Critique, My first street photography

[LifeIn35mm]

Hey! I started doing street photography and would like some tips on what I can do better. I would like some tips on how to make the shots focused and be able to be on a low f stop. I would also like to know to how to get people to look at the lens when I take the shot. I try to get photos of people looking at me with an expression that is not the usual blank expression I see so much. I'm using a nikon F3 with a 50mm. I know that there is a section for critiques that subscribers get to use but I would much rather give APUG a donation and make a thread for my critiques (I get more advice this way). Please, give me your best shot. I will not be offended nor will I take anything personally so please point out what is wrong with my images!! Without you it would take me a very long time to realize what I'm doing wrong. Thanks.

 

[Fixcinater]

Street is really freaking hard to do right.

I get the desire for feedback but what do YOU find interesting about these people you meet?

You seem to want portraits more than random snaps, so maybe before you take the photo of someone, you introduce yourself and build a rapport? Then you'll have an ally in making a photograph and not just a passerby who happened to step into your frame.

 

[Robclarke]

Number 6 is good. On number one I think you have missed a great moment; the lady being embraced on the right of the frame.

 

[David Allen]

The key to successful street photography is achieving interesting visual compositions of interesting moments in the ebb and flow of life.

I am sorry, but for my personal taste, the photographs that you have posted have neither.

I would suggest that you look again at each of your images and ask yourself the following questions:

• If I cut half of the image away, would it be more dynamic as a composition (i.e. am I achieving images that have an interesting visual structure).
• Are the people/events within my photographs interesting? (i.e why would someone else who was not there at the time be intrigued by what is happing in my image).

Street photography is not easy and requires a lot of practice and skill to get right. My recommendation would be to go away and look at as much successful street photography that you can find and then move forwards from there. For example, look at the images on this website:

http://fraenkelgallery.com/artists/garry-winogrand

In the first image to appear of three women walking down the street with reflections of light from the windows and the person in the wheelchair to the left, you have a dynamically graphic composition, you have interesting light, you have a dynamic between the three able bodied trendy young women and the man in the wheelchair, you have a group of people to the right completely ignoring him except for the young boy and you have a wide range of tones within the image. This image appeals on many levels. Now look at your own images and ask yourself how they compare.

Bests,

David.
www.dsallen.de

 

[baachitraka]

Nothing to worry.

Do not throw way this negative since they may provide an excellent material for learning.

Walk again and take more photographs and you will be there sooner or later.

 

[jimrohrer]

I love #1... The rest don't do much for me, but the first one's a keeper! As someone posted before me, street is not easy. Pictures of the Homeless who are unaware of the camera are just not right.
-Jim

 

[darkosaric]

It's hard photographing people when the whole American population is wearing 2 dollars worth of clothing. I've made a rule. If you're wearing a silk-screen t-shirt, you're not worth the money I have to fork out in film costs to take a picture of you. "Street photography" isn't what it once was.

I often wonder why HCB stopped photographing. Maybe he told the world what he wanted to say, maybe he really wanted to make paintings, but maybe world had changed and he told himself "world has changed, people are wearing 2$ worth of clothing" . In any case I noticed that my pictures from streets of Istanbul, Poland and Balkans are much more pleasing to me than street photos from Germany, Austria or Switzerland.


@LifeIn35mm --> go on some trip (if you can, of course) and make some photos, the senses are sharpened more when you are away from home.

 

[trythis]

shoot many rolls of film and look at them after a few months. Decide which images would be awesome blown up on a wall in your favourite museum.

When asking for criticism, don't preload your audience with your intent.
To get honest answers just ask "what do you think?" A real audience such as a book buyer or gallery customer most likely will not have you standing there telling them what you thought. The work should stand on its own and if you get used to people giving you slanted critiques it will make it harder for you in the end.

 

[Ghostman]

Since you ask for critique, I'll give you my opinion:

1 - There is no story or context here. What is she looking at? You, of course but what she's thinking is 'what's he doing?' and what you're doing doesn't interest me. What they are all doing there might.... step back, give it contex, give me something to follow.

2 - Almost exploitative. A shoe-less man in a hat and a wheelchair. Where is he though? How about some context or contrast to accentuate the plight of his misery. Any empathy I may feel from a photograph is conveyed by the photographer and not necessarily the subject. I'm not feeling you here. You took a photo of a guy in a wheelchair because he was there.

3 - Bin it

4 - See 1. Nothing to see here.

5 - I can't actually tell what's happening. It needs more story, some other detail that's going to give me something to go on

6 - Now we're getting there, I can see what's happening and it contains elements that could have been incorporated into 1 and 4. The story is here.

7 - I'm more interested in 'la dama de blanco con la bicicleta' than a random man smiling

8 - Bin it

Aside form that they could do with more focus, not just in terms of subject matter but actual visual focus.

I hope i'm not coming across to harshly, but critique should be honest. I hope that you get something out of this exercise and carry on learning.

