The famed photographer Henri Cartier Bresson said, “Photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression”. He employed this principle in one of his most well-known, if not the best known, photos, Behind the Gare St. Lazare. Of this photo he said, “There was a plank fence around some repairs behind the Gare Saint-Lazare train station. I happened to be peeking through a gap in the fence with my camera at the moment the man jumped.” He took the photo in what he termed “the decisive moment.”
Behind the Gare Saint-Lazare
Few of us will become so skilled, but this is a good example of what I am talking about in taking better photos of people. I don’t mean portraiture. I mean street photography – capturing what’s happening around us. This is particularly useful in travel. And most of us really aren’t comfortable aiming our cameras at strangers and snapping away.
I’m going to give a few general pointers, then show some photos for comparison. You’ll likely find many of the same pointers, perhaps expressed in a different way, given by many photographers. I’ve spent years learning by trial and error and here’s what I’ve come up with.
First, it really helps to have a telephoto lens (which is different than a zoom lens). The farther away you can be from your subject, assuming it’s not someone you know, the easier it is.
Be completely alert to what is going on around you. Watch the people, watch the focal point if there is one, and try to capture the decisive moment yourself. Of course, you can take many photos, and in reviewing them, you may find the decisive moment.
If you have some time – especially when traveling in a foreign country – become part of the scene. Sit at a cafe, have a soda, and soon people will stop looking at you. Once you become part of the landscape, it’s easier to take pictures.
As a ruse, you can ask your companion to stand somewhere near the “target” at the same focal distance. Act like you are taking the photo of your companion, then at the last minute, aim at the real subject and snap.
Take pictures of people in context – doing something. It’s much more interesting than the person alone.
Don’t think you need the total person, head to toe. It’s even ok to cut off some of the head. And is your photo a little blurry? Don’t reject it out of hand. In other words, remember, photos tell a story.
If you are photographing children, get on their level. Squat – easy to say but hard to do for those of us of a certain age, but do your best.
This is enough for starters. I’ll finish with one comparison.
This is a noodle-maker is Xian, China. Interesting enough I guess, you can see the noodles and the face of the young man. But it doesn’t tell us anything except, “Look at my noodles.”
This, on the other hand, is the same noodle maker in Xian, China. But this photo is not static: he’s actively making the noodles. We don’t see his face but it’s a much more interesting photo.
Stay tuned for part two.
[...] about that a bit on the “About” page of my webpage, as well as a former blog post on how to photograph people. And Taking Better Photos of People, Part Two. var addthis_pub = ''; var addthis_language = [...]