Shooting from the hip

[Keith]

Dan, "hip shot" is a collective term for shots taken without looking through the viewfinder, not necessarily from hip level. One can take uninteresting pictures from nearly any elevation.

I always thought it was shots taken by 'hipsters' with their Holgas ... have I missed something here?

 

[andredossantos]

So to the people who do not like the low angle perspectives of a hip shot: do you not like street photos taken with a TLR because of their low angle even though they are not a hip shot since the photographer is framing via the ground glass?

 

[Brian Legge]

I'm not sure how people can look at some of the pictures in this thread and think 'these is a boring/repetitive shot'.

I don't shoot from the hip too often. My most success has been with a 35RC where the camera was small enough that cupping it in my hands as I walked felt and looked somewhat natural. Holding it pointing straight forward, I can have a relatively a rough sense of the composition. I've only done this when shooting f/5.6-11 though.

In situations with a lot of cameras around, I'll usually be more traditional but if the act of lifting a camera to my eye is changing the scene, I'll shoot from the hip. Or point the camera, focus and set up, then wait and look away as the subject comes into the frame. I can't control their framing quite as well, but it often results in a more relaxed, natural shot.

 

[Chris101]

I always thought it was shots taken by 'hipsters' with their Holgas ... have I missed something here?

That too Keith. But Holgas are too cheap for real hipsters. RH prefer Lomos or better yet, vintage Dianas bought off ebay for more than most Leicas go for!

 

[craygc]

I make no excuses for it, and I shoot blind a lot. Fundamentally, a lot of shots you just cant get without shooting this way. Know your lens(es) and practice, practice, practice. Of course they're not all perfect or even useable but without the technique I wouldnt have many of the shots I do...

Here's a link to some work of a friend of mine in Hong Kong. The series is called "Shooting Blind" and was done with a FF DSLR and a manual focus Zeiss 50 f/1.4 - and all these shots were taken at f/1.4 and shot from the hip. A little harder than the usual f/5.6, f/8 hip shots we see.

Shooting Blind

 

[Keith]

I went out with my Leica II and 15mm Heliar today to do some hip shooting ... but only next door at my neighbour's property. In an absence of people I decided to use her goat and her pet sheep as subjects.

The sheep was quite cooperative but the goat tried to kill me ... and you people think street photography can be risky at times!

 

[Michael Markey]

one thing I hate about hip shots is how it makes the photographer look like he's 3 feet tall. the world is not very interesting when viewed from waist level, imo.

Funny enough I`ve just finished a book called "Shooting from the hip" by Alias Johnnny Stiletto who takes the opposite view even going as far as to say that a fair few of the most successful photographers were themselves of below average height thus giving their shots a better perspective.
Capa wasn`t tall neither is Bailey
Quote "Most interesting photographs are three feet below your eye. Down at waist level it`s a world of perfect perspectives and strong eye lines."
He feels that the look down into the box cameras made better shots.
He suggests that on a film set the camera is something that you look into which has nothing to do with small camera operators but the fact that the world looks better that way.

 

[dyao]

well, to be more specific - the kind of hip shot from the belly where the camera is tilted upward to capture the face, but the focus of the picture seems to be on the belly- that's the kind I don't like. in fact, I've been to an exhibition of the photographer cray linked to, and did not find it to be my cup of tea at all due to this effect. you'll notice with johnny stiletto that most of his shots tend to be of people sitting down, so that they're brought more in level with the camera.

vivian mayer is a great photographer whom I admire who photographed with a TLR - yet her pictures seem to be taken from the chest level and from a distance, and when she does get close, the skewing of the perspective of shooting from a chest level doesn't seem to draw your attention away from the content.

 

[Renzsu]

well, to be more specific - the kind of hip shot from the belly where the camera is tilted upward to capture the face, but the focus of the picture seems to be on the belly- that's the kind I don't like. in fact, I've been to an exhibition of the photographer cray linked to, and did not find it to be my cup of tea at all due to this effect. you'll notice with johnny stiletto that most of his shots tend to be of people sitting down, so that they're brought more in level with the camera.

vivian mayer is a great photographer whom I admire who photographed with a TLR - yet her pictures seem to be taken from the chest level and from a distance, and when she does get close, the skewing of the perspective of shooting from a chest level doesn't seem to draw your attention away from the content.

