Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => Discussing Photographic Styles => Topic started by: Rob C on September 15, 2010, 10:56:01 am
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Thanks to a link supplied here in the thread on great sites (the rangefinder link), I watched a video interview with the Man. Now, the classic 'moment' depicted in his shot of the puddle-jumper, made through the planks of a fence, was featured during the interview and, guess what: HC-B claims that it was all down to pure luck - a shot in the dark.
The claim, precisely, is that he was able to put the camera lens into the space between planks, but that the viewfinder was blanked out (slr, Henri - even an Exakta?) and he couldn't see a damned thing. The interviewer remarked that it had been amazing luck, to which HC-B replies that it is all pure luck. He goes on to say that he couldn't care less about 'light' and that it is 'geometry' that rings his chimes.
He also states that if you go out looking for something, you won't find it. (Note, all street shooters!) Very interesting, but no, not dumb; was the old gentleman having us all on? Old, but certainly with what seemed an impish sense of humour.
Wish I'd known him.
Rob C
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Rob, If you've ever done any street shooting you know that he was right on all counts. It certainly is all pure luck, but the trick is to be there when the luck happens. That means spending a lot of time on the street with a camera in your hand. He's also right that if you go out looking for something you won't find it. What you do when you go out is look, and respond reflexively if luck happens. In another book HCB expands on not caring about the light. He doesn't say he doesn't care about the light. He says he prefers diffused light -- overcasts -- because that lets him move around his subject. Makes sense to me.
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Rob, If you've ever done any street shooting you know that he was right on all counts. It certainly is all pure luck, but the trick is to be there when the luck happens. That means spending a lot of time on the street with a camera in your hand. He's also right that if you go out looking for something you won't find it. What you do when you go out is look, and respond reflexively if luck happens. In another book HCB expands on not caring about the light. He doesn't say he doesn't care about the light. He says he prefers diffused light -- overcasts -- because that lets him move around his subject. Makes sense to me.
That 'overcast' is what made outdoor fashion quite easy in Scotland; here, in Spain, it would be far more difficult to control. But then, most of us shooting women for cals worked mainly during the magic slot just after sunrise and before sunset, but often, with a heavy load of shots, that just had to be forgotten simply to finish the job. Nothing is easy!
However, I'm feeling that street is not going to be my new interest for the very reason you mentioned: paucity of winning shots. Seems a hell of a price to pay, all that energy and personal risk... Also, I believe increasingly that it's a genre that belongs to the city, not some sleepy little island town. And Palma is too full of gypsies and pickpockets to encourage an old geezer like me to risk it. The damn insurance company only covers stuff if stolen from home! I have started to leave my watch at home whenever I have to go to the big smoke.
Rob C
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Rob, Yes, for the most part I like diffused light on the street too. On the street I figure I'm doing pretty well if I get one really fine shot a year, but in spite of that it can be fun. Between my previous post and this one I spent an hour on the street of my not-so-sleepy-during-tourist-season town. Here are three shots from that walk. None of them are especially good, but I enjoyed shooting them anyway. Of course you have to be careful anywhere, but it sounds as if you have to be especially careful in your current environment. I don't leave my watch home, but I have a Seiko that's a couple decades old.
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I totally agree on geometry vs. light ... shapes and composition catch my eye, not "light" ... and not just on the street.
I appreciate "light" ... but I seek out shapes and lines ...
Like this:
(http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2761/4471282804_e5c22ee623.jpg)
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Russ, one fine shot a year is a hell of a reward for a year's work!
I have been thinking a bit more about the HC-B interview where the puddle shot gets put down to luck and I can't really decide if the Man was kidding or just telling the truth. I find it beyond chance that the timing could be down to luck, any more than that the framing was done 'blind' and getting both to happen in one shot stretches my credulity to snap!
With your shots posted just now, I do see what you are doing, but it puts my mind into the old question of the why, that I think I raised in a thread here some time ago.
It also fits the same point that Fred made in the Motivation thread: what would be the point of doing a series of mock fashion shots with an amateur model?
In both disciplines, the only validation I can see is the fact of the assignment, the commission. Not only does that bring home the bacon, which is the prime motivator to doing anything that you use with which to earn your living, but the fact of the assignment massages your ego: somebody thinks you good enough to want to pay you! It's the external validation that is essential. Almost without pause it brings back again the Terence Donovan quotation: the most difficult part of photography for the amateur is finding a reason to make a photograph.
Loving photography does not seem sufficient motive, to me; there needs to be something more.
Rob C
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Rob, First, from what I've read, "Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare," which is the title of that shot, wasn't something HCB made by sticking his camera through a fence. His book, Scrapbook, which his second wife, Martine Franck, salvaged, has a more expanded version -- I don't have time to go upstairs and look right now, but I think it's a version of the contact sheet. What that shows is a post off to the left that he didn't have time to move away from. I think he was walking down the alley, saw the guy about to jump off the end of the board, lifted his camera and shot. I've done enough snap shots like that to know exactly what it's like. I can feel what he did. The "luck" he's talking about is the luck you have when suddenly you see something like that. Once you see it, making the shot isn't luck. It requires that you be absolutely familiar with your equipment. If you have to think -- about anything: the camera, the lighting, etc., you've lost the shot.
