Sorry for the late post this week. As you know, I usually post every Thursday. I've had an unwanted guest at my house recently and he didn't want to leave. Some of you know him. His name is Arthur, Arthur Ritis. Here are some "Freebies" to compensate you for my being late.
How to Pose a Model and Create a Composition – Free Quick Guide
If you like taking pictures of people, there is one skill that you can learn that will make your work immediately better.
Author Ludmila Borosova tells you what she discovered.
“When
I started taking photography seriously, I was always focusing on the
wrong things like getting a new camera body or a new lens and
experimenting with various editing styles.
I would go around town looking for promising models that could potentially make it on the cover of our local magazine.
While
factors such as these have some power over your masterpiece, if you’re
looking for a nice shot of somebody, it doesn’t matter if they have been
in a beauty pageant.
Everyone is beautiful in their way, and trying to meet the standards of society isn’t going to get you exciting photographs.
What
does work is learning how to pose different kinds of models and how to
work with their body features to complement your composition.”
That skill gets you noticed!
Ludmila walks you through her beginner posing tips right here.
Candid street photography captures unique and authentic moments in time. This street photography sub-genre is a challenge. So many components need to be right to make it work.
Read on to learn some of my secrets for creating your own perfect candid street photograph.
What Is Candid Street Photography?
Candid street photography is imagery of people shot from the street
without them realizing. This sounds a bit creepy. If done with
sensitivity and skill, candid street photos tell a valuable story about the people around us. And how we connect with each other.
As soon as we’re aware that someone is taking our photo, our face and
body change. It’s difficult to discover the true personality behind the
mask.
Keen to capture real emotion and vulnerability in your photographs? Then candid street photography is for you.
1. Minimal Gear For Candid Street Photography
Keep your camera bag
light for your candid street photoshoot. Stick to a couple favorite
lenses (I use a 50mm and 70-200mm). Unless you’re planning on staying in
one spot, leave your tripod at home.
Restricting your gear means you have fewer decisions to make and you can move around easier and keep a low profile. Feeling brave?
Take your camera with a prime 35mm or 50mm lens and leave your bag at home.
Heather Milne
2. Photographing Ground Level Candid Photos
The best thing about taking candid street photos at ground level is
that you get to sit down on the job. Find a comfortable dry spot with
three or four different viewpoints.
This is a good way to be unobtrusive and capture interesting expressions.
The biggest challenge with ground-level street photography is the
movement of legs walking past. This can get in the way of the perfect
shot.
Use this challenge to your advantage by incorporating moving bodies as a frame for your subject.
3. Dress Down and Blend In
Standing out in the crowd is the last thing you want to do when
creating a candid street photo. Blending in with your surroundings is
essential.
Wear plain clothing that reflects your environment to avoid attention
and maintain anonymity. My standard uniform is jeans, tee-shirt, and
sneakers for comfort.
High fashion is definitely not my priority when taking candid street photography!
4. Creating Street Portrait Photos With Patience
The biggest lesson I’ve learned in candid street photography is the
importance of patience. I put my trust in my intuition, and sense when
something is about to make a good candid street photo. Then I wait.
Sometimes this involves waiting for a long time, but it’s worth it! Slowing down and being patient is useful in many ways.
Take the time to practice your manual settings and observe the changing light. Look at how the pedestrian and vehicular traffic is flowing. Try out your lenses and test different compositions.
The longer you wait, the more likely you are to see the connections
between people. This is how you catch intriguing facial expressions, or
beautiful movements.
Heather Milne
5. Accepting Mistakes In Candid Photos
Going against the rules? Making mistakes? Embrace your photographic faux pas with candid street photography. The decisive moment doesn’t always happen in the perfect light with the perfect background.
Learn how to incorporate movement and problematic lighting in your photographs so that they work to your advantage.
Understand how to convert photographs to black and white if you have color or light issues. And experiment with cropping to draw the viewer’s eye to the subject.
