children's & YA recommendations on the go
A Life With Leica is a short film shot by the creative minds over at Northpass Media that takes a look at the life and work of Denmark-based photographer Thorsten von Overgaard. In it, Overgaard shares his inspirational and refreshing outlook on how he approaches his photography and what it is that keeps him ticking.
via A Life With Leica: An Inspirational Look at One Photographer’s Photographic Philosophy.
he saw himself as having come late to the Cartier-Bresson idiom, a consolidator rather than an innovator. They shared the style of “concerned” social documentary photography, taking street pictures with human subjects and applying a classical black-and-white composition to them.
Those planning a weekend break in Budapest take note. From 15 March anyone taking photographs in Hungary is technically breaking the law if someone wanders into shot, under a new civil code that outlaws taking pictures without the permission of everyone in the photograph. According to the justice ministry, people taking pictures should look out for those “who are not waving, or who are trying to hide or running out of shot”.
Officials say expanding the law on consent to include the taking of photographs, in addition to their publication, merely codifies existing court practice. However, Hungary’s photographers call the law vague and obstructive, saying it has left the country of Joseph Pulitzer and photography legend Robert Capa out of step with Europe.
via Hungary law requires photographers to ask permission to take pictures | World news | theguardian.com.
Fabulous black-and-white street portrait by The Sartorialist:
In comparison to other areas of photography, there’s relatively little advice online about street photography. But a number of photographers like Eric are helping to tackle this problem as well as build a solid and much-needed community for street photographers.
via Interview with Street Photographer Eric Kim.
I think one of the most important things about a street photographer is to really understand his or her personality and how their photography reflects that. I don’t think you should try to fit your personality to a style. Rather your style should derive from your personality. For example, not everyone can shoot like Bruce Gilden or William Klein without having the personality for it. Even though they get a lot of flak for being aggressive and “in your face” they are true to their personality. As Gilden says himself when giving advice to photographers: “Shoot who you are.”
But then again, not everyone has the patience to shoot like Henri Cartier-Bresson, seeing the scene and waiting for “the decisive moment” to appear. When I started street photography, I tried to imitate his style, but found that wasn’t true to my personality. I don’t really like always being candid and unnoticed when shooting in the streets. I like to interact with people, talk to them, get to know their names and what they do and occasionally I pose them for fun. At the end of the day I just love interacting with people. To make an interesting photo personally comes second for me.
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I follow the street photography collectives such as Burn My Eye, In-Public, Strange.rs, That’s Life, Stroma, and Observe for inspiration. In terms of my favorite contemporary street photographers — they currently include the following (in no particular order):
Junku Nishimura is a Japanese street photographer whose nostalgic black and white film work brings me back to the past. Sean Lotman from Kyoto has incredible color street photography from all around the globe and combines his photos with haikus which is awesome.Charlie Kirk also has some of the most stunning work done in Tokyo I have seen and is also working on a book on Istanbul which has powerful images. Charalampos Kydonakis, “Dirty Harrry,” is one of the most innovative street photographers out there and I love his surreal images.
I enjoy the work of Dana Barsuhn, a black and white film photographer in LA whose images are soulful and have a timeless feel. Satoki Nagata, a Japanese photographer who lives in Chicago creates beautiful images that border fine art, documentary and street photography. Rinzi Ruizfrom LA is a prolific shooter as well and he has created a very signature style, which focuses on light and shadows. Lastly, I would like to mention Josh White, a Canadian street photographer who is doing some great gritty work in the depths of Seoul, Korea.
Eric Kim on flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/ekizz/
Eric Kim’s blog – http://erickimphotography.com/blog/
A French court has ordered photographer Yan Morvan to withdraw his photobook Gangs Story from bookstores and to pay a €5000 fine after it found that he had breached one of his subjects’ right to control his own image
via French court bans Yan Morvan’s latest photobook – British Journal of Photography.
“Basically, in this case, two opposing rights were pitted against one another – the right to control your own image and the right to inform,” Morvan told BJP in a phone interview. “In this case, the right to control your own image, which was introduced by French minister Elisabeth Guigou in 2000, won over the right to inform. There are 250 images in this book, what this sentence means is that 250 people could sue me. In essence, this sentence is a ban on a photographer’s right to work.”