 

[drgoose]

First a disclaimer, I like to shoot street photography and I SUCK AT IT so take my advice with a pound of salt. It is not easy to learn, try to enjoy the process of going out and shooting. Consider it an entretaining activity, shoot a lot, develop the negatives and let them sit for a week or two before you decide to work on them so you detach yourself emotionally from the effort you put into acquiring your imagrs. Be merciless with your editing, if you don't think it is an awsome picture, discard it. If you Do think it is an awsome picture, the rest of our ipinions don't matter. Enjoy!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Xmas]

Well I like them.

But as well as a shot you need a title like a cartoon in a news paper, the title needs to says it all in a few words, start with two words, four is pushing it...

The example is Weegee's 'Simply add boiling water' google of you don't know it if it was yours Id say add boiling water better.

And you need to look at each shot and crop, then ask other people is this the correct crop. Ditto for burning or dodging.

I frequently get the crop or emphasis wrong I show the whole print with crop options and burn and dodge gloss...

Your 5cm is long focus if you want peoples attention and
- people will look at you if you look at them
- some however will look at the camera whatever you do
- if you pull the camera up from waist level you will get a scowl or a smile depending on subjects attitude
- you need a deep hood even on dull days for minimum flare if you drop the camera hood helps the repair <<$, generic rubber ones are ok, and cheap.

An F3 is noisy and you may have to talk your self out of difficult situations, but sometimes I use a SLR like FM2n or F2, but mainly a Canon P though, which is quieter than a F3, and when the shutter fires it is in the can, as the cine people says.

My style is similar but mainly instinctive point, with 35mm E series or in street markets 28m /3.5. This allows you to work in closer, and get more context ie background.

You need to expect to spend all day in the street and maybe not see a shot you might want, and have a high probability of the subject being too far or too near, or mssing it, you need to concentrate and anticipate, what people are doing and what they are going to do next.

So Id start with a 35mm focused to six foot at /5.6 or /8 ... if it is too dark coffee shop. I need to blue tack lens focus rings to stop them drifting.

or 28mm at four foot /5.6 ...

But with a 5cm focused at 12 feet you have a wide radius and need to look over a larger angle and further away.

down and outs you may need to bribe with half dollar... post the shot.

Keep trying, ignore critics, unless they publish better, Weegee cheated, look at Garry Winogrand's shots, he worked in close.

 

[Pat Erson]

Unlike many other APUGers I see a lot of good things in these 8 pix.

I see a young person who's already very good at creatign what one migthc all a picture. You have a sense of composition that's quite obvious.

I also see someone who doesn't go the easy road by using a tele-lens (the "coward" lens) or using a wide-angle lens (that can produce a cheap "wow it's strange" effect). SP with a 50mm is very very hard : it's very unforgiving and you need to stand clsoe to your subjects.

I'd strongly sugegst you keep going. SP is a great (the best?) photo-school and it might take you to a photo-journalist job.

You need to find subjects that'll really require to be caught on film. From the 8 pix you offer, you don't have the ability to recognize them (yet) but I'm sure you'll get better.

And yeah bin #3, it's ugly

 

[scheimfluger_77]

Well I know nothing about street photography and am too shy to try. But #1 absolutely works. I missed the extra arms around the girl but they are not the point. The plane of focus makes the subject obviously the girl on the far right who is looking straight at you. This was an intentional focus and framing and it's unusual and dynamic, and compelling. She makes you want to look at her because of her placement in the frame.

The others don't do much for me.

 

[Xmas]

Well I know nothing about street photography and am too shy to try. But #1 absolutely works. I missed the extra arms around the girl but they are not the point. The plane of focus makes the subject obviously the girl on the far right who is looking straight at you. This was an intentional focus and framing and it's unusual and dynamic, and compelling. She makes you want to look at her because of her placement in the frame.

The others don't do much for me.

If you can see that you should be out shooting.
Try reading all the 'street' books, first then.
Go where it is crowded, 'hide' in the crowd.

Noel

 

[LifeIn35mm]

Does anyone else have any more advice?

 

[Xmas]

Move to New York.

 

[MarcParty]

Go out shooting

 

[pbromaghin]

Advice? Keep trying. You have made a good start at something I can not do well at all.

 

[analoguey]

You have already gotten some great advice above - especially @Xmas' advice about Titles.
[That "Simply add Boiling water"!!]

I am not sure if you were/are looking to make a "series" of a day out, or individual stand-out shots. Some looked like they need a story to go with them "There are these people gathered, listening to X speaking" (and additional ones to go with it) etc,..

What I liked most was #8 (on an individual basis) - the man has a goofy smile and the soft toys seemingly the exact opposite - you know best if you were looking for that, or was a lucky accident.

Shoot whatever interests you and vocalising that interest in the title (or to yourself) would probably help you refine it better.

 

[mrred]

You basicly have a good eye but need lots of practice. To get a good shot, it either comes to you or you go to it. Either sit still and shoot what is around you, or keep moving and find them. From that perspective, look at your shots again and try to remember what was going through your mind. I usually do not like mine, because I did not get the shot that was in my mind.

You have to work on your composure and technical shooting because at an instant, you have to make a decision and shoot. This takes time and practice. Just keep shooting.

