I recently submitted a couple of entries to Canon's street photography competition. I wasn't good enough. =/
Just thought I'd share the nominated entries, in particular, my favourites:
The full album can be found on Facebook, and the competition details are here. I'm a little =( that nothing of mine was accepted, but all's well that ends well, I suppose.
I like this shot.
I think it is quite awesome. Cedric disagrees.
What about you?
Well I don't think it's an awesome photo for ... two reasons. One, the caption's rather snooty:
I saw this man stopped his walking for a while to take rest during passing through this shaded way. the area was barely visible after coming through hard sunlight I needed 800 ISO with max aperture in my kit lens to take it. even after that thank god ! there was IS which helped me to get a good pic even in 1/10th sec. the one legged man was looking towards remaining long way & that seemed very symbolic to me.
I am more interested in what a photographer has to say - as a storyteller - than what he used to capture a picture. You would not be particularly interested in reading an article if the journalist constantly stopped - mid-article - to boast about how he did the research for his writing. The same rule applies here.
Second, there's nothing particular special, or compelling, or meaningful in the picture. It's an old man's back. Standing in the darkness. With crutches. Looking to the left. To be honest, I can shoot that - it's not too special, and it doesn't say anything powerful that the viewer can take back and reflect upon.
Now if you had told us about his life-story, on the other hand ...
But you didn't. And so I'm not interested. Why should I care? What's so special about this old man? And if he's not special, what's going on within the frame that I should think about? Shouldn't you go up to him and shoot him from the front? Capture his eyes, and what they tell you? Ask him for his life story? Maybe if there was someone spitting at him; that would be an interesting story to capture. Or if he was looking at a couple of kids playing football in an alley. That would say something interesting, too. How did he lose the leg? Where is he going to now? There are a hundred and one questions you can ask that would help you take the right picture, to best capture the story behind the missing leg. An old man's back standing in the semi-darkness just doesn't cut it.
Also: the best street photography always has some visual narrative going on, that says something important about whatever it is it captures.
It could be the reflection of a dark and brutal truth:
It could be the humanity of a moment:
It could be irony:
It could be the political spirit of the times:
Or even the political spirit of a country:
Or even subtle racist commentary:
The point I'm trying to say here is this: street photography is more than just pretty pictures. Or simple shots of old men standing in the semi-darkness, looking to one side, which you captured from a distance because you didn't dare to go up to him to take a better photo, one with his face in it. As a photograph, I don't think it's particularly bad. But as a street photograph ... it could've been better.
that 2nd last photo looks VERY familiar. idk where I seen that before
LOL!! Of course la you've seen it before. ;-) The Afghan Girl by Steve McCurry, from National Geographic.
The eyes that told the story of a lost nation.
Related question: the last photograph, the one I said had racist commentary in it - was one of Garry Winnogrand's most famous, most controversial shots. Can anyway guess why?
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