Yup, but you see, that's technique.
Good technique will help you get better pictures, no matter how you end up shooting them. I'm not saying I'm good at it, but I think it's only fair to keep trying and I definitely see my work improving because of it. It also makes me think more about composing shots when I'm not shooting blind. Do you always want to lift your camera up high, or do you want to lower yourself, or maybe even raise the camera higher?

To those here who are just dismissing hipshots because they're 'easy' or 'not fair', well, that reeks of pretentiousness to me, and perhaps even and overestimation of ones own skills.

 

[SimonSawSunlight]

You can't capture everything, you decide on what falls in the frame and that is your picture... You should know that no one is pressuring you to capture everything. don't treat yourself like a worker who must have a certain level of productivity. Photography has never been about quantity, its always quality. some of the top photographers would be happy to have one or two great pictures, five is really the highest level and only people like HCB hit ten or more.

I'm afraid the answer is yes. But forget about me, if tomorrow you wish to put a portfolio together and send it some places or show it to some of the experienced photographers, they will be "very" particular about this issue -I'm talking of lets say a magnum workshop or something of that level.

There is also the issue of are you a good photographer or an editor, you can shoot a lot FTH and then skillfully edit later, but would you still feel good about those photos and be proud of them? I think these are issues that you have to deal with if you take photography seriously and raise above the common lax amateur circles.

please don't teach me about how my attitude towards photography should be (especially since you probably do not know much about my attitude anyway) and what I have and do not have to do. I also never said that quantity counts more than quality (what a strange argument anyway, since people like HCB did take quite a couple more than 5 frames during their lifetime, no matter how many of them you consider 'great'. this says nothing about quantity vs quality.)...

I'm still not sure I understand, I always thought it was the shot that counted. If someone delivers the demanded quality for a job (or for his own satisfaction alone) by shooting from the hip occasionally (or a lot even), why should it make a great picture less valuable. it's not more dishonest than anything else.
if you have a proper technique, outcome becomes rather predictable and I have never heard of an editor that would dump a picture he wanted for page 1 after you tell it's been taken without looking through the viewfinder.
you know, with a rangefinder camera, you're not seeing what will be on the photograph anyway (the outcome is only 'rather predictable' as well). so your argument leads to a statement like "only SLRs can deliver real good and honest photography" (and only if you have stopped down to check DOF before taking the shot).
what about cameras without viewfinders? do these take less valuable photographs by definition?
this is all too much 1 vs 0, I'm out of the discussion...

 

[dogbunny]

Funny enough I`ve just finished a book called "Shooting from the hip" by Alias Johnnny Stiletto who takes the opposite view even going as far as to say that a fair few of the most successful photographers were themselves of below average height thus giving their shots a better perspective.
Capa wasn`t tall neither is Bailey
Quote "Most interesting photographs are three feet below your eye. Down at waist level it`s a world of perfect perspectives and strong eye lines."
He feels that the look down into the box cameras made better shots.
He suggests that on a film set the camera is something that you look into which has nothing to do with small camera operators but the fact that the world looks better that way.

And 3 feet tall--that's about the height of a six-year-old, an interesting perspective for sure.

 

[Carlos M]

People who use zooms or change lenses every two minutes will have some problem with this.
This is where a "one lens, one year" exercise would help. Know your lens!

FTH.

 

[Nikkor AIS]

12 Voigtlander ASAPH on Leica M9 (from the hip and to the side)







Shooting from the hip is an interesting and challenging way of shooting.

 

[Arjay]

You wrote this in reply to my post #29 on the previous page:

When you look through the viewfinder, you decide what would be in the frame, you compose and arrange things, you decide where your subject would be in the frame, you decide to frame horizontally or vertically, use shallow dof or long etc... you make all these decisions, even if its in fraction of a second. But what has happened is that by taking that picture you have tried to communicate something, and used the space in the frame and what was visible through it.

Hm - I don't quite see why anyone who has practiced shooting from the hip can't make these decisions just as well. Naturally, I have to be able to have a reasonably good idea of what my camera is going to see. That takes some practice, and over time, that's by no means an unattainable goal.

Horizontal or vertical - if I have enough time to decide, I can do that too (just as in a normal shooting mode).

Shallow or deep dof - that's possible too if you have an AF-capable camera, if you have a precise understanding of how AF works and how you can program it. By the way, practically any conservative manual RF shooter would make this decision beforehand - so there's no fundamental capability difference either (except that this user would be limited to zone focusing).