I suggest finding community events that will allow you to shoot without being obvious. I used to go on "hillbilly" outings with big cars, mud pits and too much "influences". This tended to put my "subjects" in a relaxed state of mind and I could shoot so much, I had to actually pick what I wanted to shoot. Here is a link to an album that, out side of levels for the web, has not been edited (or cropped). Dead Link Removed . I remember the first time, I did over 1800 frames. That was a bit nuts for developing.

When you look at my shots above, there is little technically wrong. You want it all about composition. When It gets to be about composition, technical flaws tend not to be an issue. Most of the shots were exposed at 1600 go factor out shutter speed and DOF.

One trick I used to do for practice, was to walk around with a Kiev4a with neopan 400 (pushed to 3200). By pushing it that far, I could pre-set the focus to a general distance and the fstop and shutter speed high enough I didn't have to set it at all to shoot. That thing had a bamboo curtain and was quiet as a mouse. Great practice for shooting at the hip.

Again, keep shooting and you will get there.

 

[Ghostman]

Does anyone else have any more advice?

Observation and empathy is everything. Don't simply be a tourist in the human game reserve. You're not on safari. Feel something and when you shoot it, we will feel it too. Whether we like it or not is a different story, but we want it to make us feel.

 

[Roger Cole]

Honestly. I looked at all 8 pictures and saw none of remarkable merit. And I also took into account that you had no material to work with. It's hard photographing people when the whole American population is wearing 2 dollars worth of clothing. I've made a rule. If you're wearing a silk-screen t-shirt, you're not worth the money I have to fork out in film costs to take a picture of you. "Street photography" isn't what it once was.

Good grief.

Well my rule of thumb is that anyone who thinks less of me because I'm wearing a silk screened tee shirt is not someone who's opinion matters to me anyway.

There's such balance in nature.

 

[bvy]

Pictures of people in public doing a lot of nothing (walking, sleeping, using their phones, etc.) generally don't hold any interest for me. That contemplative or melancholy look on a person's face doesn't cut it -- unless that person has a duck on their head. The advice about waiting for the images to "cool" before developing or viewing them is good. Just because capturing the shot felt good at the time doesn't mean it is good. Look at some Winogrand or Friedlander or Cohen. Every frame is a poem, bursting with subtext, irony, wit, and so many other possibilities. Think quality, not quantity. Even the greats will tell you they dump 90% or more of what they shoot.

For my own part, I've done little candid street photography with film. When I was doing it regularly, I found a small digital camera to be perfectly suited to my style of shooting. The electronic shutter was completely silent. It was usually dialed up past 1/1000 since I was shooting on the move, and the tiny sensor meant lots of DOF and never having to focus. I never found a film camera that worked quite like that. The Olympus XA2/XA4 cameras come the closest, but even then, I always managed to draw attention to myself.

 

[pdeeh]

I don't "do" street photography, and much of what I see labelled as "street" are rather dull photographs of ordinary people going about their rather dull business. I get a bit irritable about the insistence of labelling work generically. Is it Street? Is it Urban Landscape? Is it Documentary? Is it Reportage? Really, I could not care less, the question is almost always (for me) "What does this photograph do?".

But there are some very fine pieces of street work around, and what makes them fine (to me) is either something compelling in the picture's "main subject", or a very strong composition which contextualises that subject (even if the subject is not in itself terribly compelling) - or of course a combination of the two. I don't really care much for judging photographs for their adherence to main or clear subjects either. It's either a good (interesting, fun, dull, pointless, beautiful) photo or it isn't. I don't stand in front of a Pollock whining that he hasn't delineated the main subject clearly ...

HCB isn't my favourite photographer by any means, but his eye for strong compositions is unmistakeable. He really knew how to assemble all the bits of a photograph in the frame, and how juxtaposing the geometric with the human accentuates both. Same with Ray Metzger and Don Springer.


As for your photographs, I really liked #1, but I would also ask you to consider how it looks if you "flip" it horizontally ...

So anyway

 

[Xmas]

For my own part, I've done little candid street photography with film. When I was doing it regularly, I found a small digital camera to be perfectly suited to my style of shooting. The electronic shutter was completely silent. It was usually dialed up past 1/1000 since I was shooting on the move, and the tiny sensor meant lots of DOF and never having to focus. I never found a film camera that worked quite like that. The Olympus XA2/XA4 cameras come the closest, but even then, I always managed to draw attention to myself.

tusk tusk...

https://www.cameraquest.com/LeicaM4G.htm

When you push the button, it is in the can, if the subject:

- complains and wants it deleted you point it at the back of the M and say it is a film camera...
- but most ladies give you a very knowing look when you shoot them doing something bad like licking fingers...
- some males can be aggressive, but Ive never had to tell any one that I'm a judo expert, BTW I'm not...

A Canonet or similar trapped needle rangefinder or point and shoot is a lot quieter, but frequently I use a SLR e.g. FM2n or Canon P both with penetrating staccato noise from metal shutters ( and mirror in the Nikon) The swing open back are faster to reload, than a M, the 36 shots is the major limitation with film.

Sometimes I use a 28mm /2.8 Canon LTM in memory of Garry but I don't have an M4.