Three and One -- Study in Composition

Three and One is a study in composition that becomes more apparent

when one 'clicks' on it and views it 'larger'. Details of place and

time are omitted in view of its 'universal' nature, perhaps to be

added later. Your good faith comments and critiques are invited and

most welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically, please post a

helpful and constructive comment; please share your superior

photographic knowledge to help improve my photography. Thanks!

Enjoy! John

You are an important member of Photo.net with an impressive output yourself.

Maybe your suggestion above was made partly in jest, but I take it more seriously -- and it is one of the highest compliments a fine fellow photographer can pay me.

The mere idea that I can 'teach' you anything is pretty ridiculous, but with 'street' maybe you have a point -- and especially with the posting of this photo -- an epitome of my skills.

How delighted I am for your compliment!

I 'found' this photo among NEFs (raw file photos) from last Jun that my computer would not display until I got a 'raw' viewer recently, and just about jumped out of my socks, since I previously had seen it on my camera (no jpeg) and marked it for upload 'at some time in the future' but unimportantly when.

It was posted in early morning, on the weekend and not many experienced raters were online.

I think eventually it will be 'discovered'; at least I hope so.

It's one of my best for design.

I think H C-B would have said 'this boy at least has the idea', even if he launched into his characteristic tirade against (my) talent -- which he usually did when presented with portfolios of new photographers seeking endorsement.

Best to you D.

John (Crosley)

Hi John, I've been wanting to ask you for a long time - and this photo presents the perfect opportunity to ask - how you approach your subjects in the field. Do you ask permission? Do you shoot from a distance? Are people generally 'okay' with being photographed? Toronto is not the most forgiving city in the world, too, and this is on my mind all the time. Perhaps there are certain demographics in which a photographer shoot and be more comfortable?

I guess each set of circumstances is different and requires a different approach, but these are the sort of things I would love to hear your insight on. I reallllyy want to do more street photography in the coming weeks but I find myself overcome by a certain shyness and I worry about people's reactions to my lens being pointed in their direction from behind my not-so-discrete 6'3" self.

@John: No, I didn't write anything in jest at all. The geometry in the streets fascinates me a lot. For a while I've been shooting expressions, but I'm inclining more towards the raw geometry. An adequate synthesis of drama and geometry is, for me, the perfect recipe for a street photograph, and there's plenty of both here.

However, I wish there a little more contrast in the middle grays---there's too much of it, spread over too large an area; I think my discomfort is primarily due to the grass and the comparable dresses of the trio. I hope you don't mind my criticism; I'ld like to see this `jump' out, for it's not a picture comparable to a beach-side scene in the evening.

Best regards.

@Matt: I had asked John a similar question, which he'd answered below one of his pictures; I don't remember which one though, I've got a terrible memory. It'll be a useful pointer to put here I believe.

You might first look at comments under my portfolio (just scroll down under the 840 photos or so in my portfolio and read the 48 or so pages of comments (I just printed them out into a booklet -- 49 pages of thumbnails and 48 pages of comments.)

The question is do I ask before I take a photograph? And the answer almost invariably is 'no', though when I do go to take a photograph in which I will be seen taking a photograph I have a large variety of devices to allow myself to explain myself away, deflect attention from myself, suggest that the subject is 'not important anyway' or has a 'big ego' if they think I'm photographing them, and other such diversions, and sometimes I just come right up to someone and right off the bat point a big lens right at their face from inches away.

It all depends on the circumstances.

One never can tell.

It partly depends on the reception one gets or expects to get.

If coming across a scene like above, what good does it do to ask the sleeping man to awaken so you can ask him if you can take his photo. He awakens, moves and the composition is destroyed. Or to ask the three men grouped upper right the same thing. They move, pose (or move away or hide their faces, and again the composition is destroyed.)

