Street and Travel Photography Full Online Course - How to Say Something With Your Photography.

[Music] this is another cliche but photography is actually a way of life there is this idea that photography is like a language that you can learn and it actually rewires your brain so you cannot see in another way you start to see the textures and the lights and the colors and the moments in a way that it's very photographic and that's very interesting because you're going to experience everything and everywhere in a much deeper way looking for the specifics and the nuances [Music] one of the things that i want with this online course is that you feel excited and take this leap of faith [Music] and go and explore and tell amazing stories oh i want people to be curious and want to know more when they travel and discover things as intimately as as we do [Music] you know i can't make people see through my own eyes but i can teach them to try and experience these things as intensely as i do [Music] morocco and especially marrakech is a fascinating place it's a wonderful city that's very alive people are very welcoming once you get past the first moment of negotiations but it's um it's a place that is i feel very much at home and so i always like coming here we didn't come with a story in mind but that's part of what's interesting about traveling and discovering new things is that you can find those stories [Music] for example we met this group of young people that they're business owners musicians and i think it's a great way of explaining a place that often is approached like a cliche but there is so much more that you can explain and the feelings of a younger generation about traveling and about exploring as well about dreams and all of that i think that it's a great example of how we are so similar and at the same time so different in many aspects [Applause] [Music] [Music] photography doesn't just introduce me to people doesn't just take me to places photography is the journey itself [Music] [Music] no music that's a teamwork mom [Music] mud [Music] there's this quote from bruno varvey that says morocco can only be photographed with respect that's very true for everywhere especially morocco of course my way of approaching the streets is by observing a lot so there's no right way of doing this there's people that takes lots of pictures these people takes less pictures that's not important i believe that the important thing is to observe and keep looking all the time where there is a possibility of an interesting photograph either because of the story that you are making or because of the place that you're documenting my idea is to see where i can find something interesting and figure out with my mind if it can work in the frame and then wait there stay there for a moment to make the picture because when you can imagine that something interesting can happen and you have in mind an interesting design as well background foreground middle ground the kind of light that you like and and the basic design of the picture composition and everything is a matter of of waiting until it happens and that's it so in my case i take very little amount of pictures but i'm looking all the time and if i get to a place that i like a lot let's just wait there if there is people i may ask if they don't mind or i explain i'm going to be around for a while trying to take a picture and i even show what i'm doing especially in a place like morocco where people don't like too much being photographed until you explain what are you doing then it's okay so the thing is that i saw that this is an interesting place because i like the devil i like the depth that you can get here you have the first term there is the arts with the writing things going on so what i did basically is just to show my camera and say can i take a picture it's not about someone it's about the space and everybody's okay and that is i'm just waiting to something interesting to happen a nice interaction and and basically that's it are you gonna hang out here for a minute and do more photos or are you moving on we have been hanging out here just um some moments and and i think i have something interesting i don't want to push either the situation i'm happy with what i have and that's it maybe other day some other time i try again different light but for now i'm okay one thing that happened is that lots of people is worried with this candidness with this not affecting what happens once you are present and you say hey i'm about the place this is not particular and you transmit this honest body language everybody relax and they do their thing so you have an honest moment as well as kindly they are doing the things i'm not bothering anyone thank you feeling comfortable is something that i think that comes with experience at the beginning it's weird the act of putting the camera in your face three meters from someone is weird and it's always going to be weird because if you think about it for a moment it is actually weird just you're telling to people that you are there photographing but you're asking them not to pay attention which is weird but with experience and practice becomes part of who you are and what you do and you can enjoy it because you experience the world in a very different way that's very interesting as well because you as a photographer you rewire your brain in a way that you start to focus on details and the kind of light and you cannot stop seeing as a photographer which is a very interesting thing to that happens when you learn photography so basically the point of all of that is observing the maximum amount of time that you can because you will realize that oh this is this is the place i can do something interesting here and do it so you don't need to have the camera all the time in your face that's probably something that can be can get in the way of you seeing and experiencing the place i believe you've got one man that's coming into the frame and then you've got the young girls that are hanging out so it's really dynamic it's got a lot of depth and you have the young generation and the old generation you know split in two scenes um so i'm pretty excited about that and it's got a really nice background which is always important and uh yeah i'm pretty excited about that i've been to the square loads of times because i know that there's always interesting things going on so you never know there might be something especially interesting one day and i just keep coming back every year to see what's going on it's also interesting because over time these spots change the kind of people that go by change the architecture changes right now