SO, WHAT DO YOU EXPECT FROM YOUR STREET PHOTOGRAPHY?

Yesterday I walked 3 hours, crossing several barrios. I lost myself in order to find moments interesting to me. I found myself in places I knew for the first time. 

When last year I directed the photowalk in Orvieto for the FIOF many of them confessed they were surprised. Surprised because I, unlike all those who had preceded me in giving a lesson in street photography, I had not dispensed rules, I had not put stakes or constraints, I had not gone there saying that they had to use one camera rather than another or follow certain visual impositions.

Here, this anecdote is exemplary to present my philosophy and my didactic approach. And it also helps to clarify with certain voices, totally infodate, on my stiffness in front of the concept of street photography. Voices generated by those who have every interest in presenting me in a way rather than in what I am as a photographer and as a photography teacher.

I don’t make anymore many “encounter street photos”. But yesterday I was in Downtown and I found this. 

THE FIRST SUBMISSIONS ALREADY PUBLISHED IN THE SINGLES GALLERY LAUNCH THE 2nd EDITION

Check out the gallery here:

TSPN FEE SINGLE CATEGORY SUBMISSIONS

The Award 2019 will be even more successfull.

We don’t spam your inbox and we know what street photography is. And we have some cool prize waiting you.

And please note: this is an anti establishement indipendent prize.

We are simple but we are honest. We will reward only the photos we consider to deserve the Award.

We changed the rules: there is no limit to submissions. We have fee of 1, 5 and 10 Euro. At 5 and 10 the participants will receive issues by thei choice of THE STREET PHOTOGRAPHER NOTEBOOK immediately after the payment.

Submit today:

TSPN AWARD 2019

Recently I back to photograph in Downtown. It has been for a while not working there because I am focused on the barrios. C’mon, follow me on this walk. 

2019:01:25 08:59:37 When I am on the microbus I always I look out the window. I observe the light of day and the possibilities it will have to offer me. It is inspiring fo the hours of work on the streets.

2019:01:25 09:26:18 As soon as I get out of the bus I take a test shot to evaluate the light. I say this to myself, but I think is also a way to warm up.

2019:01:25 09:33:54 In this part of Reforma Av. the light thanks to the buildings create an interesting effect on the floor.

2019:01:25 09:35:05 I am always fascinated by the structures and the feeling of matter that certain buildings in Mexico City have.

2019:01:25 10:00:33 A couple…or bette, 2 couples, 2 yellow shop shutters, FOTO BRAVO, the man in the van looking at the couple. OK, I have sufficient reason to click.

2019:01:25 10:02:45 Sometimes I pess the shutter because I am attacted by the movements on the street of people. The distribution and the energy given by dynamics is something always gets my attention.

2019:01:25 10:11:42 Zocalo. I made plenty of photos there. I always find something interesting deserving a photograph.

2019:01:25 10:36:33 In the smallest Chinatown of the world I found this. Mannequins always are an inteesting subject in my opinion. In this case I found a vey funny trio.

2019:01:25 10:43:33 Sometimes I photogaph to take memory of a place, with with the intention of returning and finding some different, more interesting situation. The Metropolitan is an old, important theatre in Mexico City.

2019:01:25 10:44:29 Possibly the shot of the day. I photogaphed in the face of the foreground lady. I find interesting to have out of focus an important element of the image. I repeat often this choice in my photography.

2019:01:25 10:45:04 Lines, poles, shadows, and where the human element is there, it communicates but at the same time it is part of the scene without prevaricating.

2019:01:25 10:56:42 Clichè, improvable composition, not much to say with this encounter photo.

2019:01:25 11:11:20 Murales are a part very important of the story of this country. I am fascinated with the big ones, and fortunately hee in the city we have a lot.

2019:01:25 11:12:40 Just befoe to take the bus to back at home, I photograph this scene, it is a rotisserie.

2019:01:25 11:24:18 For my project AMERICANA I am interested to document the urban landscape. I have already photogaphed the eagle on the buiding, but now I wanted a more airy scene to descibe the human condition. This is another “barrio bravo” called Guerrero.