People often come to me and say 'photo me Mr. Photographier' and I even refuse them sometimes and other times I oblige them. Sometimes it's just crap and wastes my hard drive space, and other times I get good captures, as they'll be kissing their girlfriend and the old lady will be picking up broken and/or empty beer bottles in the background while another person is passing out and being held up behind them. You never know.

Street photography started with the clandestine Leica, (after starting with an earlier camera, it got changed to the Leica because it was compact, portable and clandestine). Henri Cartier-Bresson is reported to have kept his sometimes hidden under a napkin (serviette) at a restaurant, waiting for his decisive moment.

I do the same, but not with napkins, but also keeping mine below the car window, raising it only when necessary.

Yesterday I took a photo in the Kiev Metro (I am not in Kiev now) and someone said 'Russian Mafia?' Me? I'm not a Spring Chicken and don't look like a gangster and Eastern Mafia sorts are not looking like Luca Brazzi -- they're young guys generally -- surprisingly so.

(Photographing in the Kiev Metro is forbidden, but I do it anyway.)

Also the same for the Moscow Metro, the Paris Metro, the New York City Subway, the London Tube, and so forth.

I'm an equal opportunity scofflaw regarding such captures.

I have yet to give the tube a good going over since the latest upsets, however, and may have trouble yet.

The Paris Metro is a cinch -- some of my greatest captures are from there, and most recently.

Nobody minds. And les flics only have stopped me once, and not in the Metro and only in the Gare de l'est (East Train Station, where they inevitably will stop me, but not in Gare de Nord a few blocks away and more interesting).

I also photograph on the Paris RER -- suburban/interurban railway trains which connect with their Metropolitain. Let them object -- no one has so far formally, though black Africans and Muslims most often will signal they dislike being photographed (perhaps it's the Animism of black africa -- they're afraid a part of their soul will be taken . . . and Muslims -- well they forbid 'graven images' at all of anything, let alone themselves, generally -- especially in newfound Islam, in which a male viewing women's hair is said to be incitement to sexual arousal. (not me, though, I guess I'm missing a male chromosome, or something, and funny, but that idea only arose in the middle '80s, and family albums before that time reveal plenty of female hair -- the so-called 'magic hair').

It's funny what people get uptight over.

As a street photographer, though, you should know what people are uptight over, and judge when and when not to photograph. A parolee from the US who's broken parole can be a tough customer to photograph; same with a probationer.

Best to avoid staring them down with your lens.

They can become dangerous as their freedom (they view) is at stake, and if the issue arises, tell them the photos are for your 'hard drive' only -- private, and not for distribution and not for cops.

That calms 'em down plenty, often.

If you get the idea that it's a 'dance' out there on the street, you're right.

Witness my photograph which you can find 'three generations' showing a billboard baby, an old grandmother and a young woman walking between the two, for a view of three generations.

Well, yesterday I met the old woman inadvertently, tried to take her photograph (she allowed it willingly the time before) and she turned away. Only after I took photos of those around her and they saw the digital readout and proclaimed I was a wonderful photographer did she allow photos of herself. Yes, then she knew she was being 'photoed'. There was no way around revealing it. But she allowed my wide angle lens within inches of her face.

If you use a zoom tele of 70~200, few will know you are picking them out of a crowd. If you use a superwide angle, say my 12~24 Nikkor, supersharp, focus on someone to one side of a frame and someone to the other side of the frame is also included -- usually unknowingly. People don't expect an ultra wide angle lens can be soooo wide angle -- they often think they're out of the picture. Just pretend you're photographing some distant church, when you're really photographing them, at one side of the frame.

If you focus on something looking in the great distance as though looking at a distant building, then lower your camera for that interesting face, just raise your camera again and stare at that distant building. 'Did he photograph me? I don't think so. We walked away, and he's still standing there pointing that camera at that building. . . . '

Of course you got that photo and they're not upset.

Master your equipment so you can take a photo in one second or two. Literally, raise to eye, (autofocus) with focus point predetermined (preset), ISO already set, auto meter on (matrix if Nikon with easy adjustments made to exposure if you anticipate backlighting issues, etc.) and just snap that photo and several more (in case of blinking, autofocus failure) and put down that lens and camera or turn away.

