Photobooks - a personal list
Everyone loves a list.
The desert island game is one I will willingly play from time to time - especially with music. Although choosing only ten tracks or pieces from a lifetime of passionate listening often seems as futile as it is impossible - moods shift, needs change and new things come along. The same applies to photo books. A new one is almost automatically elevated to favourite status and, if it’s not, then the purchase is always slightly tinged with regret.
So, which would you take? No fixed limit to the number of books but let's assume that your travel is not in some kind of mobile-library(!) so that there is some implied limit.
I started by imagining a top ten. I then asked my instagram followers for their favourites. This brought me a few familiar ones and some new books that I look forward to discovering. It also threw up the question of which books qualify - I had been thinking about books by one photographer. However, there were some really strong mentions of books about photography and some collections too
This first blog is going to focus on books by single photographers, leaving space for compilations (for want of a better word) and guides in future blogs.
I should also say that I am simply listing the book without a review. If you want to see what they’re like for yourself then there are plenty of places to look online or in bookshops.
So.. here we go. Click on the image for a link to buy online.
The Suffering of Light
Alex Webb
Home Around The World
Elliott Erwitt
Colour Correction
Ernst Haas
Modern Color
Fred Herzog
Twilight
Gregory Crewdson
Valparaiso
Sergio Larrain
Henri Cartier Bresson
by Clement Cheroux
Youth Unemployment
Tish Murtha
Early Color
Saul Leiter
The New Yorkers
Robert Herman
Honourable mentions to Anders Petersen, Marc Riboud, Mark Neville’s “Fancy Pictures,” and the sheer gorgeousness of Sebastiao Salgado’s use of deep blacks in his monochrome images.
If your favourite is not listed, I’d love to hear from you. Like or comment below.
Til next time.
British Photography Awards
Thrilled to be shortlisted in the Street category of the British Photography Awards with my image All The Fun Of The Fair.
All The Fun Of The Fair
Chiddingfold, Surrey. 2018.
Part of the competition is a public vote and you can vote for my image by clicking on the image which will take you to the link.
Please do look at the other images and categories - there is some amazing talent on show.
Twitter: @GBPhotoAwards
Instagram: @britishphotographyawards
Facebook: @britishphotographyawards
Photo Rich. Time Poor.
I am lucky enough to have had a week’s holiday; not travelling but just unwinding, catching up and reeling back some of the hours lost to the day-job over the past two months. I suppose that it’s part of my own sense of worth and some deep puritan work ethic that I am seemingly unable to completely stop. I begin my time off by making lists of tasks to achieve within the week ahead - one of which is to write this blog. (So here I am with less than 24 hours holiday remaining and a slight sense of guilt for not having done it earlier - anyone else been here?)
One of my main aims this week was to spend some time looking at photo-books. I have said several times in this blog space that one of the best ways to learn is to look at the work of the greats. It’s so important. It feed us, educates us , inspires us; yet it’s so easy to put off. Why wouldn’t I want to invest a small amount of time in something which I know will help me improve in an area I feel passionate about? Yet time is precious. Finite.
How long should one sit enjoying a pile of photo-books for? Two hours? One hour? 30 minutes? Ten? Even that can feel like an indulgence when there are other people in the house going about their business. Surely, one can find ten minutes in a week.
It turns out I couldn’t.
I do know where a considerable chunk of my time has gone. Social media. Specifically, Instagram and Twitter. In recent blogs I have written a good deal about social media and largely in positive tones. I am not about to change my view. While I find that I have spent a long time on both platforms - or longer than I would’ve wished - this is purely my problem and not one that I can blame the platform for. However, while I enjoy the capacity of social media to allow me to see many, many more images in a short space of time than ever before in history (and very easily too), I find that there is such a wealth of images to enjoy and respond to that I am not spending long on any of them. It’s become a swipe, flick and like mechanism. I consume hundreds of images in a day and I dread to think how much time I spend on each one. Or rather, how little time i spend on each one. I’ve learned to quickly take in the basic elements - composition, light, framing - but it’s almost a skim reading. Sometimes I probably spend longer writing a comment than looking. So many pictures. So little time.
Don’t get me wrong, I am inspired by what I see on social media, I learn from my peers, and it definitely feeds me - especially in encouraging me to pick up my camera, get out and start shooting. I need to learn to slow down and truly consider the images before me. In short, I need to chew my food, savour it and reflect on it, rather than always subsisting on the spaceman’s diet of a dry handful of tablets that contain just enough to sustain me.