I
made this photograph in the middle of the day in bright sun. The car
drove past just at the ‘wrong’ time. Once I converted it into black and
white, it became a happy mistake. Photo by: Heather Milne
6. Get Close Up With Your Candid Street Portraits
The best way to capture a candid moment is to get close to your
subject. This feels daunting when you’re new to street photography.
Start by using a zoom lens and photograph inanimate objects to get
comfortable with the concept.
Candid street portraits don’t have to be made from the front. You can
capture emotions and vulnerability by photographing people from the
side or back.
Body language tells strong stories in portraiture. Look for hunched shoulders, people holding
hands, or interesting head angles.
7. Build Familiarity With Your Street Scene
One way to focus on your subject for the perfect candid shot is to be
familiar with your environment. We understand the light and weather
patterns of our home towns and know where interesting people hang out.
Use this knowledge to your advantage. You’re likely to intuitively know the camera settings and composition to use in a familiar setting.
This means you can really concentrate on observing expressions, behavior, and body language of people for great candid photos.
A very familiar scene in my home town. Photo by: Heather Milne
8. Stay Friendly and Approachable
Have a clear idea of the purpose of your photographs so that you can
respond honestly to any queries. Be prepared to show people their photos
if they ask.
My personal code of ethics dictates that I’ll delete a photograph of a
stranger if they ask me to. Taking sneaky photos from behind trees and
hidden corners looks dodgy. But you also don’t want to be too obvious in
the middle of a scene.
Position yourself somewhere in-between (which is easier said than
done!). Keep an open mind and calm presence, and trust your instincts if
you’re uncertain whether to squeeze the shutter or not.
9. Be Quick And Smart With Your Candid Photo Camera Settings
Candid street photography often consists of long periods of waiting
interrupted by very fast and sudden bursts of clicking. When you’re
squeezing the shutter, it pays to know exactly what settings you need to
use, and how to change them fast.
If a person is moving out of the shade and into the sun, you might need to quickly change your shutter speed. If something interesting is happening in the background, the depth of field might need to change. Practice makes perfect.
Keep working with manual settings until the process becomes automatic for your hands and brain.
It might feel easy to stick to auto settings. Over time you’ll master
the control and create candid photographs with a quality that auto
settings just can’t produce.
Quickly
shifting clouds meant I had to repeatedly change my settings while I
tried to capture the scene in front of me. Photo by:Heather Milne
10. Increase Your ISO And Embrace The Grain
It took me a long time to acquiesce and increase my ISO for street photography. I was such a stickler for ISO100 and was reluctant to change it regardless of the light conditions.
The result was a number of dull street photographs made under shop awnings and on cloudy days, which required additional post-production. Technological advances mean that you can increase the ISO setting without compromising the quality of the photographs.
When I tweaked the ISO to between 200 and 400, a new world of candid
street photography opened up. I was able to better capture candid facial
expressions and keep the shutter speed fast to ensure sharp photographs.
I also like the slight grain that the higher ISO produces in street photography. I avoid increasing it beyond ISO 640.
The
light was fading as media from around the world reported on a terrorism
attack in my city. I pushed up my ISO to keep the shutter speed fast so
the images were sharp. Photo by: Heather Milne
11. Be the Tourist
Still nervous about taking candid street photographs? Telling
yourself you’re a tourist from out of town is a great way to give
yourself permission and confidence to make street photographs.
It’s also a useful technique to observe your environment and the people with a fresh approach.
12. Tell the Story
A powerful tool when making candid street portraits is to have a clear narrative in your head. This takes practice because often the moments are fleeting. Learn about what is happening around you.
What are you observing and sensing? What can you smell? What are
people saying or singing? If you understand the story, you’ll become an
expert at recognizing decisive candid moments.
This helps you communicate what you’re experiencing with the viewer
of the photograph. It’s also useful if you’re putting together a series of photographs.
Candid street photography is perfect if you want to create an original photograph that tells a story and can’t be replicated.