I agree with Fred. There wouldn't be any point in doing a mock fashion series with an amateur model. But street photography is different. You're not setting anything up. You're looking for something that makes you respond on the spur of the instant. For me, loving it is sufficient. The reason I'm such a lousy marketer is that I just don't give a damn about selling prints. Oh, it's nice when I do, but it's nothing like the rush I get when I catch something I really like. It's pretty easy to put together a collection of shots to send to a contest, but it's a hassle to try to convince a gallery owner that she'd like to carry my stuff on consignment, so I don't do much marketing. I'd much rather spend my time out on the street looking for the year's winner: like "Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare."
But I know that's not for everyone. Most people would rather do things like landscape where they have plenty of time to set everything up, don't have to worry about someone speaking nastily to them, and hope to end up with something pretty to hang on the wall. For the most part my walls have people on them. They're not awfully pretty, but to me they're beautiful. As I've said before, I think people and their artifacts are a hell of a lot more interesting than rocks and vegetables.
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That is pretty unsettling then, Russ. In the video he says one thing, which I think I also read in a magazine or book - probably in French PHOTO - and now you have another version, also in print! It leads me to wonder if he even used the odd paid models now and again, though I do accept that most of what I've seen would preclude that. Either way, the touch to getting the image cannot be denied.
Regarding landscape - one of the first problems I'd encounter is that most of the good stuff I've seen comes from mountaineers. Never, in a thousand years! Nuttin' good comes cheap seems to be true; but I'd hate to pay with my neck!
I agree with you that people are probably more interesting - obviously I must - but that's complicated by the fact that I want them to be beautiful, too; I already know what the girls next door looked like, and so does everybody else. One thing I discovered a long time ago is that as a species, we are generally not all cast in the most beautiful of moulds; indeed, it's the very fact that makes the exceptions so different and noticeable. And powerful, should they wish to exercise it.
Rob C
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... the old question of the why... the only validation I can see is the fact of the assignment, the commission. Not only does that bring home the bacon, which is the prime motivator... but the fact of the assignment massages your ego: somebody thinks you good enough to want to pay you! It's the external validation that is essential...the most difficult part of photography for the amateur is finding a reason to make a photograph...
Rob, the above is dangerously close to the following parallel: the difference between professional and amateur photographers would then be the same as making love to someone you love, and being paid for it. Are you now claiming the title of the oldest profession in the world for professional photographers? ;)
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I agree with you that people are probably more interesting - obviously I must - but that's complicated by the fact that I want them to be beautiful, too; I already know what the girls next door looked like, and so does everybody else. One thing I discovered a long time ago is that as a species, we are generally not all cast in the most beautiful of moulds; indeed, it's the very fact that makes the exceptions so different and noticeable. And powerful, should they wish to exercise it.
Rob C
Rob, I'll see if I can remember to track down the expanded version of HCB's shot in Scrapbook tonight. That's an interesting book by the way, it has some alternative versions -- I guess we could call them outtakes -- of some of his most famout shots.
I like beautiful girls too -- always have. But what I find most interesting in street shots is more than plain beauty. Facial expressions can be interesting and revealing, but even more, interactions between people and people or interactions between people and their environment are what make for good street shots. Here are three from today's walk downtown. Again, they're not particularly good shots, but they help to illustrate what I'm saying. #1 is a pretty girl with friends and a smoke. She strikes me as pretty enough to be a model. But is she as interesting as the guy in #6 who's walking down the street wearing a skirt and packing a 45?, or the bright-looking young man in the middle left of #7? I'll let you decide.
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Slobodan, if you mean getting paid for making love to somebody you already love, that wouldn't be prostitution, it would be the icing on the cake.
But, on the other hand, many old pros (photographers, I mean) do think of themselves, in more lucid moments, as old whores; God knows what old paparazzi think of themselves.
But seriously - I assume the point that you raised above was not serious - getting paid is not only about the money and what it can buy, it is also about validation, that pat on the back that you very seldom get directly from a client if only because he fears it will make you more brave next time you quote for a shoot. But his wallet speaks for him.
I guess that for the amateur psychologists here (aren't they all?) it would translate into a need for love; well that's okay too: can't get too much of a thing like that these days. I noted this afternoon that, on the terrace next door, there were four women in their forties. I also noted that that translated into eight breasts and that not even two of anybody's were to be found on my terrace. So yes, there can never be too much love to go around. It never was a fair world, and even the socialists failed to address those problems in their manifesto. If you didn't laugh at life you would end it.
Rob C
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I noted this afternoon that, on the terrace next door, there were four women in their forties. I also noted that that translated into eight breasts and that not even two of anybody's were to be found on my terrace.