This morning, the clocks went back. Today I have an extra hour. While I have been promising myself time spent with a pile of inspirational photo-books, the week has almost passed and I haven’t achieved it. So I hereby declare that I am going to commit to spending that hour with a fresh pot of coffee and a pile of books; a collection of paper images that I will turn slowly, savour, and force myself to look at more deeply. I come to them with the expectation that I will learn from them - both consciously and subconsciously. When I next pick up my camera I will do so with the improved knowledge and better vision that this hour and these books have brought me.
Likes, Inspiration and Social Media
My last blog garnered a good response on social media - lots of positive comments on Instagram and Twitter; if no actual direct responses on here; the website that hosted it. Maybe that’s the perfect response in itself.
Thinking on (and I’m not the first person to think of all the things they wish they’d said after the moment had passed) I think the major omission from the blog was: inspiration.
For me, one of the greatest honours is to know that I have inspired someone else. There were a few posts on my feed this week that drew that response - I’d encouraged photographers to go out and shoot and, more specifically, to go looking for reflections.
Basking in that initial warm fuzz, I began to think about inspiration. I have been so inspired by so many of the feeds that I follow on both Instagram and Twitter that I was surprised that I hadn’t focused on that as a major reason for swimming in the social media pool.
Inspiration is a two way street. I can hope to inspire - but I expect to be inspired.
The work of other photographers has opened my eyes to new ways of seeing, of processing, of framing...
It has inspired me to visit new places and helped to plan my street photography when I am there.
I have been introduced to the work of other published photographers - both living and dead - through references and comments in feeds. Some feeds even exist to publish work of long gone greats who probably never even used the words “social” and “media” in the same sentence.
Social media really does have the capacity to inspire on a worldwide level - both looking ahead to the future as you see the work of current photographers develop, and looking back to the past.
In short, I can’t help feeling that if you don’t find inspiration in social media then you must be following the wrong people.
Love and Hate and Social Media
The new screen time facility on my phone is making me alarmingly aware of how much time I spend using my phone on a daily basis. Granted, a good chunk of this is playing music, using the satnav, making notes for my blog, emails, diary… you name it. But the great big guilty pleasure is social media. Instagram. Twitter. And a little bit of Facebook. All in the great cause of photography.
I know social media has a love-hate image. I can’t say I love it but I certainly don’t hate it. It’s simply the best tool for me and my street photography right now. Oh, I know it has it’s negatives:
It's a time hoover - one quick flirtation becomes a trawl though the latest updates and a cheeky check on how your latest masterpiece is faring.
The time spent framing finished photos for Instagram and the the whole tagging rigmarole, let alone thinking up a clever caption (I like words).
The swathes of bots and their promises to make you follower-rich beyond the dreams of avarice.
The companies that follow you because you once tagged a nearby town - you apparently need their pizzas, their gyms and their photo studios even though two continents now lie between you and them.
Followers who follow you for a follow back and then unfollow you within moments - before following you again in the next few days without realising you’ve met before.
The algorithms - I can’t begin to understand them. There are people who’s work I look forward to but don’t see their latest work for days. But then, I suppose, if I understood the algorithm then others far more savvy than me (not too difficult) would understand it too and they would have the system sewn up resulting in nothing but their adverts and beige offerings. So I think I’m glad the algorithm frustrates me.
But for all of those and more, it still feels like an amazing step forward to me.
You don’t have to travel far back in time to realise that your audience was essentially those members of the family that couldn’t escape your photo album after a hefty Sunday lunch. Gran, grandad and their cat. Today, your latest offering can reach hundreds and thousands - and more if you’re that good - in seconds. The level of exposure (no pun intended) to our photography today goes far beyond anything that earlier generations of photographers could have imagined. We take it for granted. Just imagine how difficult it would have been for our grandparents to hit the kind of viewer figures that we take for granted - even on our worst days.
The immediacy of it all is amazing, especially for those of us who grew up in the film days (some day my prints will come…).
It’s a great leveller. Everyone’s photo is presented in the same way. Okay, that may be a small screened phone, an iPad, or the latest wide screen plasma monitor - but the format that they are presented in remains consistent. That doesn’t just mean that fancy, gallery frames are irrelevant but that the quality of the photo is plain to see and it stands or falls on its own merit. I actually also like the fact that I can post a photo and it appears on my phone, on my pc or tablet - it’s as if someone else put it there (not just me), published for the world to see. It gives it a freshness and an objectivity that I hadn’t expected. It's a chance to hold my work up to the light and see how it compares to what every (and anyone) else has posted. Somehow it has the air of distance and I find it easier to be analytical, critical. And I learn from that.
I like that others will comment on my work - describing features, composition, point of view, perspective, tonal range, you name it. Often they notice things I hadn’t. I learn from these comments. And they build me up too.
