emraphoto
Veteran
I consider hip-shooting to be a term indicative of any type of shooting that does not involve using/looking through the viewfinder. When I hip-shoot, I rarely put the camera at my hip, because the point of view it renders is that of a small child. I prefer to shoot with the camera somewhere between my chin and my chest and often held near either shoulder, but I'll use any position necessary. If you're familiar with the focal length, you can compose a shoot accurately without using the VF.
There's nothing wrong with it. It's a great technique to use, and every photographer should get comfortable using it.
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very cool photograph!
I do whatever I need to do to get the shot I want... if it means shooting from the hip because I'm too timid to approach a particular person, I may do it. I prefer to be blatant about what I'm photographing...but it would be dishonest for me to say I never shoot from the hip.
dreilly
Chillin' in Geneva
Probably we're mixing up "shooting from the hip" with "shooting surreptitiously. The thread is clearly about the latter, since where the camera is in relation to the rest of the photographers body is not really relevant to the moral issues. Then again, I can imagine it could be... :^O
hteasley
Pupil
Morality should never be so inflexible as to forbid honest art. Capturing public life, if that is your intent, cannot be immoral.
There are things you could do with street photography that could cross a line: only shooting womens' chests leaps to mind immediately as likely taking street photography someplace where it would be hard to justify.
The method used is irrelevant. Is a hip shot with an autofocus P&S even *more* immoral, due to its greater ease and likelihood of successful focus for non-experts?
There are things you could do with street photography that could cross a line: only shooting womens' chests leaps to mind immediately as likely taking street photography someplace where it would be hard to justify.
The method used is irrelevant. Is a hip shot with an autofocus P&S even *more* immoral, due to its greater ease and likelihood of successful focus for non-experts?
FrankS
Registered User
user237428934
User deletion pending
You're absolutely right here. That was my intention. Shooting from the hip is just another method of not beeing noticed taking a photo.
There were a lot of comments about other "stealth approaches" we discuss here day by day. Rangefinder vs. DSLR, no logo, using a tele lens, ...
After reading all this it's clear to me that I mixed together the stealth aspect and mixed feelings about street photography in general. Very good thoughts and photos in this thread. Perhaps I think too much about it instead of just doing it.
user237428934
User deletion pending
I try to train the technique just in case something really valuable comes along.
user237428934
User deletion pending
claacct
Well-known
Lets deal with this question in the typical German philosophical tradition of Immanuel Kant.
Would you wish for hip shooting to become a universal picture taking method? in other words would you have any objection if someone else photographed you, your family, your kids in such manner? If the answer is no, then its moral from your perspective.
In my case, if I catch somebody photographing my loved ones, my kids in such manner, I'll break their camera over their head and then take them to the police, and I assure you they'd have a very hard time explaining their hip shots... In other words, in my case its immoral.
Would you wish for hip shooting to become a universal picture taking method? in other words would you have any objection if someone else photographed you, your family, your kids in such manner? If the answer is no, then its moral from your perspective.
In my case, if I catch somebody photographing my loved ones, my kids in such manner, I'll break their camera over their head and then take them to the police, and I assure you they'd have a very hard time explaining their hip shots... In other words, in my case its immoral.
RanceEric
The name is Rance
Why so violent?? If it's just a photograph.. I never understood why someone would get so angry about simply being photographed on the street.And in that situation, I think you would be the one who would be taken to the police..
boffen
Established
Someone would have a hard time explaining themselves, but it wouldn't be the photographer.
claacct
Well-known
Trust me, most cops are family people with kids and they'd find it very hard to side with a creepy hip shooter vs an enraged parent.
FalseDigital
BKK -> Tokyo
I only shoot from the crotch.
zauhar
Veteran
And in that situation, I think you would be the one who would be taken to the police..
I have noticed that people are remarkably irritable about having their picture taken. As I have remarked elsewhere, I think it is a reflection of the anonymous control and persistent humiliation of people in our society. The ghetto obsession with "respect" is the rawest reaction to our society's structural dehumanization of its people. Point a camera at someone, and they again feel dehumanized and treated as an object - but now they have YOU to blame for it. Finally, someone to lash out at!
While I fully believe the words I just wrote, I have no qualms about taking someone's photo if it will produce an interesting image. I think I should forget this morality stuff and start shooting from the hip!
Randy
Roger Hicks
Veteran
Quite. Common assault is hard to justify, even to 'family people with kids'. The cop is there to enforce the law, not to pander to the irrational prejudices of 'enraged parents'.
Only on a very few occasions have I ever had anyone complain about my taking their picture, and the joke is that the shrillest and angriest of them had not, in fact, been anywhere near the picture I was taking. In fact, I couldn't even see her (or anyone else) in the picture: she came up behind me. Some people are just so permanently angry that they don't need a reason to start screaming and yelling, just an excuse. At that, it needn't be an excuse that anyone else can understand.
Cheers,
R.
Roger Hicks
Veteran
shadowfox
Darkroom printing lives
Shooting from the hip is a technique, we cannot derive or infer morality from it.
What people use it for, can be evaluated against some standards of morality.
Which then comes the question, which standard are we talking about here?
What people use it for, can be evaluated against some standards of morality.
Which then comes the question, which standard are we talking about here?
RanceEric
The name is Rance
I would hardly say shooting from the hip is "creepy".. and going off of Roger's post, I think any family person with kids would all sympathy the second you laid your hands on said shooter..
RanceEric
The name is Rance
I'm always afraid of that kind of reaction from people, but in my experience shooting on the street, I have only had positive reactions from people.. smiles, waves, etc.
claacct
Well-known
While breaking the camera over someone's head was clearly an exaggeration that seems to have missed the mark, which is typical of the sour mood of this forum's denizens, but nonetheless giving a creepy hip shooter a dressing down in public, and then calling the cops on him is in fact very much in order... And I insist on the word 'creepy', because hip shooting is creepy!
Don't do it!
Don't do it!