Article and Photos by Stuart Blower © 2024
Wandering the street, and visiting public places or events, is not only about randomly pointing your camera at people or buildings, it is an opportunity to learn how to bring together elements of composition and the technical tools available on your camera, in order to create a slice of time that tells a story.
Being able to recognize multiple elements, strange juxtapositions of people and their environment colliding and interacting together and then creating a one of a kind slice of time, at the press of a button is the power of photography. The ability to capture a mood or moment in time, that will never happen exactly the same way ever again, is the essence of the photographic image.
Street photography is more about taking the opportunity to find or recognize photographs win your environment, whether you’re telling a story or finding a graphic image that affects you enough to pause for a second. It’s not just about snapping people it’s about snapping people with purpose. That purpose comes from many factors including a realization about what the lighting is doing where the lights is coming from and how it interacts with the person or the object
Once you have the lighting or exposure down then it’s important to ask. How do you tell the story? Can you just catch people moving and snap the picture when something looks interesting. Do you have to change your shutter speed so that you can slow so you can slow down and show people in motion do you want to change your aperture to have more or less in focus as part of zeroing in on what you believe the actual story is? The answer is “Yes”
Using “Depth of Field”
Candid street photography can depend on “A zone of Focus”, where you can set your focussing at a predetermined distance and then snap images as people walk through that zone. The highlight of this technique is that you can simply aim from waste level.
If you use a wide open aperture, you don’t have a lot of things in focus except the one single main thing. This depends on the lens that you’re using, but it is a tool you can use to improve your composition. But you will be more obvious when you are pointing your camera.
Selecting a Shutter Speed
A fast speed will stop motion. It could be your own motion or what you are photographing. The opposite is also useful, slowing down that shutter speed, so the camera lens stays open longer, allows you to show other people in motion. Maybe that becomes your story drawing attention to something moving.
How do you record something moving? There’s two ways you stand still and they walk by you and create a blur, or you “Pan” with them so they are sharp and everything around them is blurred.
These two requirements of shutter and aperture working together are the two main elements in creating pictures with pleasing composition. This is why you go on a street walk it’s a challenge to yourself to pay attention to how you can record images.
Photographing People
Many street photography images do have people in them and you should not be afraid of photographing public scenes with people in them. But there are some precautions to be considered.
The easiest option is not to photograph people, avoid possible conflict. Instead concentrate on architecture and graphics. Exploring light and shadows can be a rewarding exercise. Images of people that are not recognizable or in the background are allowed.
While experimenting with Infra Red Black & White photography in downtown Woodstock, I had interesting conversions with everyone in the photo, as I explained what I was doing and how they were included. – Stuart Blower
You do have the right to photograph anybody in public street scenes, but what you do with that permission can be a hassle, especially if the subject does not share your point of view. You cannot take recognizable images of people even in public, and use them for advertising etc., without permission. In some cases of community organized events you may have to obtain permission from the organizers.
If in doubt, the best thing to do is ask permission or have a conversation with any person who may appear in your photos. Explain what you are doing and how it will be used.
Be very sensitive to whether or not, they want to be recognized or have their image distributed by media. Photographing young children and compromised individuals should not be taken for granted, without seeking prior permission.