Then turn and do it to somethign else, but don't fire. Your photo victim will be thoroughly unbelieving you took his/her photo in 1-2 seconds or even a series; they won't know or understand their look was immortalized.

Learn to anticipate.

If guys are standing around BSing, anticipate that if they're hitting each other intermittently, they're going to do it again, same with couples kissing, or arguers raising their arms arguing to express their feelings with their arms and hands.

Look for such 'tells' about future behavior and 'wait'. You'll often be right.

Don't ask for permission unless absolutely forced to.

Or people will start lining up and asking for their photo to be taken like at a wedding, or covering their faces like they've been arrested.

Just get out their and quickly and promptly take that photo. Study the circumstance -- analyze it fast, and shoot the first shot fast.

If you get more chances shoot more shots but shoot that first shot. Scenes deconstruct and the last thing you want to do is overanalyze a scene only to see it deconstruct. Often the first shot is good or the last shot. You seldom know which.

People seldom stay still, unless engaged with one another. If you find such people, take a variety of captures, changing your perspective. Don't worry about framing a face with a blurry shoulder (it focuses the face). Etc.

Experiment; be bold.

Even do as I have done; take a superwide angle zoom tele and put it right into someone's face, and take a photo and then reach out your hand to shake theirs, and introduce yourself, immediately turn your camera back to them and show them the 'good' capture.

Usually they'll smile and acknowledge that you did a good job.

But as Henri Cartier-Bresson learned one day when he took a photo of a farmer, people sometimes get riled when captured on film. The farmer gave chase to the revered street photographer as the farmer wielded a threatening spade.

It goes with the territory.

But remember: people are lazy. If you move away rapidly, people do NOT have the energy to follow you (unless they're wanted in every province for murdering prostitutes and burying them on pig farms . . . in B.C. ;-))

You gotta go with your instincts.

The more you do it; the more your instincts will develop.

Learn to listen to your instincts and the better your captures will be; and the safer you'll be.

A word of wisdom: People will ask you 'how much' your super expensive camera cost. NEVER ansswer them and say they can find it in a camera magazine advertisement. You have a policy of never speaking of costs. If they say, I'm an 'airline worker' and passed a special national government security test for trustworthiness and show their badge, ask them if they can guarantee that every one of their friends they might talk to is equally trustworthy -- especially those they might share a beer with at a local bar/pub/etc., where people like to talk, and then tell them about how 'loose lips sink ships' and you'd rather NOT talk about values, thank you, but NO OFFENSE, you hope.

And if anyone asks weird questions, put great space between you and him. I was once asked if I ever worred that someone would murder me for my cameras by a seemingly 'nice' guy, but the question was totally weird and I was doing laundery in a laundromat.

I gathered my wet clothes and got out of there and only came back when he had gone.

Well, thank you for the wonderful compliment, and also for recognizing this photo; one of the finer, but least able to be recognized photos that I've taken: a sleeper, if you will ;-)

The middle grays are muddled for two reasons. The parking lot is split from bad asphalt -- it's torn and rendered and I didn't want to call attention to that by increasing contrast.

Similarly the grass was never truly cut/ it just grew there and there also is a manhole and some work that was done, breaking the uniformity of the scene, which is contrary to my intent, so I presented it as overall 'grayness' to avoid singling out the manhole cover, right center.

The grass was terribly unkempt. If this had been Pebble Beach or Spyglass, I would have boosted the contrast, or even kept it in the original, but it is not.

It's a lawn and not an attactive one -- one that the entire summer never was mowed.

All in all, I made a silk purse from a sow's ear, standing that aphorism on its face.

The deficiencies have kept this from being a 'great' photo regrettably; and in color, it just is too strongly 'green' while the foreground sleeper's clothes are clashing -- never good when showing 'patterns' or composition, and B&W didn't help much as the top and bottom do not show off his form well.

