Capturing Street PhotographyStreet shooting looks easy, but don't be fooled. Jon Sienkiewicz uses various Tamron lenses for street shooting. |
Article & Images by Jon Sienkiewicz |
Street shooting looks easy, but don't be fooled. This special brand of candid photography requires an inherent understanding of composition, a great sense of timing, a heaping helping of determination and more than just a little luck. Having an adventurous streak helps, too. Success often depends on using the right equipment. |
Capturing a compelling street scene is somewhat like watching a firecracker explode-the spectacle is over in an instant, and if you blinked, you missed it. Some photographers are comfortable using a compact camera, but most prefer a DSLR because they offer greater versatility and-usually, anyway-a larger sensor. |
Camera lenses must focus fast, be laser sharp and must be compact but still offer a versatile zoom range. I use one of four Tamron lenses for almost all of my street shooting because in addition to delivering consistently sharp results with great contrast and zero flare, they're famous for providing excellent color reproduction. The autofocus is very fast and-let's face it-no other company on this planet offers lenses that pack such a useful zoom range into such a small bundle. |
When I'm using a crop-frame DSLR with an APS-C sized sensor (the most common type) my favorite lenses for these urban escapades are the Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 VC, Tamron 18-270mm PZD Piezo Drive and Tamron 10-24mm wideangle zoom. I have used others, including the Tamron 70-300 VC and 28-70, but I like to travel fast and light, so I usually carry one body (with lens attached) and two more lenses in a very compact bag. Despite the hard knocks they occasionally take, I've never had a Tamron lens fail. I lost a lens cap once-but I found it later that same day. Honest-that's the worst that's ever happened to me in terms of an equipment mishap when using Tamron lenses. |
The 17-50mm f2.8 is a fast, constant f2.8. By that I mean the maximum aperture doesn't wink smaller when I zoom to telephoto, so it's at home in poor light. All of the so-called "kit lenses" that are sold with camera bodies downshift the aperture smaller and smaller as you zoom out. You may start out at f3.5 but on the long end the maximum opening is more like f5.6. The larger aperture of the 17-50mm f2.8 allows me to limit depth-of-field, too. The focal length equivalent when I use this lens on my Nikon D300 crop-frame camera is about 25mm to 75mm, so it covers the true wideangle to pure portrait zoom range. Sweet. |
The 17-50mm zoom and the 18-270 PZD (below) both feature Tamron's proprietary VC Vibration Compensation. As you probably know, if a camera moves even the slightest bit during exposure, the image is going to be unsharp. Camera shake is the number one cause of unpleasant photos. And believe me, nothing is more frustrating than capturing a terrific image that's unusable because a one millisecond cameraquake rendered it fuzzy. Tamron's VC feature eliminates the shakes. Because of this feature, I can handhold my equipment and get sharp results-even in dim light-without using a tripod. |
The 18-270 PZD is perfect for situations that call for a long telephoto. The equivalent zoom range is 28mm wideangle to a whopping 405mm! It's small and light, too, and the Piezo Drive mechanism makes it focus lightning fast. When friends ask me to recommend one lens for vacation, family adventures and all around shooting, I always recommend the 18-270 PZD. So far, no one has been disappointed. |
When super wideangle is in order, I use my Tamron 10-24mm zoom. The range it covers-roughly 15mm to 36mm on my Nikon D300s-can just about gobble in the whole world with one snap. When I carry two cameras on a shoot, one of them is usually wearing this lens so I am ready for anything. The depth-of-field is so great that I can change from Autofocus to Manual, pre-focus to about four feet, and blaze away knowing that everything near and far will be sharp. |
If I'm shooting with a full-frame DSLR like my Nikon D800, I use a Tamron lens that's optimized for the larger sensor. The superlative lens for this genre is the SP 24-70mm f2.8 Di VC USD. It's fast, focuses almost instantly, and covers the range needed for street action. Plus, the 24-70 VC has Vibration Compensation, so you'll be able to shoot handheld in darker situations. |
This may not matter to everyone, but it's important to me that Tamron lenses work well when I'm shooting IR (Infrared) with my specially modified, IR-only Nikon. Cityscapes are smoggy, some worse than others. What we call "atmospheric haze" is essentially scattered blue light. Being the shortest wavelength, blue light scatters easily and makes it difficult to get tack-sharp images of buildings from far away. Using a UV filter helps (because it absorbs part of the wayward blue spectrum) but if you really want to suppress the haze, shoot IR. Warning-IR is great for monochrome images, or images with false colors, but it's not good if you're after natural, living color. Matter that emits infrared light, including deciduous trees, grass and hot waffle irons, all are rendered white in a monochrome IR image. Cool looking-but not for everyone's taste. |
Go stealth mode. If your DSLR has an articulated LCD, it's easier to shoot without anyone knowing. Depending on the camera model, it's possible to shoot at waist level, above crowds and even around corners. The premise of candid street photography is that the subject is substantially unaware. There are times, of course, when the subject spots the photographer in action and figures out what's happening, but that all becomes part of the image. |
Okay, your equipment bag is packed. Now, what's the first step once you're out the door? Borrow a page from the old duck hunter's notebook: if you want to catch ducks, go where the ducks are. If your brand of street shooting focuses on people (pun intended), go to big cities where you're much more likely to find the human zoo. It's also important to have your camera with you at all times. Even a casual trip to an evening PTA meeting might lead to a street shooting opportunity. Don't ever hear yourself mutter, "Damn, I wish I'd brought my camera." |
The single most important shooting tip to keep in mind: pay attention. This goes way beyond merely being observant. Like the 1960s TV show said, "There are 8 million stories in the Naked City." Tune in, listen and above all else, watch. Getting good results requires that you anticipate what's about to happen. The more you practice, the better you become. Once you've learned how to get into the flow of your surroundings and penetrate its veil, it becomes a habit. |
Timing is everything. It's much like watching a five-year-old inflate a balloon. You know there is a point at which just one more puff will cause the balloon to burst. In order to capture the action you must anticipate when that moment arrives, and point your camera and lens in the right direction. That's all the more reason why you must have confidence in your equipment. I don't want to campout behind a lens that whirrs and squeaks while the autofocus hunts and hunts from here to infinity. So I use Tamron lenses because the focus is fast and definite. |
Many street photographers-myself included-prefer to capture a scene in one shot as opposed to shooting a series with a high-speed burst. My camera shoots four frames per second in Still mode, but I prefer to capture life one frame at a time. Do I miss a few because of bad timing? Of course I do. But making mistakes helps me improve. |
Be bold but not confrontational. This is a value judgment. If you intrude too much on a scene or subject, you alter it, and that's tantamount to posing. Whether you prefer to remain the invisible image maker who chronicles life's passing parade, or would rather be an in-your-face crowd stopper, that's up to you and your individual personality. |
Sometimes friends ask if I'm ever surprised by the contents of an image when I download it. The answer is "no and yes." I'm of the old school that says, "Get what you want" instead of having the complacent "want what you get" mentality. But I readily admit that there are many times when my camera and Tamron lenses capture details I could not perceive with my naked eyes when I snapped the shutter. The lenses are that sharp. And that gives me a great deal of confidence. |