Rob, you truly are a unique snowflake :D
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Russ, working backwards, as is my wont, I appreciate the humour in your later caption about the bright-looking young man (I am certain I saw him - or a close relative in that extended family - in Sauchiehall Street in Glasgow one day); the chap in the skirt is obviously looking for you anyway, and the chick in the minidress, sitting like that, is not going to object to the attention!
Okay, I surrender: it can be fun if you find the right people. I suppose I shall have to try again, which is more than I discovered is possible for two friends of a guy I sometimes eat beside. Turns out he had a pilot pal in England who tried to land a Tiger Moth downwind; another one lent his Piper (a twin-engined version) to another pilot, watched him take off with a couple of passengers, watched one engine catch fire and then the pilot try to turn into the bad engine. No, neither were great ideas at the time.
Makes laughing at life even more the only way to fly treat it.
Rob C
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Rob, you truly are a unique snowflake :D
On that happy note, as it's already five-past-midnight, I'd better get to bed before I melt.
;-)
Rob C
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... getting paid for making love to somebody you already love, that wouldn't be prostitution, it would be the icing on the cake....
It is actually known as... marriage, which cynics would call a legalized prostitution anyway ;)
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It is actually known as... marriage, which cynics would call a legalized prostitution anyway ;)
I'm probably as cynical as it gets, but I really can't subscribe to that view of marriage at all. I see where the 'ugly sisters' might use it as an excuse for not having been asked, but otherwise, I can think of nothing better than a good marriage. It's even better than sex.
Rob C
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... I can think of nothing better than a good marriage...
Granted. Lets just say I was talking more about bad marriages, marriages of convenience, trophy-wife marriages, gold-digging marriages, etc.
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Oh, I'd never marry a woman for her money!
Rob C
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I'm probably as cynical as it gets, but I really can't subscribe to that view of marriage at all. I see where the 'ugly sisters' might use it as an excuse for not having been asked, but otherwise, I can think of nothing better than a good marriage. It's even better than sex.
Rob C
Rob, Hear, hear! Marriage is a difficult institution, something a lot of members of our younger set here in the U.S. don't seem to understand. Many of them think Marriage will be all sweetness and light and personal rewards, and when it isn't, instead of accepting the lumps that go with working it out they jump immediately to divorce, leaving the kids in the lurch. What they don't understand is the rewards that accompany the powerful bonds that grow between people who've gone through a lot of little heavens and hells together. In less than a month and a half I'll celebrate my 58th. I wouldn't trade my bonds for anything I can imagine in Heaven or earth. Which is one reason I grieve with you when I think that you've lost your own companion.
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Oh, I'd never marry a woman for her money!
And that is why amateur photographers do what they to, for the love of it, not money. Amateur = origin from Latin amator ‘lover,’ from amare ‘to love.’
And to respond to Terence Donovan, if amateurs were having such difficult time finding the reason to photograph, they would be extinct by now.
In a broader sense, there are three basic human motivators: achievement, power (often coinciding with money), and social interaction (a version of which you would call external validation). Amateurs are mostly in the first (i.e., achievers) and third category (socializing in camera clubs, competitions, Flickr). Pros would be mostly in the second (money) and third (external validation through fame).
Russ, congrats on your 58th!
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Rob, Hear, hear! Marriage is a difficult institution, something a lot of members of our younger set here in the U.S. don't seem to understand. Many of them think Marriage will be all sweetness and light and personal rewards, and when it isn't, instead of accepting the lumps that go with working it out they jump immediately to divorce, leaving the kids in the lurch. What they don't understand is the rewards that accompany the powerful bonds that grow between people who've gone through a lot of little heavens and hells together. In less than a month and a half I'll celebrate my 58th. I wouldn't trade my bonds for anything I can imagine in Heaven or earth. Which is one reason I grieve with you when I think that you've lost your own companion.
About marriage (didn't know the french word was used in english), let's put it that way:
1) It is a tragedy for the human being that people do not understand the real meaning of sharing a life with somebody,
in a word of fast food and fast cameras, the minimum disagreement or problems, people just conclude that the relation is wrong, wich obviously will remains the same with the next person. As we are basically consummers and people are disposable, throwaway merchandise as well, it is not surprising to see the incredible amount of divorces.
2)but it is a blessing for the wedding photographers: more quick divorces, more second, third marriage, so more "fake" weddings to shoot.
And now that the weddingers have the new 40MP MFD pentax for cheap...what else to ask for?
Isn't that world wonderfull?
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Slobodan, Thanks. That includes four sons, four wonderful daughters-in-law, seventeen grandchildren, and three great-grands, two of whom haven't arrived yet.
Rob, I finally remembered to get out HCB's Scrapbook and look up "Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare." The earlier picture in the book isn't the contact sheet, but it's his first crop. He says the picture "presented itself to him" with the lens blocked by a fence (which obviously is on the left) which he immediately eliminated from the first print. That's the other print they showed in the book, which is too tall and skinny since all he did was chop a chunk off the left side. The later crop that's always been printed since takes the tall, skinny version and crops an appropriate amount from the top and the bottom, restoring the aspect ratio to roughly 3 to 2 and producing excellent geometry in the result. You can still see a bit of the out-of-focus fence in the final version.
