Camera settings for street photography - The Fastest Gun in the West

I can't remember which cartoon Quick Draw McGraw came from (turns out it was his own show www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9Nh7xIh8Og), but I'm often reminded of him when I'm in the zone for a good day shooting candid photography on the streets. Part of the appeal of street photography for me is the fast nature of it. It reminds me of hunting - not that I have ever hunted or ever plan to. I'm sure that the same basic instincts, of going undetected and making the most of the element of surprise, apply to both street photography and hunting. After all, we don't call it “shooting street” for nothing.

The fast nature of street photography is diametrically opposed to the careful planning and on-the-spot preparations involved in landscape photography. I listen to landscape photographers describe how they walked for two hours in darkness, then set up and waited another hour for the possibility of the right shooting conditions for that one, meticulously planned shot. I think, sheesh, I'd have bagged around four hundred shots in that time. Granted, 390 would probably be pretty much instantly trashed - but I'd still be nine shots up, warm, and never too far from a decent double espresso. 

When I'm on the street, my camera is ready and my eye is in full anticipation mode. I'm scanning ahead for anything that may prove shot-worthy: a movement, a gesture, a colour that contrasts or complements a background, a striking change in light... And my finger is hovering over the shutter button. I'm ready.

Anticipation is a massive part of my armoury. It's not something you can buy but people watching is something you either do or you don't. The more you do, the better you become at anticipating. However, knowing that the smartly dressed gentleman in the fedora is going to turn around to talk to his partner before they reach the corner is no good if I miss the shot because my camera isn't ready.

Deciding on the right settings is very much a matter of personal choice. For me, I generally want to avoid any movement blur.  This means shooting with a shutter speed that will eliminate any chance of this. To freeze most people walking the streets I find that 1/500th of a second is about right. 1/250th of a second is just too slow for me while I am holding the camera, walking through the crowd towards people who are also moving towards me, and preparing to shoot at any given (decisive) moment.

Aperture is even more a matter of personal choice, dependant on the desired effect. There are those who feel that shooting street should be about documentary photography - an accurate record with everything as sharp as possible and an almost infinite depth of field. If that's you then you will need to shoot at an aperture of f8 - or smaller (upwards). Personally, my photography is generally individuals and their stories. I don't mind a narrow depth of field with background (or sometimes foreground) melting away. I will even shoot wide open - especially with the Fujifilm 56mm f1.2 (85mm equivalent) because the softness of the background, and the beautiful light it creates, often prove irresistible. This is especially so at night when the amount of light is an issue but there is also the opportunity for beautifully blurred background lights or bokeh.

Wide open shooting is not without its challenges though. The shallow depth of field can easily mean that the main point of focus is not sharp, especially when shooting from the hip and not using a viewfinder. Shooting wide open also brings the risk of over exposure, especially on a bright afternoon in the city. Review your shot and keep an eye on your histogram, lowering the ISO, increasing the shutter speed and/or narrowing the aperture until you achieve the balanced exposure that you want.

So, how do I achieve that balance? How do I balance that fast shutter speed of 1/320 - 1/500 of a second with my chosen aperture of, say, f4? The answer is Auto ISO. This is where it  comes into its own. Digital cameras are now so good at shooting in low light that as the ISO numbers rise you really don't need to worry too much. Even if some grain begins to creep into your images, don't panic. With street photography, a grainy image is often part of the style and tradition. Some street photographers even deliberately introduce their own grain to an otherwise clear photo in the post production stage.

Auto ISO allows me to set my shutter speed to 1/500 of a second, open up my aperture wide (f4, f2.8, f1.2…heck) then trust my camera to balance the ISO and deliver a well exposed image.

So, in summary, my settings for street photography are generally these:

1. Shutter speed 1/500 of a second.

2. Aperture wider than f8 and often wide open

3. Auto ISO

It's all a matter of personal taste. There is no set of rules. However, these settings are a good starting point for anyone to begin to find their style, reducing shutter speed for more blur in their image or reducing aperture size (increasing the f number) in order to have more of the image sharp and in focus.

Try it. let me know. Perhaps you will be the quickest draw in the west - or at least your local High Street.

Big Shooter - Little Shooter

Recently I wrote about how the character, nature and interests of a photographer impact upon the work they produce (The You-ness of You). I said that we should follow our instincts and impulses - listen to our stomachs. This brings out the You-ness of You!

Check It Out - London March 2017

All of this is well and good but in order to be able to produce what you want - the image you see in your head before you click the shutter - you need to have a basic understanding of your camera. Indeed, you need to choose your camera. Big or small?

The nature of street photography means that the photographer seeks to be as unobtrusive as possible in order to capture the natural course of events that are playing out before them. A small, compact camera then? Possibly.

Picture taking has become ubiquitous. Since phones evolved into cameras, with the advent of the iPhone ten years ago, you only need to take a stroll down your High Street to be presented with gaggles of posturing teens shooting selfies. If you visit a tourist area it's hard to duck the panoramic sweep of the arm's length pirouette as someone captures 180 degrees of memories on their phone. All of this does make it less unusual to be out taking photographs. 

Take a look around though, and the number of people shooting with cameras is far outweighed by those who use their phones. Nothing wrong with that - the quality of phone cameras continues to improve and astound. Indeed, some street photographers simply use their phone and nothing else. After all, it's so easy to be discreet when you look like your texting your wife or ordering pizza, while actually capturing that silhouetted figure just clearing the puddle to reach the pavement on the other side.