You’ll avoid complications of artificial lighting, fancy lenses, or self-conscious models, and you’ll experience the freedom of movement and diverse themes and subject matter.
Take on the challenge and learn how to use your camera to share stories and history with candid street photography.
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People new to the genre might think street photography
is easy to define. You could say that street photography is when the
street is the location and subject. But that’s far too simplistic.
There are, in fact, many types of street photography. And there are
many street photographers with unique and distinct styles. Street
photography doesn’t have one set of rules. It is flexible and open to
interpretation.
We’ll take you through some of the different types of street
photography. It’ll provide plenty of inspiration. And by the end, you’ll
be ready to head out onto the pavement to shoot your own street
photography.
Photo by Gabriella Clare Marino
10 Types of Photography You Should Know
The street is an environment familiar to us all. If you live in a
city, you have to navigate your
way through a maze of streets every day.
There are streets we live on. And streets that are new
to us.
But not all streets make us feel the same way. There are some we
like. And some we don’t
like. A vibrant street with lots of people can
make us feel excited. Or a desolate avenue can
give us the creeps. And
streets, like flowing rivers, change as time moves forward.
These are the 10 types of street photography you should know. We’ll provide links to some
Leica Germany has produced the world’s most legendary compact mechanical 35mm cameras for decades. When Leica introduced the Leica M6 I bluntly asked a NY Leica dealer what he liked about it.
Immediately he plopped an M6 into my hand. Cradled between my palms and the camera felt amazing to hold.
Instantly I was sold.
To own a Leica M with a built-in meter was a gift from the camera gods. That weekend I put it to use for a wedding at the Plaza Hotel. I shot 50 rolls of film, and my love affair with the M6 began.
Why is this camera from 1984 is still amongst the best in the world? Read our Leica M6 review to find out!
Overview of the Leica M6
Manufactured from 1984 – 1998, the M6 was made by hand by Leica in Germany. The idea was to offer a compact, hand-held camera that used 35mm movie film.
From a photojournalist’s point of view, the Leica M6
is the best 35mm film camera ever made. If you don’t believe me, just
google “best 35mm film camera.” It is now referred to as “The M6
Classic” and not be confused with the M6 TTL its fatter younger brother.
What makes it special is its build
quality. It’s a sleek, perfectly designed, manual film camera with
through-the-lens metering.
The M6 features a crystal clear viewfinder, a durable M mount bayonet which is compatible with the best lenses in the world.
With this machine, you can expect all
controls to be smooth, quiet, and satisfying to the touch. To
rangefinder aficionados focusing is a dream, especially in the dark. The
M6 has also an intuitive and bright light meter, which is very important when your pictures are on film!
A Leica M6
naysayer would be a wildlife photographer, who needs long lenses to
rule the plains. The body is so small that this really is the
photojournalist’s choice. It hides well under your coat and is very
discreet.
The Leica M6
has been designed for a lifetime of use but you have to pay the price
for it. It’s amongst the most expensive cameras on the market. It’s
quite obvious that a small group of people can afford its superiority.
But the price comes with service. Any
well-looked-after M6 that gets a CLA (“Clean, Lubricate, Adjust”) every
10 years could easily outlive its owner. Maybe these additions make
Leica live up to its fame.
Key Features
Let’s dive into the specifics of this wonderful rangefinder camera.
Mount and Compatibility
Are Leica optics the secret to the Leica camera’s success?
In a word, YES.
The 35mm camera manufacturers routinely cut corners when it came to lenses.
Leica lenses are fast, sharp, prime, and costly. Leica has manufactured over fifteen different 35mm M lenses and 50mm lenses since 1959. Not to mention, all of them are excellent.
The Leica M6 is compatible with every Leica M lens ever made. This fact is true even for the digital Leica models such as the M10. They all share the same mount system which is without precedent in the history of cameras. One mount, more than 50 lenses, and no adapters needed.