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And that is why amateur photographers do what they to, for the love of it, not money. Amateur = origin from Latin amator ‘lover,’ from amare ‘to love.’
And to respond to Terence Donovan, if amateurs were having such difficult time finding the reason to photograph, they would be extinct by now.
In a broader sense, there are three basic human motivators: achievement, power (often coinciding with money), and social interaction (a version of which you would call external validation). Amateurs are mostly in the first (i.e., achievers) and third category (socializing in camera clubs, competitions, Flickr). Pros would be mostly in the second (money) and third (external validation through fame).
Russ, congrats on your 58th!
Russ
Yes, it sure is a bummer if you get to being single again. We met in school, in November ’54; she died in November ’08. We had 48 years of marriage – never imagined it wouldn’t be a matter of into the sunset together. More than once I have thought it would have been nice for us both to have hit a motorway bridge instead of the way it panned out.
You know, the memories and things that haunt the most are such simple ones – sitting in the morning sun on the terrace together, saying probably nothing, and having a coffee; myself in the office of an evening, just like now, calling out ‘how do you spell …’ and she, reading in the sitting room, would patiently give the reply. Dishes and kitchen utensils that won’t get used; crystal for this, that and the other sort of drink left in unopened sideboards; dust mocking me where there never was any before; songs we loved. And silence that was never painful. It doesn’t end, and anyone who tells you time heals all things simply hasn’t a clue. But what can you do? Bore and lose your friends – such as they are, those that still survive?
Slobodan
Regarding Terence Donovan, I think you are mistaken. Amateurs may be in love with photography, if they are advanced enough to get really involved, but they still don’t all know what to do with it and it shows so very much. They may be expert technicians – more so than many pros – but all that doesn’t give that momentum, that overpowering urge to work at something specific; I get the impression that it’s more a matter of having the wish to be a photographer than anything else. I imagine that that’s the reason so much Internet chat is about equipment, critiques, but seldom really about the nitty gritty of the thing, the soul: few have the material to toss around.
As I think I see it, the microstock boom encapsulates the entire ethic: all at once, anybody with the low price of admission can send in his shit and stand as good a chance of earning twenty cents as anybody else. Why do they bother? Because, as I wrote above, they have this wish to be a ‘photographer’ in the cast of whoever their pet hero might be. But with a friggin’ big safety net called the day-job. It matters not that they screw the hell out of their own heroes in the attempt. And boy, nobody had better dare mention that. If you do, then the stock (sorry, just a coincidence) reply is: why should pros have a divine right etc. etc. which is just a snow job to cover guilt and not a little shame.
;-)
Rob C
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Russ, congratulations not just on the anniversary-to-be, but on the strength of the dynasty! Well worth flying those jets to protect all that, regardless of what the softer ones of us may think...
Fred, yes, it is too easy to call it a day and throw out the good with the bad. And you know, though I owe my career to the 60s, I also see it as responsible for a hell of a lot of human disaster. (Not my career, the period.) I shall never forget listening to Suzi Quatro's r'n'r show on BBC years ago, where she quoted her mother saying that there is no such thing as free love: somebody always pays. Isn't that the truth!
Hell, we are getting somewhat blue on this show! Supposed to be about photographic style, I think... but then, how many artists, and I include snappers in that, ever live lives of utter joy? The blues comes with the job description.
Rob C
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Russ, congratulations not just on the anniversary-to-be, but on the strength of the dynasty! Well worth flying those jets to protect all that, regardless of what the softer ones of us may think...
Thanks, Rob. It's my treasure in this life.
...though I owe my career to the 60s, I also see it as responsible for a hell of a lot of human disaster.
I don't remember the title of the book or the name of the author, but whoever it was in whatever it was called the sixties "that slum of a decade." I think he was on to something.
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"It's a funny thing, the more I practice the luckier I get." - Arnold Palmer
As a kid, I was a part of Arnie's Army, if only in spirit. It helped cement a love of the game and the hard work required to best enjoy it. I sort of feel the same way about Street photography. HC-B's acknowledgement that "Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare" was luck belies the effort and hard slogging that was needed to be in the right place at the right time with the practiced knowledge of technique and instinct to capture the moment. Any luck I'm having with my images is the result of hundreds upon hundreds of hours on the street "practicing." I have a deep respect for anyone that works hard at Street or Documentary as it's a whole lot of effort for only an ephemeral chance for a result.
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Slobodan
Regarding Terence Donovan, I think you are mistaken. Amateurs may be in love with photography, if they are advanced enough to get really involved, but they still don’t all know what to do with it and it shows so very much. They may be expert technicians – more so than many pros – but all that doesn’t give that momentum, that overpowering urge to work at something specific; I get the impression that it’s more a matter of having the wish to be a photographer than anything else. I imagine that that’s the reason so much Internet chat is about equipment, critiques, but seldom really about the nitty gritty of the thing, the soul: few have the material to toss around.
