My Street Photography Journey (ongoing thread)

[Destin]

As mentioned in my first attempt at street photography thread, I'm picking up street photography as a way to push my creativity and help develop a better eye for composition. Rather than start a new thread every time I want to share photos, I thought I'd just start a running thread of my progress here.

I took my second photo walk around town yesterday and covered almost 8 miles in a couple short hours. There were very few people on the streets so I ended up doing a lot of location scouting and just photographing things that interested me. I'm hoping that once the weather warms up I'll have more people on the streets to photograph, but being a small city in the rust belt, I'm not sure how busy it will get. While I grew up near here, I almost never go downtown.

1.) Vines

2.) Abstract uniformity

3.) "selfie"

4.) Repetition

4.) Fun House

5.) Just a cool spot. Want to shoot it again with people walking by or something.

6.) Damn birds

7.) Abstract Shapes

8.) Black Lives Matter - This photo could be from a different era if not for the BLM sign giving it away

9.) My inner 13 year old boy couldn't resist snapping this, but I ended up liking how the van shows the scale of the mural

 

[Jeff15]

Good set.....

 

[Space Face]

Nice variation of takes there. All interesting in their own way. Cool venture.

 

[K9Kirk]

You're coming along nicely. Have you thought about using any PS filters for the B&W pics?

 

[PJM]

Interesting set, quite diverse. You seem to have a good eye for it. Looking forward to seeing more.

 

[Destin]

You're coming along nicely. Have you thought about using any PS filters for the B&W pics?

I've tried both Lightroom presets, and the Fujifilm film simulations. The Lightroom ones seem to be too aggressive for my liking, but I really like the Acros film simulation in camera.

 

[Destin]

Thanks for the positive feedback guys! I went out again yesterday evening for my first attempt at shooting at night in the city. The biggest struggle I have living in a small city is that there are rarely many people walking around downtown, at least this time of year. I'm hoping foot traffic picks up in the summer.

It was wet out, so I started off looking for reflections, but the most interesting subject I could find was this bus. Had there been lots of people crossing the street I would have had a ton of options with compositions like this. I just found myself very drawn to the way the light played on the wet street.

From here, I found this neglected payphone.

I then strolled over to the famous "light pole," a tall metal pole with lights draped off of it in the shape of a Christmas tree. It's been shot a million times by a million people, so I went in tight/abstract.

I ended the night with these abstract architectural shots of one of the taller buildings downtown. These are by far my favorite of the night, and when I took them they were just incidental snaps without much thought behind them. I'm not sure how I feel about my processing of them, but straight black and white just looked too cool for my liking.

 

[K9Kirk]

Nice set, your creativity is coming out.

 

[Destin]

Nice set, your creativity is coming out.

Thanks! That was the goal of this whole thing, so I’m glad it’s working.

 

[Original katomi]

Re post 7 image 1
Have a read up on 2nd curtain release
In one way the the lights of the # insert own car bus etc# make it look like the ## is going backwards by changing the setting the ## looks like it’s going forward.
It’s late here 2336 gmt so I am not going to try and look through all my photo books to find the article
I am sur you could work it out.
Have fun

 

[shippey]

Love the repetition images. Well done not always easy to spot such things in real life!Kudos

 

[smoke665]

You're coming along nicely. Have you thought about using any PS filters for the B&W pics?

I've tried both Lightroom presets, and the Fujifilm film simulations. The Lightroom ones seem to be too aggressive for my liking, but I really like the Acros film simulation in camera.

Great set, it always amazes me at what is out there if you take the time to look.

I'm not a big fan of LR presets anymore , I have a ton of both purchased and custom, but don't use them much. The problem with presets is they're to specific to a particular image, and create extra work in adjustments. Instead my workflow has changed to adjust an image to its best appearance out of camera, then apply a pleasing Profile. Profiles don't change anything in the Develop panel, and can be adjusted for opacity. Then it's back to the Develop Panel to add creative adjustments.

 

[Destin]

You're coming along nicely. Have you thought about using any PS filters for the B&W pics?

I've tried both Lightroom presets, and the Fujifilm film simulations. The Lightroom ones seem to be too aggressive for my liking, but I really like the Acros film simulation in camera.

Great set, it always amazes me at what is out there if you take the time to look.

I'm not a big fan of LR presets anymore , I have a ton of both purchased and custom, but don't use them much. The problem with presets is they're to specific to a particular image, and create extra work in adjustments. Instead my workflow has changed to adjust an image to its best appearance out of camera, then apply a pleasing Profile. Profiles don't change anything in the Develop panel, and can be adjusted for opacity. Then it's back to the Develop Panel to add creative adjustments.

I've never played with Lightroom presets other than the ones it comes with, and they've always just seemed too aggressive for my liking. I really need to take the time to learn more about the new (since I learned LR anyway) color grading tools.

 

[nokk]

i've made my own lightroom presets. i use them more like tools than as complete looks of images. in other words, one is just for sharpening. another set of presets is just to add different amounts of a matte curve adjustment. another set is for a camera calibration adjustments. but i'll still do minor changes to the settings after i apply a preset or two.

 

[smoke665]

I've never played with Lightroom presets other than the ones it comes with, and they've always just seemed too aggressive for my liking. I really need to take the time to learn more about the new (since I learned LR anyway) color grading

There's a difference between Presets and Profiles. Presets are instructions within the Develop panel that adjust sliders and other tools to a preset level. Profiles render your RAW image, converting it from raw camera information into the colors and tones you see, without affecting anything in the Develop panel. In addition to all the tool adjustments you'd have in Presets, Profiles bring the color grading power of LUTS into LR. Plus unlike Presets, Profiles won't slow down the software like having a bunch of Presets installed will.