they're doing a lot of building and stuff in america so you know this might not this spot that i like so much might not be here in a few years i could end up waiting for an hour or come back every day until i get that spot so you don't always have to stay in the same spot for hours and hours on end you can just go back to that spot and keep trying those are the moments i'm waiting for i talk a lot anyone who has ever met me knows this so for me it's it's relatively easy i'll look at what they're doing sometimes i'll just stand around for a little bit and watch them i'll ask them a question and that's how i get the conversation going and even if i don't necessarily want to take a picture of them and especially here in morocco it's important is for people to see you you know that they know that i'm around that they get to know me that they understand that i'm not trying to do anything funny so it's extremely helpful in morocco to speak to a lot of people say good morning and things like that so that when they see me doing photos they're going to be used to having seen me you know if they know who you are and what you're doing if someone else gets upset about you taking photos it's more likely that they're going to defend you and say no she's cool you know like she's just here doing this and that so um right now for example we've been telling everybody that's willing to listen what we're doing here and the clearer you are about what you're doing and your intention the easier it is than to photograph one advice i'd give everyone approaching the streets is to be yourself so it's not about changing who you are it's using the things that you're good at and just reinforcing those so i'm good at talking i talk not so much he doesn't like it necessarily and so he has a different approach and that's okay it doesn't mean you're going to get worse or better photos it's just different ways of approaching [Music] we're going to meet the new friends the musicians and we're going to have lunch and music and we're going to do some pictures and videos of them super interesting and pretty much that's it let's see how it works and how it goes [Music] christelle where are you going um i'm heading over to the market to get some of uh ingredients uh i have a i have a camera here i'm gonna be filming um we're gonna go get the stuff for the tangent so we're gonna go do some shopping some olive oil spices vegetables okay [Applause] [Music] so we're gonna take a look in our tagine [Music] so we're talking about storytelling the kind of pictures that you need if you want to build a sequence or a body of work that it's about a place or a subject that is going to make sense it doesn't really matter if it's going to be more complicated less complicated it's just that you need these kind of pictures to tell a story okay the first one and it's kind of obvious it's going to be the setting of the place where you are right and this is actually very simple you just need to take a picture some kind of landscape or cityscape that explains where you are for example here we have a very common photograph from the very touristic place that it's called cafe glacier it's in the malefina a very common place to take a picture so makes it easier for the viewer for who is watching the story recognize where you are it's the square there's the mosque in the background and lots of people in the in the square which is basically what happens here it's very busy it's very big and very dynamic what i choose because we are marrakesh and this is called the red city is to choose a certain moment of the day which is the golden hour everything gets golden red and with these tones very earthy tones and i think that suits the purpose of explaining where you are as well right it's very easy just go to a place that is a little bit elevated and just take the picture in a moment that you that you enjoy and you prefer and it suits the purpose of the of the story another option is just being in the same place but from another angle here's another picture that you can recognize as well that it's probably the mother in marrakesh there is the same mask in the background and the street with the horses and carriages that is very typical from this square as well so it's easy to identify that it's market the mood is a little bit different it's another kind of feeling um that i like a lot as well it's more backlit situation a little bit more of a mystery it's from the ground perspective it makes things closer to you so there are different options just interesting to find yours what suits the story better but just to explain where you are so the next kind of pictures that we were talking about is who is the people that live there this is something i can be mixed with um the actual um establishing shot right because as we just said with this picture you don't really see the people but you see more or less how they dress how what kind of clothes they wear where they are so you can tell that there is people here they're doing work they're just hanging out with the family maybe another thing is just to get a little bit more precise more uh in depth with a specific group for example i have here this other example and it's a group of uh musicians young musicians and we're we're documenting this time and we are just in a rooftop of a house and again you can see there is somewhere in morocco of course um because there is a mosque there's the similar kind of landscape um in the background but you also are saying here this is the people that lives in the place that we were mentioning upstairs [Music] and to do a little bit of music [Music] okay [Music] yes [Music] other thing that we were talking about was about the action the relationships the things the things that happens in the in the plays right so there are some things that are mixed we can go back to the picture of the musicians in the rooftop and they are playing music so this picture in particular fits several purposes as well you can use it in the sequence for one or the other or all together right what else as an action more of a working space you can get into a shop a barber shop and just to comment daily life in a way that it's not about the people that it's there but shows action what happens daily life for example someone going to the barbershop and cutting the hair for example and you can do this kind of pictures in a more complex way because you also are starting to explain how are the dynamics in the place that's why in this particular photograph everything is more complex in composition terms or with the same idea you can be a little bit more simple but more dramatic talking about the food there is some