As I think I see it, the microstock boom encapsulates the entire ethic: all at once, anybody with the low price of admission can send in his shit and stand as good a chance of earning twenty cents as anybody else. Why do they bother? Because, as I wrote above, they have this wish to be a ‘photographer’ in the cast of whoever their pet hero might be. But with a friggin’ big safety net called the day-job. It matters not that they screw the hell out of their own heroes in the attempt. And boy, nobody had better dare mention that. If you do, then the stock (sorry, just a coincidence) reply is: why should pros have a divine right etc. etc. which is just a snow job to cover guilt and not a little shame.
;-)
Rob C
IMO, being an amateur in the noble way is the easiest path. 100% rewarding. You feel passion, you do an activity basically because you feel you have to do it, but there is no pressure, it is 100% flexible. If there is a pressure being an amateur it is because a secret wish to succeed, being recognized, stands somewhere in the thoughts. And when one succeed, he/she becomes a pro anyway. But normally there should have no pressure.
I beleive that most amateurs in fact dream to become pros, and the microstock invasion is just an ilustration of that fame desire. If they could, they would do it.
Thinking of Andy Warhol again about this "5 minutes of fame"...
Pure amateurism in its noble way is very very rare, (at least observing the people I know in that case), there is generally a wish behind the mask.
Amateur is, to me, a pro without balls or a person who has a lot of free time to spend in something. Many beautifull images come from there I must say.
The volume of imagery produced today by serious amateurs is enormous, much bigger that what's produced by the professionals.
That has consequences to a certain extend in the commercial rule game.
A good pic is a 20cents pics etc...
Being pro, also in the noble way, is not just about taking good pics, sharing in twitter or whatever and enjoy.
In fact, it has nothing to do with all that stuff.
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Being pro, also in the noble way, is not just about taking good pics, sharing in twitter or whatever and enjoy.
In fact, it has nothing to do with all that stuff.
Again, Fred, you are right.
And anyone can see this by the fact that so few really really good pros have either the time, interest or wish to get online and write.
And not just that: try and find the website of the real David Bailey, the London fashion photographer of Bailey, Donovan and Duffy fame, and you will have done something that has evaded me since I got a computer. And I imagined I knew where to look!
It could be there is no such site – he doesn’t want or even need such a device; more, he probably prefers screens at every turn in his life. Why would he, or others of his ilk, the very ones that would interest (some of) us, bother?
That’s one reason I am grateful to the minority that fits that category that is willing to take the time; the other reason is that I love seeing good photography. We are fortunate, here, that some do bother.
Long may they continue!
Rob C
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Hi -
Enjoyed your website link; two questions: do you have another site where there is an 'About Me' sort of section; how did you learn the art of invisibility? Few people, and mainly cats at that, seem to know you are working or are disturbed when they do.
Rob C
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I beleive that most amateurs in fact dream to become pros, and the microstock invasion is just an ilustration of that fame desire. If they could, they would do it.
Amateur is, to me, a pro without balls or a person who has a lot of free time to spend in something. Many beautifull images come from there I must say.
Fred, I think we need to get our definitions straight before we go too far into this subject. By definition a "pro" photographer is someone who makes his living by photographing. The term doesn't imply good work. It implies paying work. There are pros who make exceptional photographs. Rob's one of them. Then there are the others. You can walk down main street in nearly any American town and see the others. I don't know if the same thing's true in Spain, but I'd be willing to bet it is. I suspect one reason most portrait and wedding studios produce the same dreary cliches over and over again is that the same dreary cliches are what their clients want, because as far as their clients are concerned those dreary cliches are what they recognize as "wedding" photographs or "portraits." Cartier-Bresson made some of the best portraits I've ever seen. So did Walker Evans and Elliott Erwitt. But if their clients had been like the average U.S. client, they'd have been out of the portrait business in no time. The bottom line is that "professional" doesn't imply "good."
In the sixties I did professional work on the side for a couple years. I did weddings, portraits, the debutant's ball that finally convinced me I didn't want to continue that kind of work, etc. But I also did some stuff on speculation, hoping to make some money off it. I've posted a couple examples from a dance class I did on Saturdays over a fairly long period. I found I really disliked the standard work, but I liked the spec work. I'd do that again if the opportunity arose. At this point I'm proud to be an amateur, in the real meaning of the word.
I think you're right that free time, which I have lots of now that I'm really retired from both the Air Force and from software engineering, is important. But not always. I think of people like Elliott Erwitt who didn't have Cartier-Bresson's advantage of a family fortune. He was a professional on the jobs he did as a professional, but when the daily work was done he picked up his Leica and became an amateur in the finest sense of the word.
I guess the reason I'm posting this is that I'd love to see us stop the kind of crap I see all the time in magazines like Pop Photography: "Join our workshop -- mentored by the pros." What BS. In practically every issue of that magazine I see the "pros" take a reasonably good photograph, crop, dodge, burn, and otherwise degrade it. Sometimes they're right about the changes, but rarely. It's time to stop calling novice photographers "amateurs," and start calling them what they are: "novices." The "pros" in magazines like Pop Photography are all about equipment. As Rob pointed out, equipment completely misses the point.
