Location : Eskisehir

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Before talking about the advantages of B&W, i want to criticise something about Black and White Photography. Especially in Turkey, most of the beginner photographers take pictures in B&W. Also a big group of photographers who are old fashioned themselves, take B&W pictures all the time. These so called documentary photographers, are stuck in rules and desire to he old times of photography. they are against to use of photoshop, DSLRs, pictures that do not include people in it. According to them, photography should reflect the living of (ordinary) people in street. They can say “empty” to a masterpiece of landscape photography. Nobody have to like something, but at least they should learn other genres of photography should be respected. They are especially against commercial photography. They claim that everything should be untouched and natural in the scene. So what is documentary photography in Turkey? “Face of a poor person or beggar in b&w” that’s it. Don’t get me wrong i’m not against documentary photography or street photography, i try these genres sometimes. But what i’m saying is most pf documentary photographers are closed to the improvements in technology and refuse to learn from good examples of this genre in the world. They do what they know. So traditional, boring and repeating. Why they choose to take pictures in B&W? Some characteristics of B&W photography makes things easier in terms of photography, that’s why.

Advantages of Taking Pictures in Black and White

• B&W pictures have an artistic and journalistic look. So viewers consider the subject of the picture more seriously.
• Over highlighted parts in the picture is not a big problem as it is in color photography. Consider a white sky in B&W and in a colored picture. Which one will look better? Probably the one in B&W. Why? Black and White films are more sensitive to the blue tones, and less sensitive to the green and red. So that’s why almost every b&w picture (a clear) sky is white.
• You can increase the contrast and make the picture more impressive, in a color picture, if you increase contrast too much some parts will be over highlighted and other very dark. But in b&w pictures, since there’s only black, white and tones of gray, dark places and over highlighted areas of picture wont be a problem.
• Because of the different sensitivity of B&W film to different colors (more sensitive to blue, less sensitive to green and red), creative images can be created using different colored filters. Filters lighten the objects in their own color, and darken the opposite. Such as; a red filter will show the red barn in a lighter tone of gray while show the blue sky and and green grasses darker. (If you have an digital camera you can change these on your PC using an editing software, like photoshop.
• If you are using a film camera it is cheaper to print and process the B&W film.

Examples;

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In USA in a public place everything can be photographed legally, including, parks buildings, people, images, everything… This may not be the same for every country so i advice you to learn about it before you start taking pictures in the street which will keep you out of trouble.

But publishing your work with a person whose face is recognisable, is illegal without a written permission or “model release” agreement. So if you are planning to publish your work you better talk to the subject of the picture and get the permission. Also remember you may not be able to find the person you photographed in the street next day. So if you think the results will be good enough to publish, it is better to talk to that person before or after you take the shot in the same day.

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Compact cameras are light and quiet compared to SLR’s but they lack a lot of technical abilities, such as speed, lens quality etc. SLR cameras are lauder compared to Rangefinder and compact cameras, so what? Unless you are taking pictures in a library it wont be a problem, plus street itself is a crowded and laud place.

In sum, it is up to the photographer, i’ve seen people who took amazing shots even with the simplest compact digital camera. Equipment doesn’t matter for many categories of photography. Th most important thing is creativity and imagination….

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In street photography you should be fast to capture the pictures of right moments therefore you should use a fast shutter speed and reletively fast ISO. Actually using low ISO values like 100 is better to have less grain/noise in the picture but in the evening when shadows of buildings cover the street it is hard to take clear shots without a tripod at this point i advice you to switch you ISO value to be able to use faster shutter speeds. In such conditions 400 ISO should be ideal, but if it isn’t use something like 800. But remember increasing ISO will also increase the size of the grain in your film or level of noise if you are using a DSLR. In sum, in the evening and early morning hours it is better to use fast ISO speeds like 400, and to get pictures with less grain use ISO 100 during the day.

As i said to capture the right moments on time, fast shutter speeds are preferred in street photography. For example 1/125 sec. will be enough to freeze the action. But if you want to give the feeling of motion, you can use slower shutter speeds, like i did in “Frozen in Time”. Actually as long as there’s enough light in the environment, using aperture priority mode (Av in Canon cameras) of your camera will be a good choice.

I prefer to use medium aperture between f/4 and f/8 in street photography. These aperture settings both let the photographer be fast in daylight and give enough depth of field range to avoid focus problems. As you know the lower f values such as f/4 , f/2.8 etc. lets more light into the camera therefore increase the speed of shutter. Also as the f number decreases, depth of field range gets narrower which lets you isolate the subject from background.

I don’t know is it true to give exact numbers as if they are rules. Indeed there’s no “right” settings, since they change according to each camera, film, lens, environment. The numbers and i’m writing here are just commonly used approximate numbers for the settings. Don’t forget to try different settings, angles and compositions…

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When you ask people for permission to take their pictures they’ll know you will take their picture and act or behave unnaturally. To make them forget about the picture and you, after talking to them a while, look through your viewfinder often even you don’t take the shots and keep talking to them. As the subject see you photographing him/her and environment at first he/she may be nervous but after a while they’ll get used to the the camera and you then they’ll start to act natural again.

After this point you are almost invisible to them, and you can start taking pictures.