thing going on here this person that works in this restaurant in this barbecue place is buying probably some bread or some goods for the business and it's just daily life work relationship between the humans but in this case because of the kind of lighting and the smoke and the on the place uh gives a sense of mood sense of the kind of light that is there a sense of mystery maybe because there are some things that it's just a hand going on uh in the frame and a little bit of blackleaf silhouettes and and pretty much that's it with relationships then you can get a little bit more focus on the specifics the nuances the details that's going to be is going to give a little bit of dimension to the story the viewer is going to understand not only where you are and what kind of people is there and what they do but also the details to smell the place or to feel the heat of the sun for example right or just the funny moments maybe there's this example city of cats uh marrakesh there's this cat installed selling uh paper tissues and it's it's funny it's a detail they're very small frame in the street another example could be this picture which is basically by the handwriting of the menu it's a restaurant they sell the jeans but what i like about this detail is that it shows again a little bit more where you are but how it feels to be there right what kind of food what kind of light what kind of locals are there where you can go to eat and gives you more dimension of where you are so remember that when you go to a place to recommend the place it doesn't matter if it's your own city or another continent you need to have establishing shot it shows where you are you need to show the people who lives there you need to show the action the relationships daily life people working relating each other and some details [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] oh [Music] [Music] wait wait the last touch [Music] not salt b parsley [Music] color in photography is underrated it's something that we see every day we're used to seeing color it's around us in nature and so we don't really pay much attention to it but to borrow from leslie harrington she says that it's the silent emotional language that we all intuitively know how to speak and it's it's 100 percent true if we go back and look at our photographs understanding color we will see that we are automatically applying color harmonies to our photographs but the difference is knowing how to use them understanding what it does and how they can affect our photography that's really important and that's the part that we don't usually learn [Music] through color you can actually translate a specific emotion a mood an atmosphere and since we're here in morocco i can explain for example the desert and i might want to explain how hot it is in the desert and therefore i'm going to purposely choose warmer colors to be present in my images so that that whole the warmth is going through the whole series or that one image and people understand that not only am i at the desert but it's also very hot there so before we get into different color harmonies it's important to know some basic concepts and one of them is the color wheel so basically you have a circle of many different colors and these can vary slightly and in them you have your primary colors your secondary colors and your tertiary colors it's important to know these different colors because you're going to have to constantly refer to them at the back of your mind while you're out shooting and so it's good to just kind of memorize which color goes next to what color and so on and so forth the second concept to know is that there are warm colors and cool colors as well as neutral colors so the warm colors are all the colors from red to yellow or greeny yellow and then the cool colors are the burgundies to the greens why is this important is because when you're especially when you're working with mood and atmosphere you need to know whether it's going to transmit warmth or it's going to transmit coolness aside from obviously the individual connotations that the different colors have right so yellow is about joy and emotion and energy red has a double meaning it can represent danger but it also can represent passion blue is soothing and it's mellow so you have all these different connotations there are many different color harmonies and we're going to talk about three because they're the ones that are most easily applied to in photography and then i've got a couple of bonus they're not color harmonies or theories they're just good things to take into account and tricks that we can use when we're out in the streets so the first one is monochromatic color harmony so monochromatic color harmony means that you're using one single color in all of its different variations so it can be if we're going to use orange we're using a dark orange a light orange it can be a less saturated more saturated orange but it's all in the orange color all right so that's really important because we're going to go on to another one that's very similar that has this very small difference so when you have a monochromatic photograph like i said it's very attractive very appealing to the eye it's soothing so it's not something that's gonna you know be overwhelming when you see that image um but on the contrary it can be boring if you're working with monochromatic you're gonna stress a lot the emotions the facial expressions the actions that are taking place in a scene and so in this case here i've got a girl that's running through the streets in morocco i've chosen or i haven't chosen but i've identified a spot in which i like the color it's orange and i think that orange works really well because i'm creating already a sense of mood the warmth of marrakesh and with it i'm explaining a moment which is this young girl who's she's running she's just got out of school so she's running through the streets and you're 100 focus on the action and her shadow which is what you're seeing in the image so this next one is a little different to the first one that we saw and i'm going to explain why now it's still monochromatic but in this case unlike the other one i am not taking in into account the time of day that i'm photographing whereas in the other one i'm achieving the monochromatic because of the time of day so the easiest way to get a monochromatic image is by choosing the blue hour or the golden hour and that is automatically going to give a tint an orangey tint or a blue tint to all of the the scene that you're taking photographs of so the second color harmony that we have is a little bit different to the first one but it's the