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Hi -
Enjoyed your website link; two questions: do you have another site where there is an 'About Me' sort of section; how did you learn the art of invisibility? Few people, and mainly cats at that, seem to know you are working or are disturbed when they do.
Rob C
I assume that's for me. Glad you liked my shots. There's no "about me" page as I haven't decided yet which camp of photographer you and the other's have been discussing I fall into: the aspirational amateur, the budding professional or the pure of heart. The one thing I'm not though is someone obsessed with the equipment. I value my tools but they're just that, tools.
I'm sort of surprised about the question of invisibility. Isn't that one of the core competencies of a Street or Documentary photographer? Blend in, don't disrupt, observe. There's a very long story about how I've become invisible, or at least ignored in many, many situations which started when I was much younger. Of course, there are also practical techniques I use to get a close shot before the subject realises.
Jenn
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I assume that's for me. Glad you liked my shots. There's no "about me" page as I haven't decided yet which camp of photographer you and the other's have been discussing I fall into: the aspirational amateur, the budding professional or the pure of heart. The one thing I'm not though is someone obsessed with the equipment. I value my tools but they're just that, tools.
I'm sort of surprised about the question of invisibility. Isn't that one of the core competencies of a Street or Documentary photographer? Blend in, don't disrupt, observe. There's a very long story about how I've become invisible, or at least ignored in many, many situations which started when I was much younger. Of course, there are also practical techniques I use to get a close shot before the subject realises.
Jenn
Hi Jenn
Yes, ‘twas for you indeed, the post. It shouldn’t matter in the least about others here or anywhere else, for that matter, attempting to pigeonhole you. You are you.
I don’t do street – would probably like to but don’t have the stomach (bravery) to face, camera at my nose, people who really do look as if they’d make good pics exactly because that’s how they look: a Diane Arbus complex – fear of becoming – if you see what I mean. Perhaps being female is actually an advantage – might remove the implied threat that cameras often pose, along with the natural defensive reaction of attack. I don’t run fast any more – probably can’t run at all – no memory of the last time I did anything as rash or as fast. But, if I make it another four or so years, I may well have got to the other side of the line where people try to help me cross the street, even when all I am doing is taking a breather at the lights. Funny, people.
You have just put out the strongest tease of the day: I would love to know about your early metamorphose into invisibility, that’s precisely the sort of information this forum is very short on: gadgets, tweaks, photons and circles of confusion abound, but really interesting personal stuff is as rare as hen’s teeth, as they used to say in Scotland. I’m all for more of the human and less of the plastic and tin.
Nice to meet you – nice to see your work.
Rob C
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The one thing I've learned when it comes to street photography is the more you're out on the street the more you will see. I probably spend 50 hours a week on the streets of Philadelphia and NYC.
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Fred, I think we need to get our definitions straight before we go too far into this subject. By definition a "pro" photographer is someone who makes his living by photographing. The term doesn't imply good work. It implies paying work. There are pros who make exceptional photographs. Rob's one of them. Then there are the others. You can walk down main street in nearly any American town and see the others. I don't know if the same thing's true in Spain, but I'd be willing to bet it is. I suspect one reason most portrait and wedding studios produce the same dreary cliches over and over again is that the same dreary cliches are what their clients want, because as far as their clients are concerned those dreary cliches are what they recognize as "wedding" photographs or "portraits." Cartier-Bresson made some of the best portraits I've ever seen. So did Walker Evans and Elliott Erwitt. But if their clients had been like the average U.S. client, they'd have been out of the portrait business in no time. The bottom line is that "professional" doesn't imply "good."
In the sixties I did professional work on the side for a couple years. I did weddings, portraits, the debutant's ball that finally convinced me I didn't want to continue that kind of work, etc. But I also did some stuff on speculation, hoping to make some money off it. I've posted a couple examples from a dance class I did on Saturdays over a fairly long period. I found I really disliked the standard work, but I liked the spec work. I'd do that again if the opportunity arose. At this point I'm proud to be an amateur, in the real meaning of the word.
I think you're right that free time, which I have lots of now that I'm really retired from both the Air Force and from software engineering, is important. But not always. I think of people like Elliott Erwitt who didn't have Cartier-Bresson's advantage of a family fortune. He was a professional on the jobs he did as a professional, but when the daily work was done he picked up his Leica and became an amateur in the finest sense of the word.
I guess the reason I'm posting this is that I'd love to see us stop the kind of crap I see all the time in magazines like Pop Photography: "Join our workshop -- mentored by the pros." What BS. In practically every issue of that magazine I see the "pros" take a reasonably good photograph, crop, dodge, burn, and otherwise degrade it. Sometimes they're right about the changes, but rarely. It's time to stop calling novice photographers "amateurs," and start calling them what they are: "novices." The "pros" in magazines like Pop Photography are all about equipment. As Rob pointed out, equipment completely misses the point.
Absolutly Russ!
Being a pro does not garantee good imagery at all. As you pointed, in its strictly definition it is about income source.