The decision to communicate a certain content - to actually record an image or not - still remains with the photographer. I will only shoot scenes that appear worthwhile, and will not press the shutter unless something interesting comes my way. Just because my camera might be capable of shooting long, continuous series doesn't mean it makes sense to constantly use that feature.

That was photography on a personal level. When you shoot from the hip, what happens is that you simply aim at what you perceive to be something interesting and you shoot. you might have an idea of what it would look like, but that is not the same as seeing everything through the VF... What has happened is that you have simply allowed the camera to interpret the scene for you, you have disconnected yourself from the scene. Hence most hip shots look impersonal and detached because its not through 'your' vision that we see that world, but through the eyes of the machine -the camera.

With all due respect, but I beg to differ.

Anything I shoot, whether FTH or not, is a personal statement. The differences between the two modes of operation are only in the yield that I obtain. FTH shooting does indeed produce more shots that are garbage. No problem, I'll always edit my shots after the fact, and I'm sure you'll agree that the more ruthless the editing, the better the overall quality of the remaining shots. BTW, there's nothing wrong with including cropping and verticals correction in the editing workflow (I often leave some tolerance areas around my actual subject for this kind of editing).

As to whether these shots look personal or impersonal - that will always depend on the photographer's intentions.

One thing is for sure: My shots will always have a certain look - my look. This is because even in FTH shooting, I decide to press the shutter. The camera is only a tool which mechanically follows my instructions.

Sure, if I don't know what I'm doing, my shots will be garbage. And because that risk is real indeed, I started FTH shooting using a DSLR, where burning hiundreds of pictures doesn't hurt. Would I have started on this endeavour with a film camera, I would have to budget for a lot of film. That's a financial, not an artistic decision.

It doesn't matter if the pictures feature eye contact with the photographer or even an obvious connection between subject and photographer - all that counts is that I have made a decision to take a certain photograph. If that decision was justified, you as a viewer will be able to see that in the picture: The picture will show something noteworthy. Every viewer is capable of deciding if a picture 'works' or if it doesn't - completely independently of the shooting technique used.

Ebino's post #39:

There is also the issue of are you a good photographer or an editor, you can shoot a lot FTH and then skillfully edit later, but would you still feel good about those photos and be proud of them? I think these are issues that you have to deal with if you take photography seriously and raise above the common lax amateur circles.

Shooting and editing are two sides of the same coin. To separate one from the other would be having an overly narrow view of photography. I don't know of any competent photographer who isn't a ruthless image editor. I can only be proud of my pictures if tehy are well shot, ruthlessly selected and well edited. Completing all these stages might not make me a pro, but omitting any one of these stages will certainly make me a dillettante.

 

[Michael Markey]

well, to be more specific - the kind of hip shot from the belly where the camera is tilted upward to capture the face, but the focus of the picture seems to be on the belly- that's the kind I don't like.
you'll notice with johnny stiletto that most of his shots tend to be of people sitting down, so that they're brought more in level with the camera.

Yep ,not mine either and yes a lot of the pictures in the book are taken of people sitting down.
Who was/is this Jonny Stiletto anyway ?

 

[dyao]

I'm not sure - but I remember reading about his book awhile back and checking out his website. he has some good photos.

anyway, upon further thought, I think shooting from the hip can definitely produce some great images. I remember reading an article about Robert Frank that claimed he shot from the hip sometimes as well

it's when the photograph produced through shooting from the hip suffers from too much perspective distortion and compositional anarchy that I get off the train. to be fair, plenty of the shots that I do frame also end up not being compositionally strong. you take what you can get in photography.

 

[AgentX]

It generates boring photos. I have yet to see a good hip shot.

You can tell from looking at a photograph whether the shooter looked through the viewfinder? Cool!

 

[SimonSawSunlight]

You can tell from looking at a photograph whether the shooter looked through the viewfinder? Cool!

no. it gets boring after you found out it has been taken from the hip

 

[jsrockit]

I'm going to start shooting from my arse...

 

[umboody]

I shoot more from the waist because it suits my neck strap better. I'm starting to use this technique more when walking around. Wide angle lens, around 1/60th second, produces some interesting results. Sharp in the middle and signs of motion towards the edge.