same idea and it's analogous color harmony so analogous is basically using the three or four colors that are next to each other in the color wheel but you don't remember which ones they are so if we're choosing reds we'll be using reds oranges yellows and maybe a light green or we can take it to the left and we'd be using magenta purple red orange and yellow so you're basically using the colors that are next adjacent to each other it's a little bit harder but the benefit of using analogous over monochromatic is that it's a little bit more interesting we said that monochromatic can be a little bit boring right so this adds a little bit of flavor to your image and it's still quite easy and pleasing to the eye so and soothing as well so there's no bright colors that are distracting you so here we have an image of one of the small streets in morocco we have the guys that are coming um about to go to prayer and we can see that because of the light situation we've got some more some brighter colors and we've got some darker colors in the shadows but all of them are similar and so it's not distracting you can read the image without any one of the colors shouting out at you and taking away from the scene that you want to explain right so these are especially important using monochromatic or analogous are really great options when there's a very strong action or expression you want to keep those kind of more subdued not varying colors so that you can keep the attention on the people and on the actions so here is another example of an analogous color it's coming from the light situation at night and you have your yellows oranges and reds in this image so the third color harmony we're going to talk about is complementary now complementary color harmonies are there to impact so it's the complete opposite to monochromatic and analogous right where it's all soothing here we want to shout so again going back to the color wheel by now you should know it we're talking about the colors that are opposite each other in the color wheel so you have your red and your green you have your blue and your orange your purple and your yellows and it gets more complex the more you divide the color wheel but just to simplify those are essentially the colors we're talking about what's really interesting about complementary colors is that you're there to grab attention it's an attention grabbing color harmony so if we go into these examples and when we were talking about the fact that it's in nature here's a really great example i wanted to bring up a sahara desert and a blue sky so it's naturally there you have the orange sand dunes the blue sky color harmony right there complementary then we have this next image which is a very monochromatic background and we have the woman who's walking through the streets in a purple gown and we have a little touch of yellow it's very important to know that when you're using complementary colors you can't use them with the same weight so you want to use one of the colors in a larger ratio and use the second color more as an accent or with lesser importance in your image we have one more which is this one here so as you become better at using your color harmonies and in this case complementary colors you can get more complex with your images as well so here again we've got our complementary orange and blue but i've enriched the scene with a moment in the street and the shadows that explain that i'm in marrakech and all of that so if we were to review the three different color harmonies we've got monochromatic analogous and complementary monochromatic and analogous you want to use them when you want to transmit an emotion if you want to create an atmosphere usually whereas the complementary colors are there to shout they're usually also the ones that are talking about aesthetics so you're using two very strong colors to create a visually pleasing and impactful image aside from the color harmonies there are other tricks that you can use with color one of them is repetition so by repeating a color in your image you can help the viewer won't go through your photograph and even though it's not following any particular color harmony it's going to have that functional aspect that we were talking about that accompanies the composition so in this image here i have a woman who's working walking down the street and you can see that it's almost monochromatic in that in her surroundings but she's in blue there's a door in blue and you've got a green green blue element that's in the image that's kind of leading your eye to her so by having these colors even though they're not necessarily within a color harmony it allows the viewer to move through your image easily without anything being distracting so here in this case we have a similar thing there's no color harmony coming into play but we've got red blues and oranges by having the red being repeated across the image you're following that color through and discovering the different elements that are in the image so this last bit and this is very very important is red the color red it is at the same time great and very distracting so we need to know that if we have red in our image it should be in the right place and when i say right place it means it's either in on your subject your subjects wearing red or directly behind the subject because anything else is going to be distracting so here you have this image there's no color harmonies going on but i've made sure that the kid that's running through the streets is the one that's wearing red and that is why i'm going to look directly to this child first and foremost in my image this is similar to the previous one it's a colorful image but the person who is in my image is wearing red again so i waited in this spot until the right person came by and i took the photo with that person in my frame the best advice i can give you is basically do not try and apply the three color harmonies at the same time choose one and what i would say is go back to your images first look at the kind of color harmonies that you are using now that you know what they are and once you've looked at them you might find that you have a preference for a specific one so try using that one going out into the streets and just trying to improve that color harmony what's happening um as of as of 12 12 a.m tonight um the moroccan government has stopped all flights um from france and spain and also going back so we're kind of thinking about our options right now [Music] we've decided that we're definitely staying because there's no point in leaving we'd have to do that today and we're not ready to do that so there's a boat that