Please stop by and critique some more; you are always on point, which I enjoy greatly.

John (Crosley)

This photo, posted near midnight, US time, on a weekend yet, got only 3 rates, and thus was omitted from the top rated photos pages, yet it has already six or seven comments.

In my view, it's a fine photo; one I'm proud of, yet few will ever see it, and I'm sorry for that. I'll continue to post without regard to the clock; sometimes odd hour postings bring some of the best critiques as people have time to write original prose then, or foreign viewers take an interest; and I'm presently abroad and limited in my Internet access hours currently.

If I ever publish a book of my finer B&W photos, I want this one to be in it; there may be some handwringing, as it's not a great photo and not greatly appealing, but I like it.

It has a fine common element, the curb connects the rear ends of the three boys (three, theme of threes, get it?) with the sleeping man's feet, to tie them together. Someone I think would have commented on that if it had made the top rated photos page.

While it was a striking color photo, it was overwhelmed by 'green' -- too much dark green from the grass detracted from the composition, though the photo stood out when Photoshop Elements 5.0 flipped through 120,000 of my photos one day, and this one jumped out at me, and I endeavoured to find it (it didn't show in my files because it was shot entirely in 'raw' which my files then didn't see.)

I'm looking for similar files, which I have viewed on download and haven't seen since; look for belated postings from last year and even before.

(as well as today, when there were some fine shots this sunny late spring afternoon -- from a town center jammed with people and a brass band playing -- yes, a brass band!!! There'll be no 'pool' in this city corrupting the youth -- apologies to 'Music Man'.

Actually, where I am presently in Ukraine, the main culinary delight seems to be the vast varieties of warm beer served at the town square where almost everyone has a green bottle in their hand (or a premixed cocktail 'shake' with hard liquor in it -- such as a premixed margarita, or some such, as alcohol reigns here -- which may be half the reason that particular man was sleeping, except there's no beer bottle or can around him. (bottles are preferred because one can, when drunk, smash them to the pavement. Efficient little ladies come out late at night and after downtown rock concerts and swiftly sweep up the broken glass, with nary a word said, and no intervention by the cops, who keep things orderly but seldom move.

I did see at a political demonstration, images on the local newspaper photographer's camera of a demonstrator getting handled roughly by cops, but he had trampled a demonstrator's flag and apparently needed some 'control' -- the photographer had found the one bit of violence in an entirely benign day and night of politics and rock, and I am sure it made his paper (good capture too, says this war horse, and I felt envious for a moment.)

But I feel more at home with captures as the above; who else is to take them?

Who else is even to find them?

People sleep, and people sleep and onlookers and passersby gather in patterns, but it takes some discipline to find and recognize those patterns.

The same applies to shooting birds such as pelicans which fly rather randomly, generally, and swim the same way. If one takes enough shots, or watches carefully, one seems the development of patterns and if one fires quickly enough, those possibly random patterns appear to take on 'visual' meaning or significance.

In some ways, since birds move superfast, people shooting and bird shooting have some things in common -- especially if the birds are flittering about, feeding, flying, etc., instead of perched on a branch.

(On the relationship between shooting people and birds and the similarity between the two)

John (Crosley)

this has a total HCB taste...you MUST agree...dont make me link to photos :-)

classic one ( again :-) ) 6/7

That's why I put so much emphasis on this 'not being seen' despite being one of my better photos, even if not 'appealing'.

I could link to photos too. The man with bicycle lying under a tree at roadside for instance is one.

I imagine if Cartier-Bresson and I were walking side by side, in this instance, we'd probably each have taken the same photo.

In his case, however, he'd place his into 'rejects'.

He has tons better.

His taste, I agree; my best; his worst. But certainly the H C-B look and feel, I think. It needs better treatment (or just fancier, healthier grass).

You made my day, noticing what you did. I do agree, this time.