I like to share with you my feelings and thoughts about the photogaphy experience.  In less than 2 hours this has been my back to downtown, Mexico City.

YEAR 5 IS OFFICIALLY STARTED FOR THE STREET PHOTOGRAPHER NOTEBOOK

The only e-magazines paying the photographers featued are mine.This is a fact. And we want to change the rules of the game, because in my opinion photogaphes deseve to be paid always fo their work. The ones promising you visibility are joking, and better not talking about the ones asking you money to get featured. Stop guys to feed all these vultures exploiting your work.

Here you go with a new issue while I am working to the printed edition project.

You know, the magazine is always proposed to a cheap cost and by supporting the editoial poject you support our photogaphers.

Get this issue and the others here. It is available also the subscription and the complete colletions.

Get all the info here:

Street Photographer Notebook

L’ultimo giorno per iscrivervi è il 22 Gennaio.

Un workshop di due giorni in cui i fotografi partecipanti lavoreranno a progetto e con destinazione libri e una mostra fotografica nella stessa città Felsinea.

Chi parteciperà a questo speciale workshop lavorerà al mio fianco e con Fabrizio Arginetti, dunque con due autori del collettivo la.strada. con possibilità future di essere coinvolto in collaborazioni e progetti fotografici.

I posti sono limitati, per cui il mio consiglio è quello di contattami il prima possibile se non volete perdervi questa opportunità.

Trovate tutte le info e il modulo di pagamento qui:

ITALIA DOLCE VITA WORKSHOP

I am very happy to announce the issue 47 of the magazine for street photographers

It is a monograph dedicated to Eli Dijkers, presenting 4 projects.

You can’t miss the extraordinary quality of this issue in orde to have a fantastic and inspiring book.

Get this issue and all the ones you prefer here:

Street Photographer Notebook

2 e-books contemporaneamente del collettivo la.strada.

2 e-books at the same time from the street photogaphy collettive la.strada.

They are free to download. You can it on this page:

la strada

FLICKR IS ASKING NOW 50 $ TO USERS. FOR THIS REASON I DECIDED TO RE-OPEN THE EMBASSY GROUP OF THE EDITORIAL PROJECT

As you know THE STREET PHOTOGRAPHER NOTEBOOK is the only street photography magazine in the world paying the photographers featured. A project launched in 2014 and soon arriving to 50 issues published.

The project counts already with a official page and now I decided to reopen the group. The news is now that is open to any street photographer and the main focus is to build a worldwide community and supporting the editorial project.

You are all invited to join.

If you want to get further info about the magazine, how to submit or buying the issues, please visit:

Street Photographer Notebook

Since this picture was appreciated by a certain Paolo Pellegrin, I decided to analyze the composition for this blog.

I made this photograph in Oaxaca, during my first trip there, on May 2015. The location is the side of th city I call “Fashion District” because is an area where most clothing stores are located, and exactly like in Los Angeles the whole atmosphere of that area is influenced by this type of activity.

The image shows a mannequin without head, with a feminine evening dress in the foreground while on the other side of the a woman is walking.

First consideration of this composition: the separation of the different visual elements thanks to the rectangles, the shutters of the two closed shops. They work to separate the scenes and making evident two frames to look at. 

Think also out brain how works in processing the visual elements: we are used to recognize instinctively geometric shapes and in fact mentally separate them to collect and process information.

When we analyze a photograph we should take care of the orientation. The first, most evident element in this sense is offeed by the deep shadow of the mannequin: it helps to understand the direction of the photo going to the upper right corner, encountering the secondary scene with the woman. Helping me with the lines I wanted to highlight the presence of the several directions suggested by the lines. There are horizontal, vertical and diagonal lines on the frame.

We can see a connection due to my choice to put in relation the two “human figures” through this vertical frame. It results evident the underline thanks to the extended arm of the woman the different nature and existence of the 2 subjects.

It helps in this case, observe more carefully and find out that the woman is dressing a long skirt exactly how the mannequin.

To make this photo, of course, I waited to have the woman in the second rettangle. Should I wait for the woman positioned exactly in the middle of the rolling shutter? Yes, probably. But I did have just one opportunity, and I photographed this with the Ricoh GRD IV, which has shutter lag. To have anything perfect is impossible, and I am happy to have photographed the woman with one leg in front of the other (showing the long skirt) and the extended arm.