Leica M lenses are all prime lenses. The exception is the unique long and heavy Tri-Elmar-M 28mm-35mm-50mm lens with click stops for three focal lengths.
The widest Leica lens I own is a 21mm. It requires a separate viewfinder that slides into the cameras hot shoe.
Generally speaking, photographers who use the M6 find themselves between 5 and 15 feet away from their subject.
Says Leica director, David Bell: “Our
lenses are for intimate environments, where a photographer might catch
the emotions on someone’s face.”— I call it the storyteller’s distance:
close enough to the subject, but not obtrusive. Perfect for a
photojournalist.
Image Quality
Sharp is the word.
The lenses and the camera with no vibration make for crisp photos. It’s worth noting that image quality in analog photography is highly dependent on the lens and the film you use.
But you can expect a greater range of
tone and contrast with Leica. And your subject matter will mature as
you get in tune with this camera. These are the kinds of photos that you
can’t take with any other SLR.
‘The
Beauty’ shot by Terry Gruber. Taken with a Leica M6 with 35mm Summilux Asph. 1.4, shot at 1/125 F2.8 on a Kodak PMZ 1000 film.
A great contributor to the tack-sharp images is the lack of flipping mirrors. Because of this camera shake
is more avoidable due to lack of vibration. In practice, you can shoot
with slower shutter speeds without worrying about motion blur. No to
mention that you won’t miss the decisive moment.
‘The
Afterparty’ by Terry Gruber. Taken with Leica M6 using the Leica 50mm
1.0 Noctilux, shot at 1/125 F1.0 on a Kodak TMax 1600 film
Focusing and Burst
A rangefinder camera is a camera
fitted with a built-in viewfinder with split image focusing. Instead of
focusing through the lens, you have to use zone focusing.
Whilst focusing, you should also look
through the viewfinder. You’ll see a double image in your frame, right
in the center of the view. This is for achieving the perfect focus but
it’s also crucial for the right metering.
The Bright-line illumination window
is your frame. After adjusting the focus you can press the Shutter
Release Button slightly to activate the light meter. Merge the right
arrow with the left arrow so both are showing simultaneously and you
have perfect exposure.
Image of the metering signs. If they are aligned, you’ll have the right exposure.
Rangefinder cameras allow for more
precise focusing on wide and normal lenses. With a rangefinder, lenses
can be designed with the back of the lens very close to the film plane
(SLR’s need to account for a flipping mirror), allowing lens designers
to make lenses with rear elements set close to the image plane which
makes them sharper, smaller, lighter, and have less distortion than an
SLR lens.
To focus a rangefinder, you focus on
your subject in the center of your view. Then you have to recompose your
image with the focus set.
Composing
your image centre can ease the process of focusing. Sparky from Fat
Cats, Harper and Row Copyright 1981, written by Terry Gruber.
A rangefinder allows you to compose
and shoot with both eyes since the bulk of the camera does not obstruct
your left eye view. Lens shades for Leicas have been adapted with a
corner cut out. In this way, the viewfinder is never blocked.
Things to remember:
You pick the focus point – not the camera
Even in the darkest places, the bright rangefinder allows you to fine-tune your focus
Combine focusing with your
thumb on the lens while pressing the index finger on the shutter. A
great tip for stealthy and intuitive photography
‘End
of the Night’ shot by Terry Gruber. Taken with a Leica M6 using Leica
Summilux-M 75mm f/1.4, shot at 1/60 F 2.0 on a Kodak TMax 1600 film.
Body and Handling
Leica has always produced elegant cameras, with the small details of the logo and effortless design. The Leica M6 body design alone makes it clear it’s hot.
In form and function if the Leica M6
were a car it would be a Porche 911 for power, a Lamborghini for
speed, a Tesla Model X as its whisper silent, and a Mercedes 450 SL
convertible because its a head-turner.
The M6 is a camera built to last. With a modicum of TLC, enough 35mm film, and CR batteries, it will last two lifetimes.
