Going Candid...

by Thomas Leuthard

  Which ones to keep?

  Choosing the photos you want to keep is an important process right after you come back from a tour. Especially when you don’t want to run out of disc space in a few years, you have to choose the right approach. There are people keeping all the shots from a tour. This is nonsense. You come back from a tour, choose the best shots, import them into your software (for me Aperture), process them and share them; finish! The remaining 95% of the shots have to be deleted. Yes, they have to be deleted. If you cannot delete your bad shots, you will have a problem sooner or later. And also the curator, who will find your unexposed exposures after you have passed away, will thank you the day, he has to go through them. Am I right John Maloof (the Vivian Maier curator)?

  My way of processing

  Coming home after shooting in the streets, I always remember some of the good shots. I normally process them right away. I don’t look onto the camera display during shooting, as you cannot see a lot and you are out to shoot and not to look at photos. I import all the good shots into my processing tool and then I do the following steps:

   I check for the quality (sharpness/noise) of the shot

   I straighten if needed

   I crop if needed (only very little)

   I run my preset, which includes the following:

   Add more contrast

   Add more definition

   Sharpen

   Black & White (33% Red / 33% Green / 33% Blue)

   On colored photos I reduce the saturation by 10-20%

   On colored photos I increase the vibrancy by 10-20%

   I add some vignette to some of the shots

  It’s always a bit different. You cannot say it’s like that all the time. Depending on the photo, you sometimes do a bit more, sometimes less. Often we think too much about image processing. If you look at the photo the next day, you would even do it differently. It’s a flavor of your current feelings.

  My camera settings

  Maybe you are also interested in my camera settings. I shoot with my Lumix GF1 in P mode with intelligent ISO and I will not touch anything of the settings. I shoot in RAW + JPG, where the JPG’s will be in B&W. On my Nikon D7000 I work in A mode (aperture priority) with an aperture of f/4.0, EV -0.7, Auto WB, matrix measuring, single auto focus spot and in RAW. Try to shoot in RAW as it will give you the biggest amount of options, but also the biggest files. Since you keep only the best shots, this is not that relevant.

  Balancing your work

  It’s not a good idea to shoot and not sort out. You will lose track of your work, while you create new photos. This might be fine, when you are on a trip and shoot a lot without having the time to process. Right after your return there must be done some post processing. I’m still suffering from my New York trip one month ago. There I took 4’500 photos, which still are unprocessed. I mean there are about 400 keepers waiting to be touched. I’m working on it. Losing track is the worst thing you can do. You may forget about some good shots.

  Backup your work

  Although you should think that backup is a common task, there are still a lot of people not really having a good concept. At least your keepers you should back up regularly. There are several ways. You can use an external hard drive and copy them with a backup job.

  There is software available like

  Time Machine for the Mac OS.

  There is also only storage availa-

  ble for backup. And another sim-

  ple way is the use of a photo

  community like Flickr. There you

  can get the original file of every

  photo uploaded. Sure the RAW

  file is not there, but this feature

  can still be useful. Especially if

  you need one of your photos to

  send in for a contest, to print it

  or whatever needs to be done

  immediately. Then you just pull it

  of Flickr. Maybe the best keepers

  (top 10 of the year) you should

  burn to a CD and store it off-site

  of your apartment or online (e.g.

  encrypted on your web server).

  Color or B&W

  What a question?

  When I was in New York City, I realized that you cannot convert every photo into Black & White. There are photos which look much better in color. But if you ask people, there are always some who only like Black & White. It was a difficult decision, because your portfolio will look different when you mix color with B&W. I’m wondering if this is just a phase or if this will remain?

  When you compare the photo below to the one on the next page, which one do you like better…?

  Is street photography B&W only?

  I'm wondering why I should convert a photo into B&W, when there are strong colors making a photo even better. One thing is that a lot of people think, street photography is B&W only. I don’t think this is the case. The other thing is that you should have your own style and then you may not mix up with colors. How does it look on your website when there is color and B&W and color and... For me this is a pretty difficult situation. Maybe I have to decide how I should go forward in my career as a street photographer. Should I just publish B&W no matter how it looks? Or should I start sharing color work only? At the moment I decide by photo, if it will be color or B&W.

  When you compare the photo below to the one on the previous page, which one do you like better…?

  It’s your decision

  In the end it's you who decides about the style of your photos and not to listen to other people's taste. A personal style is also a personal taste and a personal way of processing. You either take your photos for the crowd or you remain yourself. When this is matching, then it's perfect. But since I take my photos for me and not for the crowd, I will probably decide on each and every image ad hoc, if I should make it B&W or not.

