What Makes a Good Street Photography Scene?

I am with airfrog above, there has to be an interesting visual element in a photo to make it stand above just snapshots.

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Shadow play

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Repeating pattern

Btw, I am not a street photographer.
 
Will two very good examples and I am a photographer that sometimes finds myself using the visual tools that you described on the streets. We have history to support out point.

Love the repeating shapes and the perspective leading to the woman in the background appearing to use the product that just happens to be the repeating shape...
 
In my opinion Flicker is not a very good barometer. Popular doesn't mean good. Threes Company was once the most popular show on TV. it just means most understand and if most understand then that has been playing it safe. It means it is usually giving immediate gratification. You see it you get it you move on. No reason to go back and look again and therefore no real staying power.

Some words of wisdom from Ralph Gibson:
"A good photograph, like a good painting, speaks with a loud voice and demands time and attention if it is to be fully perceived. An art lover is perfectly willing to hang a painting on a wall for years on end, but ask him to study a single photograph for ten unbroken minutes and he’ll think it’s a waste of time. Staying power is difficult to build into a photograph. Mostly, it takes content. A good photograph can penetrate the subconscious – but only if it is allowed to speak for however much time it needs to get there." - Ralph Gibson

There are some really good street shooters here at Rangefinder. Simon (ourmanintangiers) Tuna, shadowfox I also like the image Keith posted above. The broken lines all seem to lead to the subject. These are all photographers that go beyond the obvious and build staying power in the frame. I keep going back to their work and I keep getting more because there is more there to see than cna be processed immediately. They have staying power. And then we get to the really important element; we can tell it's one of their photographs without looking at the signature.
 
The only criteria that to me hasn't changed so far is time, how many times can I go back to the photograph, how long can I look at it, do I still enjoy it a couple of years later etc.
I have no interest in quick "one liner" type photographs, humour or a certain lucky alignment of elements is fun once or twice but after that I lose interest and never go back to it.

Right now, at least where my own photography is concerned, I'm trying to move away from random, disposable stuff than can be made anywhere and isn't that exciting or personal or local or specific, for example a person passing in front of a background, no matter how beautiful the background or interesting the person it's still just that.
 
No I didn't mean them (except Erwitt), I think we were saying the same thing in different ways. It's a very personal preference in any case
 
airfrogusmc said:
In my opinion Flicker is not a very good barometer. Popular doesn't mean good....
Click to expand...

Flickr is not gong to teach what is good and what isn't in terms of good street photography. A lot of distasteful street snapshots with lot of "likes".
To be honest, I often unfollow those with steady "99" likes. Something changing in their pictures, to be able to hit high numbers, it becomes too obvious and too easy to digest.
Sometimes those popular on Flickr are so bad and weak, it makes me suspicious the person is faking it or joining some groups where they are milking each other for "likes".
 
Ko.Fe. said:
Flickr is not gong to teach what is good and what isn't in terms of good street photography. A lot of distasteful street snapshots with lot of "likes". To be honest, I often unfollow those with steady "99" likes. Something changing in their pictures, to be able to hit high numbers, it becomes too obvious and too easy to digest. Sometimes those popular on Flickr are so bad and weak, it makes me suspicious the person is faking it or joining some groups where they are milking each other for "likes".
Click to expand...

Completely agree. There's a group on Flickr called "Hardcore Street Photography". I used to check them out every once in awhile. I even made a submission (never accepted). But afterwards I realized how I don't want my work amongst the other work in that group. A lot of it I find fairly... Well bad. Just not much compelling work but somehow many of those photos get people falling all over themselves for it in the comments section.
 
willie_901 said:
I embrace Wingrand's thoughts about solving a photographic problem... dealing with the balance struggle, or competition between content and form.

Here is some of the transcript from a 1970 interview with G.W.

What about the reoccurrence of, say, oh, monkeys which goes back—

GW: Listen, it’s interesting;but it’s interesting for photographic reasons, really.

What are photographic reasons?

GW: Basically, I mean, ah—well, let’s say that for me anyway when a photograph is interesting, it’s interesting because of the kind of photographic problem it states—which has to do with the . . . contest between content and form. And, you know, in terms of content, you can make a problem for yourself, I mean, make the contest difficult, let’s say, with certain subject matter that is inherently dramatic. An injury could be, a dwarf can be, a monkey—if you run into a monkey in some idiot context, automatically you’ve got a very real problem taking place in the photograph. I mean, how do you beat it?

Are you saying then that your primary concern is a kind of formal one?

GW: Of course.
Click to expand...

Part of the interview is here as a clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wP6lP3UaP24. This clip is 105 minutes long, the whole interview lasted several hours 😀 😀

I love it, especially the down-to-earthness of Winogrand (relaxed, grinning, hands folded behind his head) and his shattered storytelling with the incomplete sentences. The mans photography was a total extension of his person, there was more to guess from what wasn't in the pictures and the stories than there is to be known for sure from what he did include.
 
airfrogusmc said:
Will two very good examples and I am a photographer that sometimes finds myself using the visual tools that you described on the streets. We have history to support out point.

Love the repeating shapes and the perspective leading to the woman in the background appearing to use the product that just happens to be the repeating shape...
Click to expand...

And I'm a fan of your street photos!

I think street photography still follows basic photography principles, the thing that makes it exciting is the fact that you have no control over the scenes and the subjects, and one second can be the difference between the interesting and the dud.

I wish I can procure more time to be on the streets (it's a choice, I know).
 
Will I agree and thanks for the kind words and I think a good photograph is a good photograph whatever pile you want to neatly stack it in. Either you build staying power in your image by using elements to create a very strong foundation or you can build a foundation on sand. Which images will stand in the test of time? History shows use the ones that have.
 
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