Many Layers of Great Street Photographs

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This is a very important topic that I must discuss. You can use what I'm about to describe as a measurement system that determines how good of a photograph captured on a street is. We need to have some tangible conditions in order to evaluate how good we are doing. But more importantly, these are guidelines every street photographer can have in mind if they want to improve the quality of their photos.

Great street photograph consists of several different layers or elements. What can be considered a layer?

• Flattering light
• Interesting subject
• A gesture
• Good background, interesting pattern or detail
• Extraordinary moment

What usually happens with most photographers is they'll see one of these elements, capture it and move on, satisfied with the results. But a good picture needs more than one element. Most of the time I won't try to photograph the scene that has only one layer, although I'll do it sometimes just for practice or fun.

Sean Tucker recently talked about what makes a street photograph stand out. The more elements from the list I mentioned it has the better. So how do you go about creating it?

Start by identifying couple of the elements in the scene in front of you - you may find an interesting light, then wait for a fitting subject and then try to capture their gesture or a moment. Let's see it through some examples from my yesterday's walk.

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Here I got the bus stop and noticed first that the sun is rising and breaking through the clouds. Next thing I see is a puddle so I immediately think of a reflection shot. I get the camera as close to the puddle as possible without dropping in, to get the perfect symmetry. Clouds are nicely reflected and I like the traffic light as well so I make it's included. It nicely frames the composition. There's an empty space in the middle that the subject needs to be in to be visible so I wait and hope for the best. I even tried the composition with the bus but it's too crowded. After about ten minutes I got maybe 2 images that have multiple elements we talked about and are forth keeping. :)

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Here at this next scene, the light is coming from the side and I'm on a tram stop. After a nice light, I notice the white frame drawn on the glass (it's a image sticker of a tram) so I figured I might use it as a frame through which I can shoot the scene. Now I would need to wait the tram to arrive and hope for an interesting subject as well. The fence on the left and the tram rails on the right create nice leading lines towards the center of the frame. It was a challenge to focus correctly through the tiny frame, I ended up with these three shots that are decent but I'll go back there soon to try for a better shot.

Here are some more photos from the day.

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I liked the pillars here and the open space. The pattern on the roof is also interesting. Too bad the place doesn't get direct sun from the side. I waited few minutes for an interesting subject.

Here in the next composition I like the neon lights in the hallway and the leading lights and also the reflection in the puddle. So I squat and wait for the subject. This is tricky - people see me pointing the camera and so they walk around not to ruin the shot. :/ So I have to be a bit sneaky and pretend I'm messing with the camera settings so that they think I'm not ready to take the photograph. :)

I actually noticed this scene from the bus and had to come back. The English phonebooth is an interesting detail as well as the lady with her dogs.

Do you believe in coincidences? The Universe works in mysteries ways so even though Belgrade hosts millions of people I've seen both this Asian couple and the girl with an interesting haircut from below again today. It's something that happens to me so often. I believe we create our reality by what we focus in our mind - these people left a strong impression of me that day so I guess I manifested that we meet again. :)

I hope you like the photos and got something out of my suggestion. Regardless if it's street photography or not - don't settle for mediocre images, instead do your best to make them look as good as they can by making sure they have the necessary qualities. Until next time.