  A Style is changing

  In street photography there are no rules. So it's on you to make your photos as you like them and hopefully your followers will like them as well. If not, stay on the bus and keep doing what you are doing as you do it just for you. If you are feeling about color, make it in color. If you are feeling good about color, make it in color. If you are feeling better about B&W, make it in B&W.

  When I look at the photos I have taken so far, my style has changed already several times. Maybe this is just a style changing moment and I will answer the question "Why do you shoot in color?" in my next interview with "I was in New York City, thought about it and decided not to shoot in B&W anymore..."

  Try it out

  At the end of the day you have to try it out. Try to focus on matching colors on the street next time. At least in such a situation you don’t have to decide about B&W anymore. You should not limit your view on B&W. There are so many colors out there and there might be a change in street photography to go towards color. It will be different, but we have to use the advantages of today’s technology to capture life in color.

  Keep shooting in color

  Sometimes people ask me, if my camera is setup to shoot in B&W. Don’t do that as you can never go back to color. Always shoot in RAW, which is in color.

  Then you have all the choices and the best base to process your photo. I know that it uses a lot of disk space, but you have to keep only the best 5% of your photos. When you delete the rest, it’s not too much of space wasted.

  Be hard on the selection

  It’s important that you are hard with yourself on the decision which photo you will keep and which ones you have to delete. It’s not about quantity, it’s about quality. At the beginning it might be hard to get really good shots, but after a certain time, it will be easier to delete 99% of the shots of one day.

  Grow your Balls

  "Street photography is 80% balls and 20% skills." – Eric Kim Eric is absolutely right with this expression. It's mostly about having the guts to approach people in the streets taking their photo. Al
though there are other concepts in the streets than shooting faces, there is nothing more intense than a real candid portrait of an interesting character. There are many characters out there; you just have to see them. Seeing them is easy, but getting them on your sensor much more difficult.

  Improve your social skills?

  I would say you start asking people to take their portraits. There is a 100

  Strangers project going on on Flickr. Start there and take your first 100 portraits asking strangers. Then you have the skills to convince people and also the outdoor portrait skills. Having these skills, you now go out again and do the same thing without asking.

  To ask or not to ask?

  I don't like to ask and I never do, except someone has already seen me and I still want to take his portrait. Then I have to ask to get the shot. But all the other times I don't. Sometimes people yell at me, but this is not really a problem. You can still talk to them, telling them what you do and delete the photo, if you really have to.

  They don’t beat you

  Most people are afraid to take a photo of a stranger in the streets just because they think, these strangers could yell at them, could beat the shit out of them or break their camera. I have done this for about 2 years now and sometimes go really close. I was just in New York and had not a lot of problems.

  Sure, there were people yelling at me and there were 4 Afro-American people standing around me, but I managed to solve these "issues" without a problem.

  Which focal length

  There is also dependence between the focal length of your camera and your balls. Generally I tend to say that

  "The shorter your focal length is, the bigger your balls have to be…"

  Meaning that street photography is easy with a large zoom lens, but it gets harder when you have to make a candid portrait of a stranger with a 50mm lens. Maybe you can start with a zoom lens, but you should get closer over time. Furthermore it's also important that people look into your camera. This makes it even a bit harder to approach people. But this is more about your technique on how to approach people.

  It’s not that hard

  All I can say is that you have to get used to it and you can practice it. It's much easier that you think it is. Don't think it's harder in your city than anywhere else. Maybe in a foreign city you feel more comfortable than at home. I can confirm, it's not easier in bigger cities. It's more or less the same everywhere.

  Things to remember

   When you look like a tourist, it might be easier

   When you shoot at tourist places, it might be easier

   When you use a big camera, you look like a journalist (= more questioning)

   When you use a small camera, you look like a tourist (= less questioning)

   Pretending to shoot something else is an easy way to disguise yourself

   There are certain techniques to make a candid shot easier

   Prevent eye contact with your object which prevents discussions

  Going Candid…

  How to jump into people’s faces…

  I like candid portraits and I really go close. Up to about 3.5 feet is normally the distance I go with my 50mm on my Nikon D7000. This gives pretty interesting portraits and intensive looks of the strangers you shoot. I never ask neither before nor after, because it will not be the same as a candid portrait:

  "If you ask before, they look different into your camera.

  If you ask afterwards, you have to delete a good photo."

  But how do you get that close? Here are some tips I can give you.

  The right place

  It's important you do something like that in a very crowded area. Either at a railway station, at bus stops, a festival or any other place where there are lots of people. Another advantage is, when people are standing still. Moving people are much more difficult to portrait. So ensure you get them somewhere they have to stand still. Even a zebra crossing is a good place. They wait at the red light and you can shoot them. You have to remember that they will always tend to look into the direction where the cars, the buses or trams are coming from. If you stand at the other side, they will not look into your camera. Be sure to choose the right side regarding light and the direction they will look.

