Imagination out of the ordinary
This Saturday, me and a lot other photographers participate in a makeshift exhibition at Planket in Gothenburg. Everyone get a metre (1,1 yard) and what you do with it is up to you.
I’ll go hardcore. I’ll laminate my 10-12 pics and nail them to wooden boards, just for fun (and for the possibility of rain).
Wanna see some more?
Planket, right by Bältesspännarparken and Trädgårdsföreningen in Gothenburg – Saturday August 20th, 12.00-18.00
Well. To be frank, some of the fingers weren’t that bad. Some I deserved, all I strangely like. I kind of naïvely smile in the depth of my people-loving mind…
The third of my friends in my street photography community (Gothenburg area) that I’ll like to introduce is Mats Johansson. As many of us, he’s got another job full time and take pics wherever he go (as he travels a lot). No matter whether you call Mats an amateur or not, he’s got that great eye for interesting pics.
I saw one of Mats exhibitions last spring, where he declared that anything urban interests him, sometimes it’s street art, sometimes street photography – quite often a combination of the two. In his own words:
– To look for and catch moments, views and interesting meetings in a urban environment is magic, especially with lots of people and movements in them. It’s the mix of documentary and art that fascinates me.
Photos: Mats Johansson
You can check out his pics at his own site, by clicking here.
Mats is also at Facebook (click here) at Flickr (click here) and at Instagram (click here).
In the Gothenburg area (Sweden) there are several really good street photographers, we kind of blend and mix in an unofficial photography network. I thought I’ll introduce some of them to you. First up is Agneta Dellefors Rydén.
Pic in top is called “selfie”
– It’s happening here and now. You don’t notice it, but there’s an non-staged play constantly going on, lacking both director and script.
It’s her own words, at a exhibition she’s currently having at Scandinavian Photo in Mölndal, just south of Gothenburg. If you’re close by, I strongly recommend you to go there. One reason is that almost all pics are better printed and hung on a white wall, but the main reason is of course that she’s a great photographer.
Her eyes spot both details and whole pictures, and her imaging is just as good. I believe she’s really good at the postproduction as the exhibited pics all are balanced, funny or intriguing – and sometimes all of that. She was kind enough to let me publish two of her pics from the exhibition. The one below is a real favorite…
Photo: Agneta Dellefors Rydén
More of Agnetas work? Either at her Facebook site
or at her photography site – click here for some pics from our mutual trip to London in April 2014).
Silly or not, I’m glad that someone else like to share my pics. Sometimes (on Instagram) I add the hashtag #Shootoff and some of those pics get shared. These are the latest nine pics that got shared by Shootoff. And my normal 20-40 likes/pic add upp to a little more. Nice.
Can you guess which of these nine that got the highest acclaim?
Yup, thats the one. “Thru it all”, botton middle…
Street photography isn’t at all about the streets themselves, it’s about people in the urban environment and on what people do and influence.
So, is this a “street photography”, even though there is no people in it?
I think so.
What can I say? The kids very often are the very best motifs.
So. Did finally get to muster up enough energy to create a few projects pages; London, Berlin, Amsterdam and Gothenburg and a gallery for street portraits. You find the pages under the meny “Portfolio/Projects” above.
There are a whole set of unwritten “laws” in street photography. Me and my friend Daniel Eliasson frankly claims that all these rules sometimes must be broken. It’s the image itself that must decide whether you break the rules or not…
Rule 1: You must take pictures close up and with wide angle lenses.
“Through It All” – taken with a zoom 105 mm lens at a distance:
Rule 2: Street photos are best in black and white.
“On The Move” – It’s the colours that makes this kind of pic:
Rule 3: The sharp picture is the only accepted one.
“Scared Dog” – to be in a scary place, feels unsharp, right?
Rule 4. You should always take frontal pictures of people.
“Finding Angles” – Sometimes a butt is more interesting:
“Luncheon Profiles” – profiles are not frontal, are they?
Rule 5. You shouldn’t as a street photographer be seen.
“iPad Break” – to get depth in this “Through window” shot, I let the ghostly image of myself appear:
Rule 6. The composition of the original pic shouldn’t be altered.
“Over Shoulder” – the original shot:
“Over Shoulder” – cropped, to get the effect of “dominating eye”:
These are just a few of the unwritten “rules”, there are some more. They are good to know, but don’t worry to much. Ok?
/GFN
At the “Denkmal für die ertmordeten Juden” in Berlin (the Holocaust monument), you do think a lot. One of the few public places that I’ve been very restricted with my camera. I guess the place got to me too.
GFN Street Photography 