As I repeat to my students we can’t think to obtain anything perfect, but the intent is the one to keep in consideration any shot we do. We have to be intuitive, reactive and taking the picture at home.

New upcoming wokshops 2018/2019

WORKSHOPS

THE WHOLE IS MORE THAN THE SUM OF ITS PARTS

Yes, I back to talk about Gestalt Psychology because is something pretty important in the way I do work a lot of my street photos. This helps, I think, to understand not just my pictures, but also a lot of photographs we see everyday. By understanding them we will have a clear idea about the value of any image. 

First of all, let me say that the pioneers of Gestalt Psychology were philosophers : Kant, Descartes or Husserl developed the theoretic basis on which this school of thought has been developed. 

It is important also to remind that the main proposers of Gestalt indicated alternatives to the dominant psychological paradigms, to make an example the behaviorism, which limits human behavior to associations between stigmas and responses. Great contributions were made for the cognitive by Gestalt theorists.

An important factor we shouldn’t ignore:

Our ability to pay attention and process information is affected by several factors and our brain requires a lot of effort to select the most relevant data at any given time. The example of the choice in a supermarket is perfect: we have a wall of cereal boxes, but we usually will notice the most visually striking and we will focus our attention on that. Anyway, any person understands reality in a different way: the environment and other people influence us, so our cultural background, our feelings…

To seek simple and natural explanations that can be adapted to our natural way of perceiving reality. Through perception, we are able to acquire knowledge of the world. Perception tends to organize the elements in the simplest possible way.

Our brain prefers harmonious compositions.

Mental processes are not infinite, and we cannot dedicate time and energy to everything around us. Thsi is the reasons ou brain tends to simplify what we perceive and prefer simplicity. Minimalim could be the winning formula in a photograph, but is not always in this way.

Gestalt Theory applies the law of proximity that states: the elements closest to each other tend to form a group as if they were one set.

Another law used is the law of similarity: similar figures seem to have the same shape.

Their similarity may be due to the fact that they have a similar color, shape or any other characteristic that allows us to create aunion among them.

The common fate law states that humans perceive visual elements that move in the same speed and/or direction as parts of a single stimulus.

Gestalt Psychology can have several applications and I think photography is one of them.

Based on this idea we can recognize how the circumstances are made of several components interacting with each other. If we want to solve a problem we have to reorganize its components to discover a new solution.This is also something Stephen Shore said when he stated that the photographer is an individual called to solve the composition, in order to obtain a winning photographic equation.

We know in this way that photography is about problem solving at any shot.

Wertheimer proposed us the difference between productive thinking, that consists in carrying out creative reorganizations of the elements of the problems in order to solve them, and the reproductive thinking, limited to applying the previous knowledge in a mechanical way.

Gestalt theory insists on using productive thinking, which will help us to reach insight.

The term refers to the eureka moment: when we suddenly realize what the answer to our difficulties is. Can you see how photographic is?

Gestalt Psychology is a great resource for creatives and anyone making communication through images.

If we  know Gestalt Theory very well, we will be able to attract the attention of our audience. To know how we interpret images is essential in order to identify and reviewing the photos and to create works that allow us to transmit our messages to the viewers.

If we want to compose memorable photos we need to have clear what is the important part where the message comes out. And we have to put it as clearly as possible: because photography is a language and we need to speak it with a sense. All the attention of the viewer needs to be focused on the essential elemens, possibly without irrelevant distractions. I argue this is possible also on busy streets, because the photographer entered the urban element is “dancing”, has absorbed the rhythm and speed of the scene in which it is immersed.

I smile anytime someone shows to misinterpret my ideas on photography. One of this is for sure to think I am a fundamentalist of rules when exactly the opposite is true. 

The fact I have an idea that street photography requires a candid approach doesn’t mean I want to dictate any rule.