Others, myself included, prefer to keep their phones as phones, games centres, notebooks, social media hubs etc. Call me old fashioned, I still carry a camera. Sometimes two.

It’s just that I’ve never fully resolved an ongoing debate with myself. Is it better to go small and discreet or large and bleedin' obvious?

Small and discreet is, well, less obvious. A small black camera against a black tee-shirt is almost unnoticeable. If you shoot from the hip, which I do a lot, it's quite likely to go unnoticed. When I bring it to my eye, it looks small and like the sort of thing a tourist would pack for the journey. No one thinks twice. I can also look like I'm fumbling with the controls, an idiot trying to make sense of this technological marvel in my hands, while actually I'm shooting anyone that comes near and registers on my street radar. All of these things help me pass off as some geek with a camera that's too complicated for him. "Apologies if you happen to end up in shot…"

On the other hand, I've also had days when I've taken the big guns out and shot with a DSLR, even with a 70-200mm lens attached on rare occasions. And I've got some really pleasing results. I'm not talking about differences in focal length (that can wait for another time). Carrying a large DSLR gives out a completely different message. It says "professional" or, at the very least, someone who knows what they're doing. By implication, it also says someone who is supposed to be there. People assume that you are taking photographs for "a reason" and that they just happen to be there, an innocent passer-by caught in the crossfire. Collateral damage if you like. Some even apologise for being in the way. Of course, what every street photographer really wants is to allow the scene to unfold as if they weren't there. But I do find that people usually just carry on and let you get on with "your job." In a strange way, you become a part of the street in a similar way to when you are shooting with your phone, or a small camera, simply because you look like you are meant to be there - much like the bench or that lamp post on the corner.

So, I still don’t know. Large, professional and at work or small, innocent and fumbling. It’s the results that count - not what you’re gazing down.

How about you? Let me know in the comments below...

Teaching me to see.

Of course, in my last blog, I didn’t mention the main reason that many people take photographs. The creative outlet. I firmly believe that our capacity to express ourselves artistically is a major element of what separates us from beasts. I have always felt this drive - be it through music, writing or photography - and have dabbled in several areas while I have sought to find my voice, my style or the best way to express myself. It is a basic need and one which often restores equilibrium at the end of a busy day; for those of us who don’t work in the creative industries at least.

I can trace my interest in photographs, if not cameras, back to my childhood and my parents giving me a Polaroid camera when I can’t have been more than about seven. However, once my dad had read the instructions and discovered that the prints were coated in poisonous chemicals, it was taken from me in order to keep my younger siblings safe. That camera was swapped for what I believe was a Kodak Instamatic 133 with a cuboid four flash attachment. Obviously it didn’t bring the instant gratification that a Polaroid would have brought to an impatient seven year old. But it didn’t kill my brothers and sisters either.

Christmas with an Instamatic, siblings and someone's friend... (c.1972)

Time passed and I swapped the Kodak’s cartridge film and its funny purple flashcube for my first SLR. By now I was a student and could afford (!) a Praktica - don’t ask me what model or what happened to it. It was responsible for some suitably mean, moody and magnificent shots of south east London in the mid 1980’s - not to mention the flat-tops and misguided mullets of some of my friends.

There then followed a photographic drought - with the exception of the odd holiday and small child snaps - until two developments swept me up. One was technological with the advent of digital cameras and a chance freebie on a teaching course which provided me with a very primitive digital camera and a laptop. It wasn’t inspiring. But the technology was moving and soon I was able to have a camera that was small enough to fit in a jacket or a cycle jersey when I was out and about. Before too long even on my phone. Like many people, the best camera being the one I had with me, the mobile phone camera has become a way into (or back into) photography.

The second development came when I was introduced to a Fuji bridge camera and taken out into the Hampshire countryside for a day with a friend. The pictures I took that cold January day were amazing - or so I thought. Blurred streams, frozen waterfalls, close-ups of leaf skeletons … Actually, the quality didn’t matter. Here was something which hooked me. It was expressive but it also required a degree of technical know-how that I could spend time learning.

While the bridge camera has been superseded, my friend hasn’t and now many of my photographs are taken on stolen, precious days out with him and another friend - two photographers who know far more than me and have taught me much in the last few years. We descend upon our chosen venue - very often London - and shoot whatever grabs us, punctuated by espressos, pies and pints. Much of the time we are apart, only a matter of fifty to one hundred yards, but when we come back together we are always stunned by the huge differences when we compare shots on our viewfinders.

We all see things differently.

Once, a photograph was a photograph was a photograph. At least that's how it seemed to me. I've come to realise that any photograph reveals as much about the photographer as it does the subject. The three of us express ourselves in quite distinct ways and each has his own style. See for yourselves here: www.flickr.com/photos/auribins and www.flickr.com/photos/andythekeys.

Not only do I now understand that I see things differently to the photographer either side of me (just as they do) but also that I see things differently to how I used to before I was so camera-centric. A camera is never far away but even when it’s not in my hand I am constantly framing, composing and looking for images. It has made life much richer and brought the dullest activities to life. There is always a photograph out there if you learn how to find it. As a far better photographer than me (Dorothea Lange) once said: "The camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera."