Street Portraits - On the Hop

Copyright Carla Coulson

I don't know if many of you out there have had the same feeling of excitment when you see someone doing something that they consider part of their normal daily life but as a photographer you love. This feeling has happened to me hundreds or maybe thousands of times during the past 11 years when I have seen something simple, whether it be a life worn face, an old man selling colourful flowers on a crumbling street corner or someone unloading their daily vegetables from their car roof. In the simple there is so much beauty and it is that beauty that has pushed me over my natural limits to enter their lives for a few moments in the attempt to capture an image.

The big challenge is that you have a very short amount of time to engage with someone you don't know, who is doing something fleeting and who maybe gone in a few seconds.

Here's what I do:

1.  I approach them with a simple question about what they are doing or I ask information about their local area. This stops them in their tracks for a couple of moments..In this case I asked what was the vegetable he was unloading and how you cook it? It bought me a couple of minutes.

2. Whilst I am speaking to he/she I watch the light and the way it is falling on them. I ask myself is it good as it is or if I want to take a photo where would I move them? I mentally compose a photo and watch them closely to see what they are doing. With my subject above I loved all the colours, his mahogany skin, the light brown shirt, the stone walls with just the green veges to break the colour palette.

3. By the time we are into the conversation and I feel he/she isn't going to tell me to 'get lost' I ask my question..Would you mind if I took a photo of you?? I already know the photo I want to take when I raise the camera.

4. My experience, particularly in Italy where the above photo was taken the answer is mostly yes.

5. As you don't have half an hour to get it right, maybe just one shot or two as your subject doesn't  have all day for a portrait shoot or they don't understand why you may need them for five minutes,  you have to think quickly. In this case I asked the man above as he was unloading the vegetables could I take a pic with them in his arms. We were in a tight spot between a stone wall and his car. I just had enough space (I was using a 50mm lens) to jam myself up against the wall and get him and his veges in the frame. After two frames he was off to grab another punch and I had managed to get this pic..

This photo was taken at dusk in my husband's home town of Terlizzi in Puglia.

I would love to hear from you if you have any particular ways of engaging with strangers in the hope of getting a portrait..

If you want to check out some incredible street portraits you will probably enjoy the photos of Magnum photographer Steve Curry. I have long loved his images of people.

Steve McCurry The Unguarded Moment

Steve McCurry Portraits

Steve McCurry Looking East: Portraits

Carla xxx

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