Taking the same concept, the amateur photographers produce stunning images, we can see that easily in internet. The lack of limitations (client needs etc...) is an advantage in order to express artistically, simplifying we could talk about more freedom.
But that's also where good pros differ, in the hability to be creative, having a personal style and producing stunning images being limitated by factors the amateur does not have.
Taking a paralel, when I finished to study arquitecture before joining fine arts, we (the students) where all really creatives, imaginative and enthousiastic. In the summer I joined my first paid job in an arquitect agency and to my surprise, I realised that what we learned had to be "de-learned" because the professional activity had many limitations in practise.
Reaching the creativity into those professional realities is IMO where the differences stand, not specially in the image quality.
Or, taking another example that will resonate with your life: I have been a private plane pilot in the 90's for some years (only VFR). I felt passion about flying. But can you see the difference between flying the Sabre on assignment and flying the Cesna for pleasure? Of course you can. Yes, it is flying anyway, basic rules are the very same but the context is totally different. Skills required are indeed different even if a common knowledge of flying is evident. In the french army, I was in a military base call Mont-de Marsan (air Force base number 118). It is a sort of elite unit where they test the Mirage weapons. Well, at that time I could recognized any shade of a russian plane and put the name on it, wich gave me a sort of "fame" into the reconnaissance squadron , to my surprise, none of these top pilots where able to do so...They where the pros, I was the amateur teaching them the russian plane shades??!
Now, my life gives me a very good oportunity to see those differences and that is why I understand Rob. I have been an amateur for many years, and now I'm also an assistant of a top spanish fashion photographer, and beleive me I can observe the differences from the field.
You are right Russ, image is not, and should be not, where the basic differences between a pro an amateur are. Although the kind of imagery that do some pros is simply not possible for an amateur because of the budget involved behind (few photoshop retouching by the way). The differences are in other lands than creativity itself. It is about the hability to lead a team, to understand client needs...things like that.
A point that James Russell and Rob have stressed many many times here and that I confirm, is the very little interest, if not lack of knowledge (if we can call that knowledge) in some cases, about camera gear by those pros. Yesterday I took a coffee with 2 top printers that work with 300m2 sizes prints on aluminium for cities projects. These people are on the very top knowledge about printing and one only has a Canon G9 has a main camera. Well, we where talking about resolution, camera gear, files etc...really, they told me this: you can start with any 5MP camera, as long as you know how to do...One has heard about the Olympus PR1 he told me...I said "what?, are you talking about thye EP1?".
Anybody in a forum like this one would laugh if you write "what about the new Pentax 564 ?" But some of the very best pros I met so far would probably make the mistake, so did the top army pilots about russian planes.
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"And Palma is too full of gypsies and pickpockets to encourage an old geezer like me to risk it. The damn insurance company only covers stuff if stolen from home! I have started to leave my watch at home whenever I have to go to the big smoke."
I really think this is an offensive statement, particulary in the current anti-Roma climate in Europe. I'm disappointed that no-one else has picked up on this.
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... I really think this is an offensive statement...
Ohhh, phluease!
Now we can not say anything bad about insurance companies? ;)
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Ohhh, phluease!
Now we can not say anything bad about insurance companies? ;)
No, Slobodan, the chap clearly hasn't the slightest idea of the reality on the ground.
Pete, stop effin' about with political correctness and do something real: use your friggin' eyes and see some life.
Rob C
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:o I must say that in this interesting thread now, I reached the limits of my english and I don't catch anything more you guys are saying.
It looks like a spy secret code, something like that.
What are you talking about the "anti-Roma climate in Europe" and the "insurance companies? :o ???
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:o I must say that in this interesting thread now, I reached the limits of my english and I don't catch anything more you guys are saying.
It looks like a spy secret code, something like that.
What are you talking about the "anti-Roma climate in Europe" and the "insurance companies? :o ???
Fred, my friend, sorry, can't help you with this one. If I have to explain a joke (or sarcasm, as in this case), it would not be a joke. Either you get it, or you do not. If you do not, it is not necessarily your fault, it could be me telling a bad joke just as well. But I think (hope) Rob got it.
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"And **** is too full of **** and pickpockets to encourage an old geezer like me to risk it. The damn insurance company only covers stuff if stolen from home! I have started to leave my watch at home whenever I have to go to the big smoke."
I really think this is an offensive statement, particulary in the current anti-Roma climate in Europe. I'm disappointed that no-one else has picked up on this.
Could be said of any big city. Rob identified the local problem. Now in fill the **** with the local variants with regards to a big city near you. I notice that you are resident in London. How about skinheads, hoodies, gangs etc etc. ??? :-[ :-\
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:o I must say that in this interesting thread now, I reached the limits of my english and I don't catch anything more you guys are saying.
It looks like a spy secret code, something like that.
Just wait till we start writing in broad Scottish slang. ;)
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Slobodan, I'm so pleased to be able to communicate most of the time with you guys, and yes, there are moments where you can't explain meanings in a language. Or you got it or not, very truth. That is where the gap starts when you use a forein language without actually being part of the culture. 12 years in Spain and I still miss a lot.