I actually thought that so many of his captures were dependent on the times and places he lived in, and I think I'm partly right; I have lived the better part of the last year in Ukraine where things are pretty s l o w and not t o o q u i c k, and the people are somewhat not up to western standards . . . because I noticed that such captures still were possible (here). Next week, I will be in the U.S., then Ukraine again.

John (Crosley)

Matt Vardy, above, asked for a street tutorial, and I wrote a very long post here, to supplement the hundreds of posts which address the issues of how one goes about doing 'street' photography including whether one reveals one's self as a photographer or not and how much or not one is surreptitious.

I said many times 'it all depends', but also noted that using a SLR or DSLR is conspicuous, then I wrote about meeting the man in the laundromat while my clothes were wet who asked me if anybody ever showed an interest in murdering me for my equipment, supplementing other 'odd things' he had said to me and some other patrons, intermittently, as I did my laundry at night.

I wrote above that I immediately gathered my sopping laundry, threw it into my car and drove off, better wet than dead.

I was right.

I described this man and the event to a woman worker I met at an establishment I patronized later; her response was 'that is my ex-husband!  He was injured in an accident and he says and does things like that.'

He had looked absolutely benign and middle class, there in the laundromat late at night, and absolutely harmless and was on sight not one to arouse my attention 'UNTIL' he opened his mouth.

Then I skeddadled.

You should too, when you hear such talk.

His ex-wife tried to pass him off as harmless.

Perhaps he was to her.

Perhaps he still is.

Perhaps he always will be.

But anyone who thinks and says things like 'murder you for your cameras' and asks you directly about it when a you're stranger in a strange and unfamiliar place (not a laundromat I used before), then your job is to immediately put distance between yourself and that person.

It may be that the James Nachtways of this world -- the 'war photographers' do and are destined to get wounded (he has been several times). 

Some famous ones have been killed pursuing their passion.  Maybe they're adrenaline junkies and like the television serial murderer Dexter, who as a boy stood on the edge of a high building's edge feeling his heart to see if it pumped faster, to see if he could 'FEEL' something from danger, maybe they NEED to have danger.

I don't.

I am not an adrenaline junkie; I have plenty of adrenaline just reading a book or watching a tv; perhaps too much.

I don't need to tempt fate; I take every precaution, consistent with still getting a good 'street' photo.  if you're not heartless and soulless like TV's 'Dexter' or an adrenaline junkie, then as a 'street photographer' you should always take great care for your own personal safety.

Part of that includes observing your surroundings as well as your intended subject. 

You will do that as a matter of course.

The part I have written about (rather extensively now) is to watch for the stranger who has a 'thing' for being an 'enforcer' but who is not part of anybody's plans and certainly is not an intended part of the photographic process - someone who has a thing for injecting him/herself (usually himself) into others' lives with aggression, and who sees an opportunity by stopping your photography or otherwise inserting himself in your photographic process to vindicate some ill-understood idea of some 'law' or 'justice he thinks exists about 'privacy' or other rights that in almost 100% of the cases does not exist at all.

You're his excuse for venting his aggression, and you cannot foresee that; you're out there photographing innocently enough, and suddenly one of thousands of strangers sees a photographer and for him it's a trigger for 'aggression' - sometimes violent.

He may be a person who watched as photographers (paparazzi) hounded some celebrity, and decided that anybody taking a photograph was of the same ilk. 

Any bystander with such little and confused intellectual discretion is a dangerous person if he uses such poor intellectual power and follows through with aggression against the photographer.

You might find a hand blocking your lens.

You might find someone punching your lens pointed at someone else.

You might find someone screaming at you (African) that you stole their soul, when in fact, you were eying a shop window with your lens and had not taken a shot at all, then suddenly a thrown shoe whizzes past you (high insult in African/Muslim countries) all for no reason.

