His world is not just black & white;

it is grey, pink, red, yellow....

Photograph by Gautam Narang

If you look at Gautam Narang, ignore his beard. It gives him that brooding look and you would assume he only spews philosophy and the minutiae of photography. But he has a funny bone the size of a watermelon and when he rattles off his favourite George Bush bloopers, the world suddenly seems such a hilarious, happy, cheery place. If he is still in that mood and you ask him what would Gautam Narang be doing if he wasn't a photographer, he would grin and say, "Peddling drugs!!!" But don't take that seriously; remember the behemoth of a funny bone that resides in his petite frame.

Gautam Narang lives in London. He is a photographer who goes anywhere where there is a possibility of finding an interesting subject to shoot. And these casual peregrinations have brought him awards and slotted his pictures in magazines worldwide. He just turned 21 and lives by a self-proclaimed edict, "Everybody will laugh at you when you start out. And they are going to hate you no matter what you do, so why bother listening! Get on and shoot." Perhaps he would know a word or two about people laughing; he is dyslexic and mentions the glitch without a grimace.

At Collingham High School, Narang found it hard to string words or do the complicated mathematical equations and found solace in history. "I love history. In many ways history got me into photography, I used to stare at the pictures for ages, they were stories in themselves," says Narang about his first itch to not follow the beaten track. There were other things falling his way - while doing his GCSE he stumbled upon a photography course and that is how the journey began. The casual interest turned into a passion and that passion soon translated into the chosen career. All along there was an inspiration that walked by him - National Geographic photographer Steve McCurry.

So smitten is Narang with McCurry that he can spend hours talking about his use of bold and vibrant colours combined with flawless composition. What about the dying art of black and white photography? Narang quotes another photographer (he forgets the name, he says) who said, "You use colour to capture the colour of someone's clothes but you use black and white to capture their soul."

Between quotes and his inspiration, Narang shatters another myth. "When I started out I used a Centon K100. I later discovered that when it comes to photography equipment isn't that important. I used to use a 6x6 camera, which was more like a tin box with no automatic features. The camera is really basic but if you have the eye you can churn stunning pictures out of that tin box."

Out of that tin box and the Canon 10D that he now uses, Narang has shot photographs for several magazines (he counts "30 magazines to be precise") - the absolute highs being the front cover for Aesthetica and a shot picked up by Canon's official EOS magazine.

But like all similar journeys, Narang's caper has been fraught with tentative steps, sneers, derision, and the bruises that come with jostling for space in a tight, competitive world. It also meant a litany of odd jobs - of being studio assistant to Still life & Food photographer Tim White, fashion photographer Daniel Horn's assistant for lighting and finding locations, first assistant for New York-based photographer Russ Flatt, and as an editorial assistant for John Freeman's travel book.

As if these were not odd enough, he has also worked as a sales assistant at an ethnic furniture store, an agent for a creative agency and even a proof reader for a website!

All this not because Narang likes drifting, but because he knows he has to "constantly push myself to achieve my targets." At 21, he is unwavering about his tomorrows - to remain a photographer, capture cultures from across the world on his Canon, publish a coffee table book of his photographs and "do what I love doing."

He realizes that you can't go out and fetch dreams out of thin air, that is why he is ready to wait, to work hard, to do his best, to condone the jeers and to move on.

Gautam Narang knows he needs to hang in there just a little longer.