It’s social media, right. Social. It’s about interacting. You can choose to walk into a party and not speak to a soul or you can compliment others on their hair, their suit, their dress, their latest book/recording/photo/whatever… Or you can choose to sit in a corner and scowl. Social media is like one big party to which everyone is invited. Sure, online followers follow for a variety of reasons - and one big one is to get followed back. That’s just the oil that greases the cogs. The oil is needed. It’s what gets your creations out there;
It’s a camera club for those who don’t like camera clubs. As Groucho Marx said “I don’t care to belong to any club that will have me as a member.” For those of us who are too shy, lazy or busy to commit to joining a camera club, it social media provides us with the feedback to grow; and inspiration from others whose work we admire.
It often surprises me. I like that my work gets approval. We all need stroking from time to time. We are social animals and the approval of our peers matters. I’d like to pretend that the number of likes, followers and retweets doesn’t matter, but it does. Sometimes a favourite, sure-fire shot dies an untimely, unheroic death. Sometimes a real doozy strikes a chord and scoops acclamation all over the place. Sometimes one of the followers picks you up and does something with it. I have had my first exhibition, magazine coverage and invitations to openings - all as a result of exposure on social media.
Finally, it introduces us to new ideas, new artists, new concepts. Photography is partly a science but, for me, it is primarily a creative process. Creativity is always reinventing itself and social media can often be the kindling for that creative spark. I still shoot to please myself, first and foremost. However, I learn from the responses and ideas of others. Man is a social animal - not an island.
There are those who continue to use social media but slag it off, which I don’t really understand. I know I probably spend far longer on it than I should - but that’s my problem, not the media itself.
Perfection Postponed
I’m writing this for myself, as much as for anyone else. I need to remind myself that sometimes I just have to get on with it. Stop putting it off and just do it, to coin Nike’s phrase.
No more waiting until everything is in place. Because it never is.
Let’s face it, we will never ever feel that something is completely ready, never feel that it’s good enough, never feel that we have said it, photographed it, processed it... in the best possible way.
So get on with it. Print your work. Make a book. Host an exhibition. Launch your website. Photograph strangers. Whatever it is…do it. Unless we actually begin, we will never finish. And, do you know what? Sometimes, when we begin, we realise that the finishing part isn’t quite so hard.
Last time I said "We are all seeking the ultimate photograph. That one shot that says it all!” That wasn’t meant as a reason to give up because we will never be satisfied. It was meant as a recognition that it is that very act of striving that makes the likelihood of achieving it more likely. As Elliot Erwhitt said "Nothing happens when you sit at home."
So what is the ultimate photograph? We assume that every great photo we see is perfection itself, don’t we? Just because it’s in a book, or on a gallery wall or on Instagram. But every artist, great or small, from Sebastian Salgado to the girl next door with her selfie stick, must surely feel as we all do. That they could have done it better if…and you can finish that sentence yourself with one of over a million different reasons.
Think of your best photo. The one that you are most proud of. If you have a website, it’s that one there, right on the Home page. If you could show me - I guarantee you would also point out where it could be improved. If the light had been better; if you’d got there later, stayed there longer; if you hadn’t over saturated the processing… We all do it.
It is human nature to compare ourselves and our achievements with others. And to put ourselves down. It stems from a primeval need to survive, from a time when we humans were always on the look out for threats. But there are no sabre toothed tigers on Instagram.
We are all constantly striving for artistic perfection and never feel that we achieve it. And, do you know what? That’s fine. It’s the striving and envisioning that is important. That is how we hone our craft. By taking the shot, putting out there and gauging the response. Not by sitting back and waiting for the perfect moment.
Imitate, Innovate, Invent
Who's the leader?
Hungerford Bridge, London. Sept 2018.
Sometimes it seems that there is an almost constant reassessment and reevaluation of social media. Often the most vocal critics are those who seem unable to walk away from it. Personally, I enjoy the opportunities to learn from others’ work, and to place my own in the public eye for a far wider audience than I could ever have dreamed of. The way I see it, we are all learners, learning all the time - to a greater or lesser extent. Even those with tens of thousands of followers post disappointing images sometimes. And do you know what? They probably never feel completely satisfied with their work either. I bet that occasionally they post photos that they expect to be met with great acclaim, only to find the silent curse of internet tumbleweed blowing through their feed. Just as I do. And at other, less-inspired times, they probably post something that’s been gathering virtual dust in the cellar of their hard drive, only to find it being greeted with wide acclaim and a posse of new followers. Just as I do.
We are all seeking the ultimate photograph. That one shot that says it all!
