A senior cameraman of satellite channel ATN Bangla (News), Soumen has had experience of working with famous cable television networks like ESPN and Neo Cricket. He started his career in cricket broadcast in January 2010 when Nimbus Sports came to cover Bangladesh-England series in February. After that, he worked during the Bangladesh-New Zealand series and Bangladesh-Zimbabwe series. Finally, he got an offer from ESPN to cover the World Cup.
"Covering the World Cup is a very special experience for me as I have learned many things from it such as the use of cameras and techniques," he said.
A total of five groups worked in three venues of the World Cup. One in Bangladesh, one in Sri Lanka, and three in India. The group that worked in Bangladesh were called crew-1. The crew-1 consisted of 15 camera crews -- nine from South Africa, two each from India and Bangladesh and one each from Australia and Zimbabwe. A total of 29 cameras were used to cover a single match.
Another one from Bangladesh to in the world-class event is Golam Mostofa, a freelancer cameraman, who has a vast experience of working in various television programmes and telefilms. One of his jobs was to capture the action of a bowler running from the bowling end to throwing the ball, said Soumen.
He said everyone in his group was expert and some of them had the experience of covering World Cup and Indian Premier League (IPL) for two times.
He said he covered all the eight matches held in two stadiums in Dhaka and Chittagong. "I used to find out celebrities like Bangladesh President Zillur Rahman, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and International Cricket Council (ICC) President Sharad Pawar in the stadium and framed their reactions," he said.
Throughout the game, Soumen framed numerous emotional moments, of elation and woe of cricket fans. "I took a shot of a lady who broke into tears after Bangladesh managed to take a wicket of the West Indies side during the Bangladesh-West Indies match in Mirpur. The commentators also talked about the lady."
Besides, he said, he took the shots including playing of the National Anthem, players' entry into the ground with children, batsmen's entry at the crease, reaction of the players and profile shots of the spectators.
Apart from these two Bangladeshi cameramen, three more Bangladeshis worked in different departments of the production. They are: Tanvir Ahmed, Mehedi Hasan and Shad Ullah.
From his experience, Soumen figured out that one thing the country's cameramen lack is academic knowledge. "There are many good cameramen in our country but most of them lack academic knowledge which is extremely important for working in a world-class organisation."