User:Rutuja Naveen/sandbox

= Sameer Belvalkar = Sameer Belvalkar is born in 1976. He is an International Fashion and Advertising Photographer based in Mumbai, Pune and Dubai. He is a self-taught photographer and has been working in the industry for more about 2 decades associating with various brands like JW Marriott, Ford Motors, Bridgestone India, Tanishq and many more.

Early Life and Education
Sameer Belvalkar is born and brought up in Pune, Maharashtra. Being the 4th generation in Pune, his family has been in the city for more than 100 years. By nature, he was an introverted child having a limited inner circle. Tennis and drawing were his only interests. His father Vidyanand Belvalkar, has a Masters in Physics. In 2007, his father opened India’s first Harmonica Club in Poona and is popular for reviving old Hindi music through the harmonica or the mouth organ. His Grandfather Shripad Krishna Belvalkar born in 1880 being a historian has published books such as Kalidasa's Shakuntalam for the Sahitya Akademi, Systems of Sanskrit Grammar amongst others. He also has made a significant contribution in establishing Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute. Sameer Belvalkar went to Abhinav Vidyalaya where he schooled and was later followed by his Bachelors in Chemistry degree (B.Sc Chemistry) and further completed his MBA from the Institute of Management Education, Pune led by Dr. P.C Shejwalkar.

Career
His first job was as door-to-door salesperson. He quit that and then became a part of an event management company until he realized it wasn’t his calling. He then took admission in EDIT Institute, Pune to learn Graphic Designing for Corel Draw. He dropped out of it as his pace of grasping was more than the teaching hence, he decided to learn by himself.

He started working for a company called Design Directions, as an illustrator. Then he started working for a Dot Com and moved to Singapore for two years. Where he was multitasking and handling various company responsibilities. The dot com bubble burst and he was sent back to India on a day’s notice. After job scouting for a long time, he ended up working as a web designer for a year and half. It was during those times that his interest for photography started growing. He picked up a camera that was lying at his house, in order to prove his sister that he can take better pictures than her. He went to a family friend Mr. Nagraj who was a photo enthusiast; to touch up on the basics. 20 years back he took this camera on a trip to goa and the picture he clicked there were selected and published in Times Journal of Photography. He quit his job as a web designer to pursue photography full time. Followed by that, he started working as a press photographer for The Maharashtra Herald Newspaper alongside freelanced for various Pune & Mumbai Magazines such as Femina, Verve and Bangalore based Rave Magazine where his photographs that he shot at a Mark Khopfler concert got published. He was mentored by photographer Gautam Rajadhyaksha  and later on went out to assist Fashion photographer Avinash Gowariker. Subsequently, after few years of hard work, he was offered to click stills for the movie Jodha Akbar followed by My Name is Khan and We are Family. Without any formal training his journey as a Fashion and Advertising Photographer then begun and now, he is associated with brands such as JW Marriott, Mia by Tanishq, Ford Motors, Bridgestone India amongst others.