what is the philosophy of street photography?

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SeonNantonPhotos

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Photography is such a broad tearm, but within there are different genres, buy my personal favorite being street. But having just jumped into the world of photography I feel it is most useful to have a camere that is useful, by that I mean takes photos of good quality and has useful controles and is unobtrusive. That in my view is the way to extract the essence of the moment. So I view the philosophy of street photography as giving the viewer the feel of the street and its random living moments.
 
To capture an image as if you had no camera. Shoot what you see, but not just anything for the sake of sensitizing silver or pixel sites.
And no, the camera doesn't matter.

Phil Forrest
 
Street photography: in a public, usually urban space, how one or more people interact (or don't) with one another and/or their environment, in an informal slice of life style.

Images like this with no people, would more accurately be described as urban lanscape. IMO
 
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I think of it as being in the moment first and foremost. Imagine yourself visually describing your surroundings to a person who's never been on that street. I've never been to many of the cities in the world, but I can almost taste them when I see good street shots.
 
SeonNantonPhotos said:
Photography is such a broad tearm, but within there are different genres, buy my personal favorite being street. But having just jumped into the world of photography I feel it is most useful to have a camere that is useful, by that I mean takes photos of good quality and has useful controles and is unobtrusive. That in my view is the way to extract the essence of the moment. So I view the philosophy of street photography as giving the viewer the feel of the street and its random living moments.
Click to expand...

shooting for an audience is always a good idea, rather than shooting for your own admiration, or your circle of like-minded people who will not hurt your feelings.
 
"I think of it as being in the moment first and foremost."

Absolutely agree with this. Most of us are watching ourselves being photographers, rather than being photographers.
 
'street' is the art to get the 'hook' out of the moment. For me it's not the hipshot on the sidewalk against the others.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/36573929@N00/169523816/in/set-72157594175685831/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/36573929@N00/169527004/in/set-72157594175682729/

and very fresh five weeks ago:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/36573929@N00/5023647528/in/set-72157625031362422/

you need time, patience and a very big portion of luck.....

than it might go like this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/36573929@N00/5159531330/


http://www.flickr.com/photos/36573929@N00/168436528/

I would be happy to get 5 pics per year........:eek:
 
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After being on this forum for a little while, I no longer care what street is... it's nonsense to try to define it.
 
I would think that more Tessinas would be used for street photography. 35mm film, spring motor that is very quiet, and TLR focus. Hold in in the Palm of your hand, check framing by glancing down, take the shot. Slip it back into your pocket. Smaller than any P&S 35mm camera that I know of, smaller than the Ricoh and Nikon Lite Touch.
 
Phil_F_NM said:
To capture an image as if you had no camera. Shoot what you see, but not just anything for the sake of sensitizing silver or pixel sites.
And no, the camera doesn't matter.

Phil Forrest
Click to expand...

Dear Phil,

I have never seen anything that comes closer to a definition of something that is all but indefinable. Thanks!

Cheers,

R.
 
Brian Sweeney said:
I would think that more Tessinas would be used for street photography. 35mm film, spring motor that is very quiet, and TLR focus. Hold in in the Palm of your hand, check framing by glancing down, take the shot. Slip it back into your pocket. Smaller than any P&S 35mm camera that I know of, smaller than the Ricoh and Nikon Lite Touch.
Click to expand...

Dear Brian,

Also the camera of choice for spies. There's a LOT more information on a 14x21 Tessina neg than on 8x11 Minox. There's a manual-wind version (MORE expensive than the spring drive) for still quieter operation. As far as I recall, there was a choice of (noisier, longer-lived) metal gears or even quieter nylon gears.

A few weeks after I bought mine in the late 70s, I found the wrist strap in the 'junk box' of a local camera dealer for 5/- (call it 50 cents). Proof of Sir Terry Pratchett's assertion that million-to-one chances come up nine times out of ten.

Cheers,

R.
 
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I think we can all look at history and see that there are lots of jumping-off points for what we call 'street photography'. Where each of chooses to jump off and what we end up with depends upon the philosophy we take with us when we shoot.




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