And I disagree with the real fundamentalists thinking an eye contact makes a photo no more street photo and as they think should be defined a street portrait. My most famous photo so far shows a powerful eye contact (the Oriental girl ina starbuck’s window in Los Angeles) and I consider it absolutely a clear and pure example of what street photography is.

In the photograph we can see here, of course we have a clear, well defined subject. The girl is in the foreground, she is looiking at me, looking at any observer of the photo. She is the main subject and at the same time she is the opener of the story, because then the eye wanders, looking for other information it finds. The viewer can recognize a market situation with several people in the frame. We have in this way also information about the little girl, arriving to guess the reason why she is there. 

I would highlight the extraordinary of photography: it is always a representation of the reality, but is not the reality. It can’t because is always something filtered by the elections of the photographer, and despite the photographer took a piece of reality, in any moment somebody else will see the photo will be his/her reality, due to a different background, that feeds and provides a different understanding and metabolization of the scene.

In the photo above, I photographed attracted by the expression of the girl, and I immediately recognized a photographic frame where her position worked as a perfect introduction to the world behind her. There is an eye contact: of course when often happens when you count with a normal or wide angle lens and you photograph though the viewfinder. And yes, I consider it a street photograph, because I don’t marry the idea a street photogaph should be always based on juxtapositions or having a smile in the head, I have an idea of street photographs more classic and anchored to social and anthropological reflection. 

I use often to propose eye contact photos. I love the way they wok to involve me (the observer) in the frame. And if you don’t agree, no problems, you can call it my gonzography.

I ADDED A NEW SECTION ON THIS WEBSITE

CITIES will show a selection of street photos in any city where I worked.

Currently I have already published:

MILANO

PALERMO

LOS ANGELES

Other cities I will add as soon as possible:

ROMA

FIRENZE

TORINO

ORVIETO

MEXICO CITY

OAXACA

Of course I hope to visit other cities in the world!

CITIES

One of my favorite things about photography is that it allows subversive acts, far from academic constraints.

I support the need to listen to our voice. Bearing this in mind, the formal approach must be sought in our way of expressing ourselves rather than following the rules that all, more or less, have studied.

Don’t get me wrong and continue reading this article.

“In his introduction to William Eggleston Guide, John Szarkowski drew attention to the circular core of many of the pictures, which radiated out to the frame–a pattern clearly demonstrated by The Red Ceiling–‘Just like the Confederate flag,’ Eggleston had responded.”

source: http://www.americansuburbx.com/2011/05/theory-william-eggleston-introduction.html

Any photographer out of a photography school will repeat the same adage: avoid to put in the centre of the image the subject.

Let’s see these photos:

I think the 2 photos work fine, and the subject is in the center of the frame. In documentary photography, the priority of the content takes the upper hand over the formal one, but I believe that in the two cases presented a formal rigor exists, and it was decided by me. 

Now I want to present you a picture set according to more classic canons:

In this case I tried to compose using the guidelines that lead to the subjects. This is evidently a composition built almost like a landscape. The checkout tapis roulant starts from the right corner, reaching the scene, the eye is led in a natural way in  that point.

The secret for a photographer is always the same: to have the intuition to solve the composition, in order to obtain a certain photographic logic. We photographers are continually creating equations. Photographic equations. Personal photographic equations.

I share another photo:

Sensations can guide the decision to shoot. On the street we work in a really short time to capture what we want. Street Photography is first of all a question of reaction to what we see in front of us. The forms that I insert inside the image don’ t necessarily have to respond to a total caption. I have already written in previous posts about the imporance to capture the atmosphere of a certain scene. In this photo I focused on the relation that interposed between the squares of the lady’s dress and those of the box. It is a totally instinctive photograph, where there is a clear main subject and where secodary elements are confined to the edges of the frame: they still are useful as context, and I can see dynamism offered also by those elements.

Look at this:

I can see I photographed this almost blind. I was inside a restaurant and visibility was very hard to have an idea of people passing in front of the window. However, I was still attracted to the graphism that would have created the curtain. The subject is exactly on the cente of the image, but it works.

OK. I added new elements of thoughts for my readers. I would conclude this post to remind I am available for online street photography workshops where I can analyze your work and starting a learning path together. You can get all the info here:

Online Street Photography Workshops