You might find yourself, as I did, being lectured sternly by a German businesman telling me as if he were my GOD that I had to wake the sleeping man I was photographing in the Munich Airport to ask the sleeper  paradoxically if I could take his photo sleeping, but of course only after I had first awakened the man from his sound sleep on airport seats, (in front of the whole traveling world) disturbed the man, and then possibly gotten his consent, and that, the businessman told me was 'GERMAN LAW' 

[That assertion by him was a bunch of CRAP under German law, and as he tried to summon airport polizei who would have told him the same thing (I know German law and had it researched) I first told him so in so many words, told him to go away and be less stupid, then I just walked away knowing this businessman's plane was boarding, and he could continue to harass me, or get on his plane but if he harassed me he would not get on the plane.

I walked off confidently.

I think I may have gestured to him as I walked away, but cannot remember.  He deserved it, but it pays to be discreet and not make too many enemies -- the street is a place where one can make great friends and street photographers generally end up with a great many friendships formed on the street.

(I was shooting today/tonight and hailed by 20-30 people who had not seen me in a month or so, as their long lost friend (acquaintance)  . . . . missed and part of their circle of acquaintances, if only because I formerly showed up and took photos of them fairly regularly, then there was a long time when that didn't happen, then I showed up again, . . . .and now I find I am warmly received, if not seen for a while. 

(What a nice thing, to be missed by 'strangers', now friends of a sort.)

All sorts of people who are BYSTANDERS can try to insert themselves in to the photographic process -  A FEW OF THESE ARE THE MOST DANGEROUS PEOPLE because you are not expecting trouble gtom them out of the tens of thousands of bystanders you pass. 

They give no clue, even to the observant photographer; you have to know that these people are out there, and some time you're going to come into contact with one or more of these Loony Tunes people, and they ARE Loony Tunes.

They may be seeing psychiatrists for their 'issues' or should be.

They may be taking medications or be under court orders or supervision.

They may have restraining orders against them by various people, but not you.

Perhaps you're changing buses as a bus stop, you start taking photos of college age kids goofing around [fertile ground for a good quick candid], they're also bus passengers transferring for a few minutes) and some cracked out, whacked out junkie woman with purple hair, probably an ex-con, sees an older man at a bus stop taking photos of those students of both sexes (and over 18 too, but not essential for the story) then yells loudly  CHILD M . . . .  (you know what) and flags down cops. 

Of course the cops are great guys and eventually understand when you tell them she's psychotic (and clearly so), and absolutely NO ONE else is complaining or even noticing, but it's part of the territory of taking street photos if you're going to try to do a good job and not run around being scared of your shadow.

The gendarmes see the photos and KNOW what's going on -- that you're an artist with a camera doing what you do, and the complainer is clearly psychotic -- but it takes time, you miss the next bus being cooperative, and then you're late for the doctor's appointment so the doctor gives you less time. 

It comes with the territory.  Worse, you didn't even take a good photograph!

The good part of 'street' is such things happen exceedingly rarely.  Maybe every year to three years, but such events are almost guaranteed to happen if you're being diligent.  If they happen too often, you probably need to work on your street behavior, though reactions vary from country to country and culture to culture; what is accepted in Compton, Los Angeles County may get you beheaded or stoned to death in Saudi Arabia. 

Things are relative.  Street reactions are dependent on the culture; people in one part of Paris behave completely differently than in, say, the 19th Arrondissement where 80% or more of the residents (or their parents) hail from Africa.

The point of this post is that if you take enough photos, such issues are guaranteed to happen, especially if you're male, and especially if you're older.

Cartier-Bresson famously got chased by a farmer with a spade whom he had just photographed; he never allowed himself to be photographed during his active years for his own safety, he said.  The 'no photograph' rule was almost sacrosanct, and he regarded it highly for his safety; when he stopped photographing, photos were allowed, and at the end of his life, there were photos and numerous videos.

It's just in the numbers, no matter what, and regardless of how well behaved and what good intentions you have, on occasion trouble will happen, even if you use a telephoto lens and think you're being clandestine.

Just be aware that it goes with the territory no matter how pure your heart and clean your soul.

So instead of fretting, just go about doing what you do best