Some photographers use a piece of cloth to cover their cameras in order to be “invisible” in the public, i actually don’t know how it works. I didn’t see anybody doing that around me. And i’m pretty sure i get suspicious if i see somebody pointing something covered with a piece of cloth to the people in the street. But the main point is some photographers want public to be totally unaware of them when they are doing their job. If you are one of these photographers, and you say “i’m not going to walk in streets with a cloth covered camera, than i advice you to take the shots from first or second store of a building, hiding behind curtains etc. Of course you’ll need a tele lens to be able to shoot from distance. Some other photographers use wide lenses and most people don’t notice they are included in the frame. Also there are some special lenses that bend and shoot to the side, not in front of the camera directly. Again people won’t understand, they are being subject to a picture if you use these kind of lenses.

As always i want to remind you that taking pictures of people without their permission is not ethical or legal.

It is hard to go out and point your camera to the people in the street. Shyness is the problem for every photographer who is trying to take pictures of people in the street for the first time. Although i’m not taking street photographs often, i tried this category of photography several times. Going out and asking strangers that “May i take a picture of you?” was really hard for me.

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To overcome shyness best way is trying once… After you trying it once, you’ll be more relaxed and probably won’t afraid to talk to people after a couple of tries. Smile and be kind when you are asking people for permission to take their pictures. Most of them won’t say no, but remember to talk with them in order to relax them (also see my last post about taking pictures of people in the street). Talking with people will help you increase your communication skills . When you approach people friendly you’ll get friendly responses.
Also remember there’s nothing to afraid of, in worst case scenerio they’ll say no, say “ok, thanks for your attention” and that’s it. No one will shoot you just becouse you asked for permisson to take his/her pictures.

If you are too shy, i mean really shy and there’s no way you’ll talk to the people than i suggest you to have a tele lens and take the shots from distance. If you cannot either point your camera to somebody even from a distance. Stand at a point in the street and wait for subject to walk in the frame. But again ask yourself how ethical it is to take pictures of people without their permission and what will you feel if you see somebody pointing his/her huge tele lens to you when you are walking in the street. I’m telling once more in my opinion best way to have street pictures (if you want to include people and if they are certainly recognisable) asking them for permission. (Unless there’s something that you cannot wait or shouldn’t miss).

Tomorrow; Street Photography Part 4; Being Invisible

There are two different styles that you can use in street photography. You can ask for permission to take the pictures of people which lets you get close and focus on one person to focus on emotions etc. or you can take a general view of the scene including more than one person in the frame and don’t ask for permission. Second one is more easy for the starters but if you want to on a subject and get more emotional and expressive getting close to the subject is better. Actually asking people to take their pictures is not that hard after a couple of tries. Of course it also depends what country you are taking pictures in. For example here in Turkey if you ask 10 men, at least 7 of them will give permission to you to take pictures. But when i was in USA i saw that people are more sceptical especially in New York City so it was harder to persuade people there. Because of that most street photographers in USA is taking the pictures without permission in the street which is not ethical in my opinion. Also you may be sued for image thievery, and charged with high fines.

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Most of the street photographers thought and claim that if you go and ask somebody for permission to take his/her picture, the person won’t be natural anymore. But i don’t believe this is true and i have some good examples to prove it. But of course there are somethings that you should do to have natural results. Before taking pictures spend some time with them (if they have enough time) and ask questions about his job or whatever he is doing in that moment. Introduce yourself, tell them why you are taking these pictures. After that the subject will relax and keep doing his/her job and he/she will not pay attention to you that much. Then you start taking pictures. You’ll get good results if you can have a nice connection between you and the subject.Here there are some examples; they are all strangers that i met during a walk in the street, and i asked for permission each of them.

Or you can stand at one point and look through the view finder of your camera and wait for the subject to appear. Also you can point your camera to the people when they don’t know they are being photographed. Most photographers it is the best way to have most natural results. They are two different styles of taking street pictures without permission. When you stand at a certain spot and wait for the subject, you should set a good composition with a not confusing background. In this case you should really wait long to get an impressive result or you’ll only have a picture with a walking man/woman in it. If you use this style your subject can be anyone since he/she is not in the scene until you see him/her in your view finder. Also you can take pictures of the people that you choose. Observing them and waiting for the right moment or action is essential in this style. But as i said earlier, it is not ethical, and you may face some legal consequences.But if you want to use this style and get totally natural results, you can go and ask for permission after taking the shot. If this person doesn’t want to be photographed, you can just delete his/her pictures and showing him/her you deleted them. It will be more ethical plus you won’t be sued. Some pictures that i took without people knowing they are being photographed; (I asked for permission later to publish them.)

Also you can take a general view of street or any other public place including all the people in it. This is better for showing crowdedness of a street, living conditions of people in this street or an event with lots of people included such as a strike, walking and cheering supporters of a sports team etc.In this case you cannot ask for permission to everybody in the scene. Just be sure the faces of people are not recognisable clearly. “Frozen in Time” that i uploaded again in the previous post is a good example for that, there are lots of people in the scene and none of the faces are recognisable.

Of course being sued for the picture that you take is not common, and most people don’t care about it so much. But i mentioned it because being respectful to the rights of people is important to me.

Tomorrow; Street Photography Part 3; Overcoming Shyness

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Street photography holds up a mirror to the public and people. The subjects of street photography are the normal people that you see everyday around you. Considering this it is more sincere than glamour or fashion photography that takes the most beautiful women and most handsome men as the subjects. Street photography also tends to capture the details and unexpected events of the life. Focuses on conditions and feelings of the people in the street. My picture “Frozen in Time” can be an example for street photography.

That is all for today. Part 2 will be published tomorrow.