  The right models

  A candid portrait is one thing, a character face another. You have to find the interesting faces. I like old people who have a face telling a story. Not the average guy, people who stand out of the crowd. In big cities there are plenty of them, you just have to watch out for them. Just walk around in the places mentioned above and keep your eyes open. You will see them.

  The best camera

  As you jump into their faces, the camera is not really important. Normally I like a small discrete camera, but for these kind of shots, it's not relevant. I use my Nikon D7000 with a 50mm AF-S 1.8 G. If you use a full frame camera, you may use an 85mm lens. A fast auto focus would be useful and a frame rate of 4 shots per second would give you good results. I always shoot 2-3 times to ensure, I really get it and one out of the series will be sharp. Often you have only one second while they are looking at you, so you have to be prepared.

  This means you have to already point your camera at the person, focus on the eye and be ready to shoot. They will turn their head, look straight at you and then you have to shoot fast.

  “The street has many faces, find the interesting ones…” - Thomas Leuthard

  The settings

  Since my lens is the sharpest on an aperture of about f/4, I use Mode A with aperture f/4, the shutter is set by the camera (be sure it's fast enough, at least 1/160 with a 50mm) and the ISO value depending on the light. Often I use ISO

  400 as in the city it's always a bit darker than out in the field. I set it to “Continuous High Speed”, so my camera takes up to 6 frames per second while I shoot. The auto focus is on continuous and the light meter on matrix measure.

  With the 50mm from Nikon I normally have an exposure correction by -0.7EV.

  The guts

  It's not everyone's thing to jump into other people's faces, but you can get over this barrier. You just have to practice with a longer lens and maybe ask first. Then you may be able to get closer after a while. You will figure out that it's not that bad and hardly anyone says anything. At certain events people don't even care. The more people, tourists and photographers are there, the easier. Try it! May after 2-3 beers it will be easier, but as I don't drink, I cannot judge that.

  The technique

  You find the right place, the right character and you just approach him. Maybe you pretend to shoot something else first and then point at the person and press the button. Wait until 3 shots are made and walk away. The most important thing is that you never, never ever, have eye contact with your subject. The only eye contact happens through the viewfinder. If you look at the person, they realize that you have taken their photo and they will ask questions. And when they ask questions, you have to answer and it might get difficult. Just approach, shoot and walk away.

  Two videos on “How to…”

  I have made two short videos to show how this works. I guess you can see what I mean and you can follow the technique or how it works. It was a big festival and there was music and a lot of people. At such events there are a lot of characters in the streets and it's very easy to take their portrait. It's not as difficult as you think. Have a look and try it out yourself:

  Video 1 | Video 2

  Conclusion

  As you can see in the videos, people even looked at their back to see what I have shot. Meaning, when you do it right, they don't really get it. Just pretend that you did not shoot them and walk away. There are only very few people who will approach you and ask something. Then you will just have to have a good excuse or you delete the photo right away. Not a big deal, just be friend-ly and follow their request to delete, if they want you to.

  Safer Shooting

  How to shoot safe?

  A lot of people don
't have the balls to shoot candid portraits or don't even point their camera to someone else. There is an easy and safe way to shoot without fear. It's a bit sneaky and cheap, but the photos speak for it. You shoot people sitting in buses, trains, trams and taxis. Depending on the light situation, there are really great opportunities available out there. And when these vehicles stand still, you have a lot of time to prepare and the people in the vehicle have time to "pose".

  One of my best shots…

  The next photo I shot in a “safe” way when I was walking down the streets in Edinburgh (Scotland). I saw this lady sitting in the bus. I just pointed my camera on her and pressed the button. In that moment she looked at me…

  They will always look outside

  The best thing is that they are captured in their vehicle and cannot do anything. You just have to be ready with your camera, because they will look away, as soon as they see you. So you have only one or two shots. Don’t miss it; it's your chance to get a good face without having to get too close to someone. Actually you get close, but there is glass in between. Another good thing is that people in such a vehicle tend to watch outside the window.

  Shoot at night

  Try this also at night, when the light is only inside the vehicle. Then it's completely different, but maybe also a bit more difficult. Just wait until the bus stands still, keep your camera still and shoot. The light situation will be amaz-ing.

  For the expert: Panning

  If you are an expert in shooting people in public vehicles, you can shoot the tram or bus, while it's riding. You make a kind of a panning with a passenger looking out at you. So you follow the person with your camera and a short shutter speed (about 1/20). Everything around will be motion blurred and the person would be sharp and in focus. Not that easy, but would be a great effect.