MikeDimit
Established
🙂)) I do think the couple in the backstage is supportive!
Street Shooting
- Thread starter Bill Pierce
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nightfly
Well-known
The goal in street photography, at least the way I practice it, is to get the camera out of the way so I can just react to what I'm seeing this is why I bought a Leica in the first place.
So when shooting with an M4-P that means 28 or 35mm lens with Tri-X mostly but color sometimes, with the shutter speed at 250 or so and then moving the aperture as the light changes and using the distance scale. This has been the most successful method for me and I can do it unthinkingly and nail the exposure.
With a Ricoh GR-1, it's basically the same.
As I move to digital I try and duplicate this which is what got me to get an m9 and it works pretty much the same.
With my GRD3 which I use a lot, I wavier between using either shutter priority or aperture priority or increasingly manual mode.
Thing is that with film I can usually guess exposure pretty well, even with slide film, I don't really intuitively know how to expose digital to get it the way I like it. I feel like digital ISO is a lie. Exposures shot at ISO 800 at say 250 and f4.5 that would have been perfect on film are very underexposed on digital or at least on the GRD3.
Also I never ask for permission or do street portraits. To me, I need several elements in the scene to make viable for me as street photography, it's the interaction of people, light shadow and the city itself. But that's my personal bias.
So when shooting with an M4-P that means 28 or 35mm lens with Tri-X mostly but color sometimes, with the shutter speed at 250 or so and then moving the aperture as the light changes and using the distance scale. This has been the most successful method for me and I can do it unthinkingly and nail the exposure.
With a Ricoh GR-1, it's basically the same.
As I move to digital I try and duplicate this which is what got me to get an m9 and it works pretty much the same.
With my GRD3 which I use a lot, I wavier between using either shutter priority or aperture priority or increasingly manual mode.
Thing is that with film I can usually guess exposure pretty well, even with slide film, I don't really intuitively know how to expose digital to get it the way I like it. I feel like digital ISO is a lie. Exposures shot at ISO 800 at say 250 and f4.5 that would have been perfect on film are very underexposed on digital or at least on the GRD3.
Also I never ask for permission or do street portraits. To me, I need several elements in the scene to make viable for me as street photography, it's the interaction of people, light shadow and the city itself. But that's my personal bias.
02Pilot
Malcontent
I shoot a variety of focal lengths between 21 and 50, more often 50 (various) or 42 (Olympus 35SP). My normal daytime settings are f/5.6 or f/8 and 1/125, pre-focused at 3m/10ft; on Tri-X this guarantees me shadow detail in most light. I like to shoot fast; I rarely stop walking, and I sometimes use a Voigtländer Kontur auxiliary VF with a 50 to shoot with both eyes open to maintain situational awareness. I'm not concerned with overall sharpness in street photography, so I willingly compromise it in order to make sure I can shoot on the move.
I did a little bit of night shooting recently with HP5+ rated at 1600 and a Canon L1 with a Serenar 50/1.9 shot wide open (see example below). I pre-focused as a baseline, though I did make adjustments when I had time. Sharpness was never going to be achieved, but I was very pleased with the atmosphere of the photos. The experience made me realize that the look of street photography is really important to me, not perfecting the exposure or the focus. The tolerance of B&W film makes it possible for me to think first about what I'm shooting, not how my equipment is set.
I did a little bit of night shooting recently with HP5+ rated at 1600 and a Canon L1 with a Serenar 50/1.9 shot wide open (see example below). I pre-focused as a baseline, though I did make adjustments when I had time. Sharpness was never going to be achieved, but I was very pleased with the atmosphere of the photos. The experience made me realize that the look of street photography is really important to me, not perfecting the exposure or the focus. The tolerance of B&W film makes it possible for me to think first about what I'm shooting, not how my equipment is set.
Colin Corneau
Colin Corneau
Street shooting is like going for a walk. I go out hoping for images but don't count on it.
I keep everything the same so I the only variable is the light, and I can judge on that -- 35mm lens set at f/11 for lots of depth of field. Shutter speed depends on ambient light; mostly I eyeball it but check with an external meter once in a while to be sure (I'm getting better as time goes by.)
I pre-focus on the same distance as most subjects are to me; overall that's about 2-3ft. away, judging by the scale on my lens.
Simple, quick, quiet, unobtrusive. SLR's just don't do it for street work, it seems...for me it's rangefinder all the way. YMMV.
I keep everything the same so I the only variable is the light, and I can judge on that -- 35mm lens set at f/11 for lots of depth of field. Shutter speed depends on ambient light; mostly I eyeball it but check with an external meter once in a while to be sure (I'm getting better as time goes by.)
I pre-focus on the same distance as most subjects are to me; overall that's about 2-3ft. away, judging by the scale on my lens.
Simple, quick, quiet, unobtrusive. SLR's just don't do it for street work, it seems...for me it's rangefinder all the way. YMMV.
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