It’s human nature to want to get better at whatever we are doing. We are also our own harshest critics, pointing out why our latest great hope is actually fatally flawed. We failed to nail it. Name your top three all time greatest photographers and I guarantee that they would tell you that they never nailed it either. Cartier-Bresson, Winogrand, Leiter, that Instagram shooter with a squillion followers… If only we could ask them.
It’s natural to be striving for improvement; for innovation; for that new angle. There’s always something we could do better next time.
Throughout history people have been inspired by others. It’s natural to want to recreate something that has brought us pleasure. That does not mean a direct imitation - plagiarism - but a desire to create something which evokes the same feeling, creates the same atmosphere, has the same message; or any combination of these and more. We learn by imitating. It helps us to understand what the originator did - be it artistic, scientific, sporting - whatever...
Once we have understood how something was done, we can then assimilate that technique into our own skillset. We are in a new position - we are able to innovate. Taking our new skills, we bring our own background, experiences, tastes etc to the creative process and can now shoot a new image. This image is rooted in all we learned from the original artist but we have moved it beyond imitation to create something new. This innovation is all part of finding our “voice” or distinctive style.
We have all experienced knowing who took a particular image before being told, simply by recognising certain elements and features of their style. With perseverance, the best artists find their own distinctive, easily identifiable style. They have learned their craft and have moved beyond imitation and innovation, based upon their initial artist led inspiration, to a higher state where they are able to use their hard earned skills to create something totally new, in their own unique voice. This is invention. Invention needs both imitation and innovation. No one invents in a creative void, out of nowhere.
This is the learning process. It is something everyone goes through - from learning to speak to painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Pick up a photography magazine and you will read an interview in which professionals tip their hats to those who have gone before. They are happy to acknowledge the influence of a Robert Frank, a Cartier-Bresson, a Garry Winogrand. Or go to a big hitter on Instagram and you’ll find that very often their feed will happily direct you to others who they admire. Even the first photographers (without any photographers to emulate) were influenced by the fine artists of the past, learning composition from the painters and sculptors of the previous thousands of years.
It was partly as a result of a recent tense exchange on social media that I decided to put down these words. The debate centred around the use of public spaces and whether one photographer can claim to own a specific view because they believe they shot there first. The streets are busy places and London (perhaps more than other cities at the present time) is seemingly filled with street photographers. Beyond that, anyone with a smartphone has the capacity to shoot in these popular places. The great views are, after all, popular for the very reason that they are great views. Some places will be there for centuries to come - monuments, grand buildings, landmarks. Others are more transitory than others - advertising hoardings, building sites etc. Perhaps the work of another photographer encourages us to emulate their work in a certain place, or even to feel that we can build on what they achieved, having a go at creating something new for ourselves as we seek to present our own unique take on our surroundings. Once we can imitate what they have created, we can then innovate and finally invent our own unique image. Each of us is a singular and creative individual - each with our own unique outlook, background, likes, dislikes, tastes and way of seeing. We are all striving to develop our own voice or style that incorporates that uniqueness - but we need to learn from those around us and those who went before.
There is room for us all.
Carnival
Highlights from Notting Hill Carnival 2018.
And so to Notting Hill...
What an amazing event the carnival was. Nothing any camera can do will ever come close to capturing the noise and the atmosphere but the colours and sheer liveliness of carnival was amazing. A true melting pot of all the best that multi-cultural London can offer.
You can check out my images from carnival by clicking the image below:
4 From 7: no.1
If truth be told, I’ve always struggled a little bit with the idea of a blog. I set up my website as a place to share images and the blog kind of came along for the ride, like a trailer, or the family mutt, or a piece of chewing gun stuck to my shoe. Now I’m coming to realise that I don’t change the galleries as often as I should and that the blog is often the scene of some self-flagellation. I have many half formed opinions about cameras, techniques, practice, photographers, family pets, chewing gum…. but they remain half formed and unpublished.
One thing I do know is that I continue to take photos and keep on posting them on social media. And so it occurs to me that just maybe the blog space is the place to put my most recent work and see how it is received - or even just see what it looks like online. Maybe it's a modern day twist on Garry Winogrand's view that he takes photographs to see what things look like photographed by him. Perhaps this is going to become the space where I find out what things look like online, posted by me!
I always kept a diary as a kid and even into my adult life. Perhaps this blog space should be a continuation of that - a visual record of a small number of the images that I take each week. I can’t promise that I will manage to do this each week but if I keep it text light and post a few images it shouldn’t be beyond me, should it? It's a target.
I am going to limit myself to four images from the previous seven days - hence 4 from 7; and this is the first.