leaves on the 4th to um and the other option is just to drive there but it's 15 hour drive that'll be fine okay let's do an interview let's do some work since we're stuck here [Music] people ask me about this this topic often and it's interesting because i believe that it's a it's it's a weird question for some reasons the first the first thing is that this having a personal voice or something like that personal style something that be that people can recognize the photographer it's something it's very new now because of the access to information and everything we can know who make the the things and if you are interested in photography or visual arts and this kind of stuff you can find out about the person behind but this is not really normal because photography and people based photography it's not about the photographer it's about the story or about the place or about the subject right so it's weird that we try to do something to make us important within the concept of photographing the world and humanity because should be about the story not us so the first thing that i will say is that center your attention on what you want to say is less about the boys is less about the composition or the techniques or the fame or being known and it's more about what you want to say and how you want to say it right that's where are you going to find your values there is this cinematographer roger diggins that explains it very well he probably has some kind of feeling that identifies his movies right because of the use of the the artificial light unnatural light and maybe composition as well but he always says that he doesn't have a style he put the style in service to the movie which is very cool and i think that too for photography we should try to do the same thing probably you will have some patterns through time that will repeat that's probably your own voice as a photographer because you will find some inter interesting details and aspects in certain things that other people maybe are not going to see right that's your voice as a photographer what is interesting maybe is to know a little bit of how you can build compositions that help to give a sense of a mood of the place sense of atmosphere for example we were talking about the dynamics the layering the complexity and composition that's interesting well one thing that i find important to explore about yourself as a photographer is to decide if you are going to be an artisan an author or an artist of course you can be an art an author of art but let's keep that aside for a moment so art it doesn't need a reason to exist it's an axioma right so you can do whatever you want you can play with colors with feelings and all of that and it's fine an author like a writer a journalist it's about the story it's about the news or the story or yeah it's about the story an artisan is a little bit of both somehow an artisan can be someone else that makes these beautiful doors that are hand painted and there is art here but serves a purpose right which is keeping something close or open it's a door think about for a moment in which of these three very broad concepts are you and it's important to know that maybe you will evolve in that as well it's it's very possible that you start with something that it's very more it's much more artistic maybe more about the visuals and all that and then you start to gain interest in some specifics and that's that's normal but be conscious on where are you on and where you want to be maybe in the future try to avoid trends that it's easy to fall in with social media and these things try to learn composition the use of color or black and white because with all of that when you start to understand how to work with these techniques with these concepts with the kind of lens that suits your distance to the subject better it will help you to tell the story in a better way as well an interesting tip about personal style particular style is the the choice of the lens because really changes the feeling of the picture of the place i use uh 35 uh fixed lens um and i like that particular angle of view because it sets me to three meters nine feet from the scene so the viewer of my pictures can tell that i was there just in the action in the moment and i find important to explain my stories and through my photography that what's happening is happening in front of me and i'm involved with that but maybe your choice can be different can be even closer with a wider lens that's fine as well or a little bit longer maybe with a 50 because the lens choice is it's going to affect how you compose for example you prefer a 50 because how it looks probably you're going to be less complicated composing because of the properties of the lens so try to find which one is yours and from there you will find that you start to develop a language through your own angle of view your distances composition is the language that you use to explain the situation or the scene that you're photographing it's like solving a visual problem and there are some tools that you can use techniques to give the sense of complexity dynamism and more formal visual aspects of the picture just to guide the viewer basically through the frame to tell the story [Music] first of all there is a difference that everybody should know between framing and composing an image framing is what you choose to put inside and outside the frame and composing is what you do with the things that you have in the frame that's how you apply all of these tricks and techniques the first thing that everybody learn and almost everyone knows is the the role of the basic rule of thirds just divide the frame in nine parts and you position the main subject in one of these intersections right but often and eventually when you learn more about photography you want to give more depth more dynamism more interest to the picture and there are some tricks that are interesting to use for example the use of diagonals the use of a technique that is called frame within a frame that is available almost everywhere something that is maybe less known is something that we call the rule of odds it's to have an odd number of subjects and interesting points in the frame to create geometrics to create a triangle maybe and then it's easier to create this sense of depth the layering the famous layering that it wants to do and with that in mind you can guide the viewer with more intention through the frame basically what you want to do when you are framing and composing is to select what's there what's in the scene to explain your story right so everything that is there should have a purpose in the picture so the use of the background