I didn’t take the camera seriously until moving to Manhattan a year ago. I’ve always owned a point and shoot camera and enjoyed taking pictures, but never felt the need to understand what makes a good picture possible until I was in an environment that dared me not to pay attention, dared me not to care.
Shortly after my wife and I relocated here, I began recording the dizzying array of details that rushed at me every time I stepped out of our apartment. Soon hundreds of mediocre shots with my FujiFilm camera pushed me to replace the point and shoot with a Nikon DSLR and a pair of prime lenses.
Almost immediately I realized that taking pictures could become photography. Abandoning the automatic mode and learning to shoot in manual taught me that you could control the resulting image, almost bend it to your will. I started to think about camera settings before composing a shot. I thought about camera settings even if I wasn’t carrying a camera.
If I saw someone interesting on a street corner in dimming light, I’d think, “1.4 aperture, probably around 1/50 second should give me nice separation and a pleasing glow of background lights. Might need to crank the ISO to 600.” But I wouldn’t even have a camera with me.
That’s when I knew I was hooked on photography, addicted to using the camera and the correct lens as a tool to capture images.
Now I live and work on the tip of this small island that feels like the center of the world. NYC is segmented into distinct neighborhoods, making it seem like every culture on earth is distilled into one city. When 8 million people are crammed into 22 square miles something is always happening.
For an emerging photographer, this is a blessing. You can start the day in Lower Manhattan, walk north to Chinatown, then after a stroll through the Lower East Side, you quickly traverse Little Italy, only to end up in Soho as shops are opening. Then Greenwich Village to the northwest leads you to Union Square, which quickly turns into the Flatiron District. Walk east and you’re in Curry Hill. It’s suddenly mid- afternoon and you’ve seen so much life.
When I’m out walking, I’m attracted to storefronts and signs. I’m interested in the history of buildings and the details revealed in their facades. These shots are the low hanging fruit that I enjoy shooting while keeping my eyes open for moments.
The moments are everywhere and they happen quickly. The only way to capture them is to be in them. You have to be walking, which is my preferred mode of transport. If you slow down and get comfortable, you can anticipate what might happen next. This is the most exciting thing about photography to me – sensing that something might make a good shot, getting into place with your feet, and then capturing that moment.
Shawn’s Links:
Photoblog: http://www.shawnhoke.com/
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/shawnhoke/
Our photography ‘journey’ is almost parallel! I often find when I walking around Sydney I look at objects, people, places so differently i.e what composition will look good if I took it like this? I find it cool how you don’t even have your camera and you’re thinking of aperture and shutter speed settings! I think thats fantastic! I just checked out your website, fantastic shots, hope to see more!
Shawn,
I envy you the diversity of opportunity that Manhattan offers you! NYC has always struck me as one of those ideal places to be situated as a reportage style photographer, with that great cultural-social mix and the dizzying architecture and… I could go on. Perhaps you should post a photo-diary of the walk you mention above – I’d love to see what you come up with on your journey.
Paula, thank you and it seems like you understand the sickness that is photography. 🙂 It does make you look at things differently. Thank you for the compliments! I just checked out your Flickr page. You have some gorgeous black and white pics, especially the bridge ones. I need to work with black and white more!
Jose, I think NYC is the ideal place. Seriously, there are already cameras everywhere anyway with all the visitors and tourists. It’s a shutter happy city! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had tourists ask me to take their picture with their cameras. I always oblige. One time my wife and I were running along the Hudson River and a young couple was struggling to take a picture of themselves against the gorgeous Hudson view. So I stopped running, smiled, offered to take their picture for them, handed the camera back to them, and kept running. I love this place and I want everyone who visits to love it too! 🙂
Perfect idea on the photo-diary. Challenge accepted as long as you don’t mind if I give you credit for the idea.
Jose, I’m going to do that photo diary thing that you mentioned one weekend in April. Am thinking about a 10 mile walk through Manhattan with only one 30mm prime lens.
Here’s a warm up for it:
http://www.shawnhoke.com/2010/04/bowerynolita-lunch-time-walk/