Like Buses
No posts for a while and then two in one day…
Just a short one to mention how honoured I am to have been listed in the list of Top 10 UK Street Photography Blogs. For me, it’s a real honour to be mentioned alongside the likes of Linda Wisdom (Linda Wisdom Photography) and Max Gor (maxgor.com).
Do check them out and the other great UK photographers in the list. And pass them on…
Thanks,
Hugh.
Brilliant Mistake
Since watching the Champions League Final I have been thinking a lot about making mistakes. For the uninterested football avoiders or those who have been dormant for whatever reason, Liverpool goalkeeper Loris Karius made two catastrophic errors which effectively cost his side the game and the trophy. Uninterested football avoiders please bear with me.
Goalkeeper has to be the most vulnerable position in football. Most mistakes are immediately punished. And punishment is swift and harsh, particularly from your own fans. Football fans have long memories. An outfield player, on the other (ungloved) hand, is given more leeway. The tragedy of this situation is that for Karius this will almost certainly have been the biggest match in his career and he will probably be forever remembered for it. It will take some spectacular keeping in matches and seasons to come to change people’s memories.
Karius won’t agree with me right now, I’m sure, but I think mistakes can be brilliant. Aren’t they how you learn? Take riding a bike; your body’s muscle memory soon learns what to avoid if it wants to make skimmed knees and bleeding elbows things of the past. Take making a curry; too spicy and it’s unpalatable - you go easy next time. Travel overnight to that once in a lifetime sunrise without a battery for your camera - you check next time (and every time thereafter). It’s these mistakes that help you focus your skills into becoming a better cyclist, curry chef, photographer....
The important thing is that when things go wrong you look at why they went wrong and you go again. You get back on that bike. By doing that, you are making sure that you learn from that mistake.
The mistake becomes your best teacher.
Street photography is high paced with scenes opening and closing before you in the blink of a 1/500 shutter. You often don’t have time to think about what you have just shot, let alone check it in the viewfinder, before the next three scenes establish themselves in front of you. There is little time to learn as you go. The exception is the mistake that actually prevents you getting the shot. How often have you you switched the camera off then continued to shoot nothing? Forgotten to remove the lens cap for that best shot of the day? These things all happen to all of us and we shrug and move on, vowing never to make the same mistake again.
The time to learn from mistakes is very often later on - pausing for a coffee and checking back on the screen or when the images appear in the darkroom or computer monitor. That’s when you get a chance to critically review your work. Some mistakes you can correct with increasingly sophisticated software - under/over exposure probably being the key fixable error. Other mistakes you just have to make the best of or give up on but put right next time. If you are shooting a familiar place then you can probably make sure you position yourself better next time. If it was a one off situation, you just have to accept that your mistake will be burned into your memory and you will avoid making the same one next time.
It’s worth saying, at this point, that street photography is a very hard task master and is pretty unforgiving in its hit rate. Most of what I shoot is not for public consumption because it falls short of what I had envisaged and of what I would want anyone else to see. It is always disheartening to download a day’s worth of images and then sift the ones that are keepers. There are so few. Some are mediocre at best. The vast majority are immediately deleted.
Thankfully, we forget the ones we delete. It’s the select few that we go to work on - processing to a greater or lesser degree - and its these images that embed themselves in our memories and on our hard drives.
And just occasionally, a mistake turns out to be a hit. Regular readers/viewers of my work will know that I am drawn to windows for framing, for giving glimpses into interior worlds and sometimes for the reflections. The problem with shooting into windows is very often that what you see with your naked eye is different to what the camera sees. This can lead to disaster or a fortuitous happenstance, as in today’s picture. I was wanting a shot of the lady (btm right) and her friend (edited out to the left) but the reflections had other plans. I think it works.
It’s good to keep learning - not just in photography but in all we do - and mistakes are an integral part of that. When we are afraid to try, for fear of failing, we will learn nothing. After all, penicillin was a happy accident - a brilliant mistake.
Heightened Perspective.
When Henri Cartier Bresson was asked about what made a great composition he simply replied “Geometry.”
I had this in mind when I found myself staying in a 34th floor apartment in Toronto recently. The view across the city and to the next door CN Tower was amazing. However, it was the view immediately below that fascinated me. I was transfixed by the ant-like people. They manoeuvred themselves along the busy streets, stopping at junctions and then beginning their immaculately choreographed street dance again. All of this movement was punctuated by the road markings and street furniture which would not even be worth a second glance for a local resident. To a tourist and street photographer, these were things of beauty.