the use of the elements that are there should be there for a reason right so when you know that and you're framing with intention you can start to use these techniques with composition you can start very basic and that's a good thing because with that basic rule of thirds for example you can start to build complexity around there for example in this picture i just wanted to show what kind of people lives in the medina in marrakesh so this is a coffee place and someone is just doing a crossword thing in the newspaper what i did basically is just to put my subject which is the only and main subject in rule of thirds as you can tell here the background it's clean enough it's not bothering the concept you can tell that it's some kind of local some kind of place where people just hang out there is a little bit of information here around the spices and all of these these things and there's a tiny trick that's going on with this with this picture actually it's very basic the subject is there and that's it the background helps and also i try to include these lines here that guides towards the main subject but as you can tell it's super easy and very basic you should use the basics because they are very helpful sometimes with that in mind you can go to another kind of pictures so as you can see in this picture basically the main subject which is this kit it's in the other side of the frame but it's also in rural thirds it's very basic the background is also helping because it's not distracting it's clean and it tells a bit about where we are doing this this picture i wanted to give a little bit more of a dynamics to the fixture a little bit of depth so i waited until there was another kid playing with a wheel to put it in the background so see that the basic the starting point is the same thing it's someone in rule of thirds but i kept working the scene until i saw something that can help me to explain the depth and the playfulness of the moment what happens with that is that you create a diagonal line here it's just putting someone else a little bit further also in a clean position raw thirds actually it's going to create this connection between the two elements in the frame two subjects that it's already a dynamic point in the picture it's very easy you might ask how can i do this kind of pictures in a city where it's busy well i can show you this other example which is this photograph it's in a very busy place in the medina of marrakesh actually but as you can tell it's happening exactly the same thing as the kid in the desert it's someone which is this man exactly in rule of thirds in the proper place the background is very clean here i'm using again the background in a way that helps me a little bit more of a mystery a little bit more of a drama with the shadows and all of that but the same thing and there is another person here as a silhouette that gives me that depth and that dynamics in the photograph also with a clean background giving me that connection between the two men creating this diagonal line and as you can tell it's exactly the same composition just in a different place what you have to do probably is to pay attention to the background because that's key remember that shouldn't be distracting everything that is in the frame must help the viewer to read the photograph and go through all the elements there i'm going to take it to another spot that is quite interesting because it represents marquez very well especially the medina and it's a very simple way of taking a picture with a very simple composition but very strong so a couple of years ago uh in summer we were walking from the meson de la photography that is right here and i was walking that street over there and i saw this one man that was very interesting looking weird looking as well and i thought i want to take a picture of this situation this place with this man in particular not the rest it was full of people so what i did was just to get inside this alley this heart and just waited i framed the thing with a frame within a frame idea in mind and i waited until the guy just crosses the frame and i took the picture usually symmetries in photography are less dynamic can be boring if you put something just in the middle of the frame but sometimes if you do it right with a nice light with a knife with intention you can create interest about the person that is there or the framing or the situation with social media and newspapers and tv and everything we see thousands of pictures per day and as a photographer as storytellers we want to catch the attention of the viewers so you are competing with all of those photographs that's why you are asking for undivided attention but if you ask that to the viewer you need to give something back right and that's good work well composed and easy to understand and to read how you can start to build complexity and more dynamic compositions if you like it depends on what you want to tell it you don't need to be complex in your photography you can be simple and still use these techniques to be more intense maybe more dramatic if if you want to or if the story needs to should be a reason for you to do complexity there's another example here actually you can start to see that it's not that complicated to start to build complexity i have the same man in the same place in the frame it's not the same i'm not in the same place photographing the scene but he's in the same place raw thirds is where you start with the basic again then you can start to build more things like the diagonals that we were seeing in the other picture in this case i'm applying another kind of technique which is the rule of arts we have three subjects the main one is in thirds which is the basic and we have another person here that is interacting is doing this human connection this action that it's uh interesting to capture and this this other element you don't see the whole man the whole thing going on just see the hand here that's enough to create a point of interest and that creates the third element to create this rule of outside so interesting to use but again if you look at the picture it's a breaking background i'm using the light the hard light and i'm under exposing the frame just to clean the background it creates a shadow right so it's not busy there's the smoke going on that helps helps me to explain the story where i am what's going on and that's it it's more dramatic maybe more mysterious a little bit more dynamic but it's the same basic starting point composing well always is going to be about patience it's normal when you start to interiorize these kind of things the basic rule thirds and then diagonals