Maybe that is where the photography or any visual expression has an advantage over the writting, because it is universal. But, also limitating. (although I'm sure that cultural training has a lot to do on how an image is perceived. Example: the nazi cross and the buddhist cross. First time I saw the buddhist cross when I was a child, it looked evil to me even if they reversed it because we where trained to associate this symbol with the WW2 politics).
Stamper, I know about the scotish slang. I had a scotish girlfriend in Paris, gorgeous brune, breasty, warm, funny and horny. She took me there and there was this tv show (can't remember the name) while we where having the tea after dinner, and she was laughing and laughing...and I was just looking the screen, then looking at her (or her breast) thinking when this bloody show will finally end? Actually, she was telling me exactly what Slobodan said: "unexplainable". Could not understand a single word. But then, I was happy to hear that the English where in the same situation than me. So scotish people have their own secret codes to fight the naughty english invasor.
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Fred, my friend, sorry, can't help you with this one. If I have to explain a joke (or sarcasm, as in this case), it would not be a joke. Either you get it, or you do not. If you do not, it is not necessarily your fault, it could be me telling a bad joke just as well. But I think (hope) Rob got it.
He got it all right!
Here in Mallorca and also on the Costa del Sol, the local criminals are no longer the numero uno problem facing the fuzz. Now it is the Russian mafia as well as the truckloads of drifters from the Balkans who are here and can't be flung out. What a friggin' wonderful idea that the Common Market spawned: no passport-control that counts, no criminal record exclusion policy, open friggin' season on the law-abiding citizen is what it brought us. Thanks.
I remember flying in to Florida. In the 'plane from London we had to declare how much money we had, our return tickets, the lot. And damned right too! Protect your own first every time.
Rob C
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OK, so it's Gypsies, Russians and anyone from the Balkans (I'm assuming Jews and Arabs are included by default), anyone else you'd like include in your hate list.
I'm sorry, I'm outta here, this place has become too unpleasant.
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OK, so it's Gypsies, Russians and anyone from the Balkans (I'm assuming Jews and Arabs are included by default), anyone else you'd like include in your hate list.
I'm sorry, I'm outta here, this place has become too unpleasant.
Yes, probably somebody who speaks without knowing anything about that of which he speaks.
Take care
Rob C
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OK, so it's Gypsies, Russians and anyone from the Balkans (I'm assuming Jews and Arabs are included by default), anyone else you'd like include in your hate list...
I am (originally) from the Balkans, my wife is Russian, I lived in Spain, and I do not feel offended by what Rob was saying at all. I simply understand the context he has in mind and fully concur. Besides, Rob never generalized the way you did (i.e, "all ...", "anyone from..."). His references are much more directed to a certain subculture and circumstances than ethnicity.
Had you ever been attacked by a dozen of Gypsy kids, early teens, in broad daylight, on the main street of a world metropolis, aggressively attempting to steal your watch and wallet, young and cute and sweet enough for you to hesitate to fight back (even the nearby policeman turns his back, assuming kids are just "being kids"), when your own "political correctness" kicks in (of the I-can-not-possibly-hit-an-underprivileged-kid type), when your suit's sleeves and pockets end up torn apart, you would have understood what we are talking about. In a situation like this, I am sure you would, like any real armchair, bleeding heart, politically correct humanitarian, gladly turn over your watch and wallet, with a smile, and perhaps even offer to send them a check, knowing that all that will end up in only one possible place: their school fund?
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Yes, indeed. And there was even a series of photographs of one such attack by kids in front of a Moscow hotel, where an American tourist, probably in his early thirties and quite large and fit-looking, was being surrounded, gripped from all sides, and nobody on the street, within camera range, did any damn thing at all whilst he was losing everything.
But the problems are far removed from the street, too. Marbella had a series of 'forced' sales of villas to various hardmen; Rod Stuart quit and so did 007... all people that can or could afford security. It isn't worth the risk. Even here, at a building next to me, I remember watching as two policemen escorted away a pair of gents from eastern Europe who had gained access to an apartment where they'd stored stolen goods. But on the basic level, the gypsies are the more visible problem with their flower sellers who distract you with a babe at the breast whilst offering you a flower you are supposed to buy as another of them works behind you... Fortunately, they are very easy to recognize. If you are aware of the scam. With many thousands of virgin tourist a year...
Had a slight run-in with one just a couple of weeks ago, when I had the mad urge to try street pics. Not only did I get to see the older lady with the cantilevered front, but also this woman, working with her male partner. He was making elaborate sandcastles on the beach which were rather cleverly done, and I stopped to take a pic as he was doing it; the woman, who was obviously in charge of the hat, called something out to him which he ignored. I took my shot and continued along the pavement past her, and got a mouthfull of abuse when all I did was tell her they were rather nice... obviously, she wanted money. Nice PR. She got zilch except for a sore throat.
The irony is, they are all doing this sandcastle thing illegally, in broad daylight, and nothing ever gets done about it.
Rob C