It’s a great gift to photographers that new places allow you to see things with the fresh eyes denied to the locals. I loved the yellow and red taxis, the yellow fire hydrants, the stop signs, billboards and fire engines. Those colours just ... popped!
My usual street photography set up involves a 35mm equivalent lens on my Fuji x100f. However, that would have been useless up there. Instead I reached for a 300mm lens; something that would be impractical and highly unusual in street photography where Capa’s maxim of getting in close is sacrosanct. I needed those 300 millimetres to frame the shots I wanted; shutting out so much of the busy streets and just focusing on the geometry below.
Something a little different from me - but all the more satisfying for it.
Featured...
I’ve pulled together articles and links to features about my street photography.
Here are some links to articles or features about me and my work:
Kris Karl Photography Podcast:
I am lucky enough to have been featured twice on Kris’s podcast. You can listen to them here
Article about my work on Streetphotography.com by Sergio Burns
https://streetphotography.com/adventures-start-street-photography-hugh-rawson/
Interview and images on The Pictorial List Mag
https://www.thepictorial-list.com/post/interview-hugh-rawson
Featured in Digital Photographer magazine Issue 195.
Never a dull moment.
I find that when I go out specifically to take photos that I can’t allow myself other distractions or it just doesn’t work. I’m not the kind of photographer who can listen to headphones while I shoot (much as I wish I could) or text, eat, drink or any of the other things which seem to count as essential to modern life. Maybe it’s a bloke thing - after all, I’m not half as good at multi-tasking as my wife or female colleagues. I have to be in the zone and focused on just that one task.
I am rarely bored. Whenever I find I have time on my hands, my camera seems to magically create a host of photographic opportunities. If I’m alone, even in the most familiar of places, give me time and a camera and suddenly the scene has great potential. It doesn’t matter if I’ve never been there before or I know the place like the back of my hand. There is aways something to see.
Obviously, having time means I will look around and notice things that otherwise may never have caught my eye. Throw a little patience into the equation and, of course, opportunities will appear the longer I wait.
This morning, sitting alone in a cafe I know well, I became aware, for the first time, of the light coming through the doors. These are doors I’ve walked through many times. This time I was alone, with time to kill. That light was just waiting for the right character to silhouette themselves there. And suddenly my morning was transformed.
London Light - Feb 2018
My blog thus far has tended to be philosophical ramblings about photography; musings on settings and gear; or the occasional “how to.” That probably begins to explain why blogging tends to happen fortnightly - fitting around the day job and collecting my thoughts gets in the way.
I have decided that perhaps the blog space is the place to try posting photos that I have been taking recently with a view to seeing how they look published, out there in the world, for all to see. Be prepared for more photos and and more posts - though just as many words.
Last Saturday I was in London with the camera, though not specially to take photos - this was a family outing. The trusty Fuji x100f is never far from my hands. The light was fantastic, even if the clear blue skies meant the air was shockingly cold, making holding a camera a challenge at times. I can’t do gloves. Gloves seem to introduce some kind of layer between camera and brain - as well as between hand and camera. I just can’t seem to function properly as a photographer in them.
Here is a mix of colour and black and white images from the day - all shot around South Kensington and Brompton Road.
Working the scene - fishing for photos.
Most street photographers will favour one method of shooting over another. First, there are the "hunters" who go out looking to see what they might find and satisfy themselves with unplanned, unexpected stolen moments that happen to come their way. They rarely stand still and will walk around following their noses, the light or an interesting character or scene as it plays out.
Then there are the "fishers" who will go out specifically to work a location or scene. This may be somewhere that they have been successful before or somewhere that they have made note of and planned to visit for some time. It may be a chance discovery which anchors them for a while until they are satisfied that they have what they came for. Some will wait a short time, but many will wait patiently for an hour or more until they are satisfied that they have what they came for.
Temperament must play a part in whether a street photographer is more hunter or fisher. The weather must surely be significant too. I suspect that there are more fishers in sunny Mediterranean climes than there are in London.
Personally, I am more of a hunter. I get restless and bored in one place unless there is a lot going on. Waiting for a character to enter a scene (who may or may not turn up) fills my mind with all the images I could be getting if I moved on and found something else to shoot. Furthermore, if I stay put I risk being moved on or arousing suspicion. Easier to keep moving.
Like all hunters or fishers, I can change style if I find the right circumstances. And one of my photographical resolutions for 2018 was to slow down. So... nothing for it then!
On Monday I was shooting around the City of London. The light was fabulous - strong and directional through the towering monuments to capitalism. In one dark walkway there was a reflected rainbow of sunlight from a high window that slanted across the pavement like some heavenly dancefloor. It was just waiting for the right feet to break the rhythm. As you can see, I stayed for some minutes and enjoyed the carnival of legs and feet that tripped their way through that fabulous light. The problem is that I now find myself unable to decide between a gallery of similar shots. Three are posted above.
How about you? Hunter, fisher or bit of both. Let me know.
It Don't Mean A Thing If It Ain't Got That Swing.
Jazz and Cocktails. London, Jan 2018.
“Writing about music is like dancing about architecture. It’s a stupid thing to want to do.” Elvis Costello says; at least he is just one of several musicians who this quote has been attributed to. The more attributes, the more pertinent - perhaps. So, if writing about music is like dancing about architecture, how about writing about photography? And what about about the connections between jazz and street photography? That is what is currently occupying one partially lit corner of my mind.
Many great photographers have shot evocative images of many great jazz musicians, it's true - deep blacks, crisp rim-shot whites, all filtered through a haze of filter-less Gitanes smoke. You can almost hear the flattened fifths of the tenor saxophone. The music and the stylised black and whites take us back to a bygone age when cigarette smoke was de rigeur and a kipper tie, pork pie hat and blacked out shades was the uniform of the new school of jazz. But that particular alley is not where we are heading.
Instead, I want to explore the connections between jazz and shooting on the street.
Music and photography both have their own distinct subcultures or genres, each demanding a different appreciation and I think there are similarities here. Take landscape photography. This requires a considered approach, taking time, preparation and precision to create the greatest images. In this it is a kin to classical music. The holiday snapshot; surely that’s pop music. Immediate, brash, unsophisticated for the most part, disposable yet relevant and life enhancing. Street photography must be jazz.
Jazz relies on certain rules or forms. Structures are learned - scales, cycles, blue notes - forwards and backwards and around. Well known songs, standards, are revisited time and time again as new elements are unearthed and discovered or rediscovered by new bloods eager to make themselves heard. It requires a great deal of technical proficiency. These structures are echoed in street photography with its foundation in other genres of photography and of visual art - the rules of composition, the work of the greats on whose giant shoulders the photographer attempts to climb.
Perhaps the defining feature of jazz is its reliance upon improvisation. True, this is not confined to jazz. Classicists will tell you that the great composers created frameworks for improvisation. However, it is improvisation which defines jazz. This, to me, is where the arcs of jazz and street photography swing closest to one another.
The dictionary will tell you that improvisation can mean making do. Who would want to sit on an improvised chair, or tuck into an improvised meal? Improvisation in jazz is not about making do. Far from it; but it is about making, creating something afresh. It is about an artist at the peak of his/her powers, creating something on the spot whilst referencing the traditions that preceded them and demonstrating their technical prowess in response to a given situation. It means a high level of technical proficiency combined with a high level of creativity.
Isn’t this what the street photographer does? In creating a new image, they bring to bear the knowledge of every image they have ever been influenced by. They use their technical expertise coupled with the inside-out knowledge of their camera, each button and lever falling into place instinctively just as the keys of every piano or saxophone do in the hands of the most skilled jazz musician. And they do this instantaneously; responding to whatever happens along.
It is this ability to react quickly to whatever is going on around them which makes a great street photographer or great jazz musician. It is part anticipation, part learned technique and part luck. The challenge is to rearrange the world into something beautiful from whatever ingredients you are handed at the time.
The moment of creation is one of stepping off into the void. For a jazz musician, it means being able to imagine the sounds before they have been made; for a photographer it is about envisaging the image before the shutter is pressed. Nether moment is repeatable in quite the same way. This is what puts the energy into the piece or the image. This is where the excitement lies.
Perhaps most significantly, jazz also likes to throw away the rules. At its most free, it is simply a celebration of sound and reaction to an environment. Street photography, too, is at its most creative and innovative when it bends the rules, breaks the structures and surprises our expectations. A celebration, a riot of light.
As the great Charlie Parker said: “They teach you there’s a boundary line to music. But, man, there’s no boundary line to art.”
Jazz has always doffed its pork-pie hat to tradition but forged bravely forwards into new territories and this, to me, is what street photography does best.
Talking Crop
Talking Crop. Should you? Do you? Whisper it...
At a recent talk about my street photography one of the questions I was asked was "Do you crop?" This was clearly the litmus test. Would I be seen as a street photographer true to the code, or was I some kind of imposter? They’d listened to me talk for the best part of an hour. I’d shown my photos; talked about focal lengths, shutter speed; I'd mentioned the greats. Here it was - all distilled to this one moment.
The room was silent. I looked at my shoes. Then, head up, I said it.
"I crop."
Done. It’s out there.
I crop. I know that this can be a crime tantamount to murder in some avenues of street photography. But hear me out.
Today’s cameras are capable of shooting in such amazing detail - look what you can do with 16, 20, 24 megapixels. The detail is incredible, allowing you to zoom in and crop while still retaining great clarity. If I’m carrying a camera with a fixed lens or one camera without a bag full of lenses then the shot I want may well be compromised or impossible with the gear have on me. And there isn’t always time to zoom with my legs and walk closer. Being able to crop in gets round this and brings the shot I envisaged to reality.
The stricter street photographers will say that a photograph should not be cropped or straightened or altered in any way. I disagree. I am not a documentary photographer (even they will turn their focus to the riot at one end of the street and choose to frame an image without the quiet Sunday shoppers at the other end). My aim is not to record every small detail with great accuracy. My aim is to create the feeling of what I experienced on the street. It is subjective. It is how I saw it, how I felt it or, as Bruce Gilden might say, “smelt it.” I don’t see myself as some kind of street scientist, forensically documenting minutiae. No; I see myself as an artist, recreating a scene as I experienced it or as it moved me. Otherwise, I’d get a job watching video screens of CCTV footage.
Resolutions: 2018
Having allowed myself the indulgence of reflecting in my last blog it only seems right to think about the challenge of resolutions for the new year that has just started. I’m not talking about any of that dry January, veganuary, or any other personal “anuary” stuff but purely about a photographic perspective. However, it is a subjective consideration of where I need to put in some hours and resolve to improve my work with the camera. Join in if you want to.
It’s always good to begin a list with at least one thing you can tick off already so straight in at number one is “Enter more competitions.” Of course, the more bit is the easy bit here because even one competition entered would mark a massive percentage increase on last year’s zero competitions entered - but I am delighted to announce that I can already tick this particular resolutionary box. I succeeded in entering three candid street shots into the Sony World Photography Exhibition, sneaking in just hours before the deadline of 1.00 p.m. GMT on Thursday 4th January.
This is one of my favourite events of the last few years, visiting the exhibition each April/May in Somerset House with a couple of good camera comrades. I’d definitely recommend it if you haven’t been before. How incredible (unbelievable) it would be to see an image of mine represented this year.
Of course, there will have to be other competitions entered to really feel that I have fully embraced the whole resolution thing.
Number Two - Slow Down. Something I’m not particularly good at - which is probably why I’m more Mister Street than Mister Landscape, Mister Macro or Mister Portrait. I habitually shoot at a fairly fast shutter speed (1/500th) as I ricochet through town centres. I don’t want to stop that completely but I am aware that there are times when taking a more considered approach will pay off. Heck - I could even bring the viewfinder to my eye from time to time, like a real photographer. I think this may also mean carrying two cameras and shooting slowly with a longer focal length. I have the beautiful Fujinon xf56mm f1.4 lens which is equivalent to an 85mm full frame lens and produces beautifully creamy bokeh. I’ve tried shooting fast and furious with it from the hip - gunslinger style - but I miss almost every time. If I could slow down and shoot from further away, taking my time to compose and get just the right shot, it would bring a new style to my work with compressed foreground and a magical fall off.
Number Three - I’m sure I’m not alone in feeling that I only know part of my camera. There’s so much more that I could utilise if I only knew how. I can get it to do the things I need fairly quickly but my needs are simple and mainly based around getting a quick result. However, I know that there are shortcuts and settings that would help if I took the time to get my head around them. I read other people talking about how they’ve customised their settings or watch You Tube clips of magic fingered photographers working their camera like it’s some kind of Rubik's cube. I could never do them either. An afternoon by the fire, working out my optimal settings, is probably all it needs - there just always seem to be better things to do with an afternoon.
Number Four - is a processing issue. It seems that most people think of my work as black and white. That’s fine. I love monochrome. But I do love colour too and some of my favourite photographers have a real strength in colour - Saul Leiter, Harry Gruyaert, Ernst Haas, Alex Webb, Fred Herzog. I know I like my flavours strong and perhaps that’s the problem. I find it all too easy to overdo colour processing. I think it’s finished and publish it; then I look at it and feel that I’ve overdone it again. More subtle in 2018, that’s the plan.
Number Five - keep on keeping on. By this I mean to continue taking the kind of shots I want to look at; photographing for me and not for anyone else. This way I will continue to develop my own style and voice. I know I’m good at getting close - often too close that I lose the setting - but maybe I should step back a bit to contextualise a shot and then not be afraid to crop in should I need to; perhaps take some of the clutter out of a shot and focus on the key elements of an image.
So, there are my photographic resolutions laid bare. What about you? What will you change?