With mainstream cinema churning out repetitive music with each passing year, and limiting the creative capacity of artistes, independent music has gained tremendous traction in Hyderabad. Several talented young artistes have begun to gain recognition and popularity through independent music and platforms such as YouTube. The latest beneficiary of this sudden burst of Independent music is cinematographer Abhiraj Nair.
Nair, who hails from Kottayam in Kerala, has been in Hyderabad for the past 21 years and has gained popularity for his cinematography in music videos such as Who Am I by Meghraj Ravindra and Patang by Roll Rida. The youngster, who will be making his Tollywood debut shortly, had hit rock bottom, before realising his true passion.
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Even as a child, I was always drawn towards photography and would always click pictures with my old Kodak camera. I was always poor with academics and one day, when I was really depressed about myself, I went through some of the old photo albums in my house. That’s when I realised how much photography meant to me,” he shares.
Abhiraj was pursuing his bachelor’s in Little Flower College in Uppal Hyderabad, but dropped out in his third year to focus completely on cinematography.
“I realised that academics was not meant for me. I decided to solely focus on my passion, which is cinematography. My parents were initially not supportive of my decision but after they saw my work for themselves and realised my passion for this field, they have been supportive,” the 22-year-old points out. Abhiraj started his career as a cinematographer with a sufi song ‘Aa mil yaar’ by Hesham Abdul Wahab. The song was written by the great sufi poet Bulleh Shah and the video released in markets across the world. “That was big step in my career. It was like a spiritual start for me. After that came the song ‘Who Am I’ by Meghraj Ravindra. The video got featured in VH1 and MTV Indies, and several people appreciated my cinematography as well,” he says, excitedly.