and frame within a frame you start to see the possibility of that picture in the places because the first thing you walk there and you see this is an interesting background can work and then you see a subject that can be the main subject because it's interesting because of the features or the color or whatever reason then you can start mentally to build the what the possibility of the interesting picture there the complexity if you need complexity or not and work the scene and be patient if you have the idea you can just wait until it happens if you're lucky that always happens but it's possible that if you're thinking about it it's because you see that it can happen because all the elements that are there make available that picture okay so for example in this picture that it's inside the barbershop we are using several tricks and elements about composition as you can see here we have the barber that it's more or less in thirds but we're using as well the rule of art technique we have an odd number of subjects why is that interesting because you can go again to the first subject that you see maybe is the barber or maybe it's the kids because both are in thirds and then from there you start to travel around the picture how you travel around the photograph is because of these three main subjects it's the kids this man that it's in the foreground and the barber which is in the middle ground it creates as you can tell a triangle which is a geometric form that makes easier the viewer to travel even in with a complex composition like this one to travel around the frame to travel around the picture so another aspect of the rule of attack is quite interesting is the psychology that involves our brain naturally counts in pairs for example if you go to the shop to buy oranges you on your 110 you will say 2 4 6. it happens almost with everything with the elements in the frame as well so when unconsciously your brain start to read the picture you start to say two four but there is no fourth so you stop there i look for that fourth and because it's not there you engage with the picture even more so for example in this in this picture is less complex but we are using the same technique we have the cat that is around thirds and it's okay not to be perfectly mathematic with this techniques we have the table with the tissues and the thing that the cat the cat is selling and we have this hand here so we have a clean background it's not confusing and three very distinctive elements there so you're going to watch the picture in the same way as the other one maybe easier because there's less things but in the same with the same process and you're going through first the cat what's the cat selling and then this hand that gives you again the sense of depth the dynamism and the interest so in this picture for example we have the same thinking process with framing and composing we have this element which is the closer to the camera and it's on third we have this other one ladies in the middle ground and then we have the background with this man that is walking in the other direction also there is this thing that is more personal in your way of composing and and in your personal style which is this other element which is this pole that creates again a frame within a frame with this other woman as well this is more personal these people likes it with these tiny bits of complexity or not but the basic composition that is happening here is creating again this interesting triangle that guides you through the frame again and again one of the things that i want to with my with my photographs i want to show how is it feels it's less about the specific you can feel the life in the pictures [Music] i feel that in the picture everything is dark and what you feel that is a story in this picture you know you feel like yes yes you don't focus about the of the person but usually it's more about the life important what just happened you guys want to finish my friends where is it nothing lucky day no girl no guys but now we'll go make it together after we kept going adventure me for this lunch we find gold now [Music] [Music] there is this great photographer the spanish photographer that says that he became a photographer to to be close to reality not to see the world through a telescope and that's very interesting because if you are doing people-based photography you're supposed to be there in the place it's a nice concept to think about for a moment we are in the square of the spices it's a translation because there are loads of spices as you can see and we're talking about gear and what i use to this kind of photography that i call people based photography it's a mix of documentaries street photography going around and i i want to say that it's not the most important thing what camera you use but if you are going to use one it's interesting to have something it's light and it's not very big and not very intrusive this kind of cameras that are small this new mirrorless several models are great great quality so it's okay to have something like this to walk around i believe that they are more polite with people it's less imposing and the second reason to have one of these this kind of cameras is that they are very light so you can walk around and going around the city and and all of that the whole day without carrying a huge weight on you which is important because you're supposed to walk a lot write and talk with with everyone and these kind of things there's loads of photographers that say that the most the most important thing in photography is not the camera it's a good pair of shoes and it's kind of true because you really have to walk a lot to do this kind of work and it's part of the fun as well so so yeah comfortable shoes and a nice camera that it's polite and lightweight with a couple of nice lenses and we can talk about the lenses if you want what i use it's a fixed lenses it's the equivalent full frame of 35 millimeters but the range is quite wide you can use wider like a 24 up to maybe a 50 which is the classic point of view cartier-bresson and this kind of this kind of thing that is very classic and very interesting and what all of them have in common is that they are usually smaller just because there are fixed lenses you don't need to zoom so your feet and your nice pair of fuse is your zone and [Music] and yeah they are small again they are not imposing they are very polite and yeah that's it i tried to use my 35 sometimes i use a 50 maybe for some portrait something like that but 95 of my pictures probably are with a 35 or equivalent and yeah that's the reason that's what i use what i use there's one