Street photography is beloved by many, but it’s a strange genre that is deceptively difficult to master. Here are five bad habits that could be adversely affecting the images you create.
I have dabbled in street photography with my own camera and I’ve spent an enormous amount of time looking at the work of others. There are undoubtedly myriad bad habits that can hold the work back. I’ll discuss two here: one is mentioned by Roman Fox in this video and it’s something I personally have, and the second is a pet peeve.
The first is “rushing”. There are many reasons why street photographers might rush their work, but for me, it’s a mixture of three elements: self-awareness, scarcity of moments, and impatience. With self-awareness, it’s usually because I become conscious that I am standing in the street with my large camera and often getting in the way. I become concerned I might affect the scene or just be a nuisance, and so I rush. The scarcity of moments and impatience are both push and pull in the same area. I rush shots because I want to make sure I cover as much ground as possible and capture fleeting moments and don’t miss great opportunities. However, that also causes me to move around a lot and not just sit still in a researched location, patiently waiting for the right shot.
My pet peeve is street photographers whose entire oeuvre is grounded in invading people’s personal space or privacy. I have no time for those “artists” or their “art”.
Do you have any bad habits in street photography? What are they?