Urban Symphony

Street photography is a symphony of different elements.  It is the urban landscape in a composition of shapes and people.

As you walk down the streets you find reflections of the city in its buildings, an alley with a wall painting that seems to reach out at you and various inconsistencies that add to this collection of symphonic images.

The photographer is the composer of this operatic symphony - as he leads the viewer through this landscape, stopping along the way to point out various parts the viewer should listen to.  You don't need a camera to take part in this symphony -just a desire to observe and enjoy the world around you.

DOWNTOWN

“Downtown –things will be great when you’re downtown” –as the Petula Clark song goes, and that is what I occasionally do.  I grab a camera and head downtown to walk and photograph the urban landscape.  I am drawn to the light as it outlines the various shapes while it hides others behind the dark shadows.  I think the key to shooting any downtown is to pick an area and become familiar with what stands out in that area – it could be the buildings or the people that reside within the area you have chosen to study.  However, in my case it is the mood or feeling that I want to create about these couple of city blocks–from the arrow lines in a parking lot to a mannequin in a window or a building peeking behind the shadows of another building.  My exposures are trying to capture the light and let the shadows go dark as a means of creating a hard look at my interpretation of this downtown.

Arizona Paint

I very rarely use a tripod because for many of the images I compose, the freedom of movement is important to me.  However, the one place I did bring along a tripod was Antelope Canyon, which is approximately 360 miles due north of exit 270.  This is a place where the light streams down from above the narrow irregular cuts in the canyon walls lighting some interesting colors combined with dark shadows.  Here is a place where long exposures and a wide-angle lens are the norm.  While I probably should have used HDR in making the exposures -I hoped that Photoshop would later help in opening up the deeper shadow areas.  I like to think of these images as “Arizona Paint” - because the canyon does feel like someone used a large bristol paintbrush with lots of colored paint.