Sorry for super late update from this blog. I’m nowhere near fully busy like my usual schedule, thanks to Covid-19. However, the “working from home” trend bring a negative effect to me as well (will explain later).
Actually, I’m still working (for living) regularly four times a week, and sometimes I also do a little jogging exercise, or simply walk around complex of my working/living place with a camera on my hand, while shopping for daily supplies at nearby supermarket. These routines actually lead me to write this blog post.
Of course I try my best to follow all safety rules (mask, physical distancing, hand sanitiser, more aware about touch face with my hand, etc). Plus, my environment here also relatively quiet. Fortunately, all of person i encountered also followed the safety rule well (especially mask and physical distancing). So far all good, and I plan to continue this way.
So now I’m about to write something controversial: Do street photography at Covid-19 time could be a good idea. Of course, I have my own explanation for this.
Covid-19 itself able to shape a drastic change in people’s lifestyle around the globe, and it’s also my very first time face this scale of pandemic. Documenting city’s lifestyle nowadays is a rare opportunity to me, to see the city from different perspective. I don’t hope and expect to face another massive pandemic later in my life. This moment could be the only one chance to “record” what life be like at my area, when large scale pandemic is attacking the Earth.
Having said that, at the same time I also encourage most people to still stay at home and not doing anything stupid like create gathering of street photographers and do the group photo walk. Only going out for necessary needs, and stick to safety rules all the time. But, still make sure camera is in your reach every time need to go outside!
In my case, I did not go randomly to an interesting street photography spot, or a place that I thought great to captured street projects. I strictly only shot when I was outside, which was only when went to/from work (8 minutes drive or 15 minutes walk from my living place), to buy supplies (at nearby shops), or do jogging around housing complex.
Having limited resources like good spots and people (trust me, it’s not that easy to find someone to photograph), make it harder to even get one decent street shot. So, I use most of this time to shoot whatever interest me. Simply a snapshot of tree, line, flyover bridge, road marking, attractive neon box, reflection of something, shadow of something, and so on.
Not something I will proud of, however, this way I able to still maintain my sanity (because usually I use street photography to relieve my stress), and hopefully I don’t degrade my instinct too much because I can not shoot regularly everyday.
These days I only go out and really take pictures perhaps once a week. Snapshot while simple to do, is a good practise to learn about composition. The still objects will not run away, and I can use time as long as I want to “work the scene”.
Experiment with different exposure, different angle of view, different time (morning/evening), and imagine what if a subject would enter the frame, which side I should prepare for it. You can say, it’s like a shadow boxing, but in street photography world. I don’t chase for a good final result, but only give my mind a chance to think how to compose a shot. Which elements should I include in my frame and which one I should “cut off”. Practise makes perfect they said!
There were few times though, when I was a little bit luckier and able to find the right subject to enter the frame. Purely luck, as I could not do my typical “fishing technique” to stand at one place for 30 minutes or more. It just felt did not right at time like this to lingering for long time.
For instance, at photo above, it supposed to be a typical photo that waited till the right subject entered the frame. However, that time was purely a coincidence I met both person who use red and yellow accent just like the lines. I passed this spot almost everyday though, that increased my lucky moment indeed.
Main purpose of this post
As you might already knew from my previous posts, for me street photography was all about how we reflect our artistic mind into an image. It is a reflection of our mind. Losing this medium and took no shot at all could stressed me out because it felt like I could not “confide” about something that stuck on my mind.
Truth to be told, at first I expect to write a really short post, because I only want to reflects what I think into words (like 200 words or shorter). Somehow, every time I decided to hit the post button, my fingers found a way to add a little more sentences. Successfully delayed me for few days (5 days to be exact). However, I think better for me to explain in more detail as I don’t want to give misperception to people.
I don’t suggest to wildly back to street photographers routine, but, we don’t have to totally abandon street photography from our current lifestyle. Even when we can not go outside freely at most of the time. Use a little moment or time we have when outside to keep shooting is still fine. Not to mention, right now we are in such unordinary condition to documenting things around us.
Another street photography related at this Covid time: Use our WFH time to study more. I found some street photographers doing live workshop through various mediums (Instagram, Facebook, Zoom, etc) which is mostly for free. Additional benefit: So easy to access, we don’t even need to wake up from our bed to get lesson and new inspiration! It’s way more efficient rather than in normal days, most workshop need to be attended physically (even without photowalk process).
That is all about my personal view. Thanks for reading and stay safe everyone! Our health is always at numero uno priority at all cost!
Related article:
Train our mind by doing snapshot