Don’t look for an “on-off” switch on the M6. The camera is purely mechanical. The meter is activated by depressing the shutter slightly.
The film loading is easy as it could
be. You should remove the bottom, insert a roll of 35mm film on the left
side, drag the film end across to the right and feed it into the three
teeth of the take-up spool. After wind the film advancer with the
camera’s Single Stroke Rapid Advance lever to advance the film.
The rewinding process is also user friendly. The Film Rewind Lever is located on the front of the camera, under the Leica M6
engraving. You have to flip it towards the “R” then flip the film
rewind lever 180 degrees. If you turn it to the direction of the
engraved arrow, the film winds back into the cassette. Then you can
remove the bottom and have your finished roll.
Standard edition M6 cameras came in black or silver. Speciality editions were not as common for the M6 series. It is more relevant to the newer models like the M7. But surely, there are plenty of unique designs on the market.
Value
After 40 years of buying cameras, I recently moved out of a 3,000 square foot photo studio in NYC’s Flatiron District.
I sold a palette of cameras, strobes
and accessories of vintage equipment. All of my Leica equipment brought
in fair market prices. Whereas my Canon and Nikon cameras did not level up to their market value.
The M6 (body) in 1984 was under $2,000. That was a high ticket. (Compare it to a new Nikon body 1/3rd of that).
Adjusted for inflation an unopened Leica M6 today can be worth the same as a Fujifilm GFX 50R. And that’s a digital medium format camera.
With an average eBay price of a used M6 in “excellent” condition coming in at the same value as a new full-frame DSLR camera. It clearly shows how the M6 has retained its value over 36 years.
Accessories
There are plenty of accessories for this camera. My personal choice, the Soft Shutter button, innovated by Tom Abrahamsson.
This smooth, convex milled, aerospace
aluminium alloy shutter extension screws into the shutter and
quadruples the size of the shutter to 15 millimetres. It increases the
hair-trigger shooting accuracy while shooting.
You gain as much as 1.5 stops in slow speed shooting. It is possible to shoot at 1/8 sec with a 50mm lens and get sharp images.
Wider lenses work even slower, down to ½ sec. It is available in Silver, Black, Red, Blue, and Monogrammed.
Another accessory I like is the M grip.
You can easily take off the bottom plate and replace it with the grip
which. It provides a rounded surface to hold the camera with your
fingertips perpendicular to the ground, alleviating fatigue and offering
you a more secure grip.
The Leica brand price is steep, but
there are off-brand options. An expansion on the M grip and replacing
the need for it is the Leica M Motor Hand Grip.
Basically, it is the M grip with a
motor drive. At every event, there are moments like the wedding dip or
the ceremony kiss. There a flurry of photos can help to nail the
moment.
Lastly, if you like a challenge opt for an AUFSU Leica’s waist level finder. This was designed for the candid shooting.
It mounts in the hot shoe and has an adjustable feature. Using the
right angle, you can set your target in a split second and shoot from
waist-level. This allows you to shoot totally unnoticed.
Alternatives
There are a few somewhat comparable rangefinders to the M6, like the Voigtlander Bessa.
The Bessa
is almost entirely plastic, making it less indestructible and feel
cheaper and less sophisticated than the M6. But it is still a quality
rangefinder.
For more of a price drop, there is a
Canon 7. The Canon 7 did not perform as well as other rangefinders due
to design faults; no hot-shoe, and no frame selector lever. Both cameras
are compatible with Leica M lenses.
Verdict
If you like to shoot film and you
like to be unobtrusive while shooting, the M6 is a classic choice among
pros, amateurs and film enthusiastic.
Its form and function, weight and feel, ease and quietness will make you an ecstatic Leica shooter.
Once you join the cult of Leica users
you are certain to become emotionally attached to your M6. Your images
will be sharper and edgier than ever. Your challenge will be finding
subject matter fitting of this camera. The only sacrifice to make is to
pay the price for it.
by Darryl T. 