thing that i find very important which is the small notebook coming back to the concept of walking around and talking with people it's interesting to have something to put down your thoughts to write notes emails maybe to send some pictures names and it's it's very important because all of the things that happens when you are traveling and you are in a place that is very dynamic like marrakech for example it's easy to to be overwhelmed and also it's easy to forget stuff right so if you carry one of these small notebooks it doesn't need to be fancy this is important because people tend to not to use it because they want to write very well like a poet or like a writer and you don't need that it's just to put things and it's just only for you it's the only other thing that besides the camera and maybe hand sanitizer thing like that i carry on me well now there are these huge capacity sd cards or cards in general but i believe that it's interesting to have with the fewer gigs but more sd cards and it's maybe a pain to change it all the time but you're supposed to to do your pictures well and you do your photography carefully thinking right so it's not really normal to to feel an sd card so fast because you're not it's not sports photography you are thinking every shot and there is a reason and there is a reason for the composition and all that so with more sd cards with less capacity if you lose one of those sd cards you don't lose everything now we're going to the hotel and we're going to do the backup of the picture the first thing that i do when i go back to hotel maybe is to drink a little bit of water with my hands and all of those things and yeah i download the pictures to the laptop and i run the pictures through lightroom just to see the thumbnails very fast very wide maybe i focus on just a couple of pictures to make sure that i'm going in the right direction that's it when you are not focusing too much on on the pictures of the day it's very cool because you can go through quite fast and you see huh this idea maybe works and i will work more on this concept because it works it's interesting and that's a good thing but not to stop working it's just to be inspired maybe there are some things that you didn't see at the moment right so you can say oh this this is interesting this is cool i can keep going this direction but working even more with this specific concept maybe if you find stuff that you know that it's that you cannot repeat then maybe you can you can stop for a moment and see just for you curiosity you really don't have to go through everything very carefully because again you don't want to lose you don't want to believe that you have the picture or the set of pictures it was one you want to see if you are in a good direction that's it editing your own work is very complicated to do for several reasons one of them is that we so we are usually very close to our own pictures we are here or we were in a place and we remember the smells how hard it was to take the picture so we want to select some photographs just because it was complicated to make you know but often those pictures doesn't work with the story with the sequence because of the composition or the color and all of those things i believe that your editing supposed to be happening afterwards when you are already at home and there is a little bit of space between the trip or the work and the process of editing your own work because you start to forget a little bit the weather the heat the people that you met so you can be a little bit more objective with your own pictures [Music] so we met this group of young people and we started to follow them through daily life a little bit of vacation a little bit of work their music their arts their businesses so in this time i have 800 plus pictures that i have done in these 10 days so what we're going to do is go through quickly all of these pictures to see how i start to select this first wide selection of things that i that i believe that are can work and after that we will be more precise with more complex compositions maybe about the color and the last thing that we will do is to think about moments expressions and if the actual pictures make sense within the story and all of that so what i'm going to do is to go through these 800 plus pictures that i have and of course the first thing that it's important to know is that you will have random things you maybe have in mind a story but you're not going to start with the story because you arrive to the place and maybe you start to do a little bit of street photography maybe you start to do these establishing shots that every story needs and don't care too much about where are the pictures so go fast and try to identify those raw thirds thing maybe if you see an interesting landscape as well it counts how you can work so i have here this one selection so i go through very fast and the reason is that identifying pictures with just a nice background and the subject or the subjects in the role of thirds is easy it's easy to find and easy to to see so you can go through very fast so this other one here startling shot with the moleskine third also counts it's a little bit of street photography making sense of the place there's one interesting picture here in this section we already met this this group of people so we are now inside of their house we're making food and all of that so makes it a little bit more complicated but still i'm going to select the ones that are easy in the to the eye for the composition with the glow thirds and these things okay so i've gone through uh my 800 and something pictures um [Music] i did this very wide selection at the beginning looking for simple compositions everything is proper and formal rule of thirds clean backgrounds and that's it the next step that i went through is getting a little bit more complex looking for maybe some diagonals a little bit of mood the colors more complex compositions uh itself and the lie and the last thing that i did was already thinking about the story uh that i want to that i want to tell picking some interesting moments or interesting expressions that makes sense and it's going to start to tell what i want to express with the with the sequence here is how i break down my edit into one three and five stars in my one store edit i put all the pictures that are in focus it has nice classic pool thirds composition and catches my eye a little bit for my three star edit i go back to the first wider edit and i look for a little bit more of a complex things in the composition i will start with this very same thing of blue thirds nice backgrounds and everything in focus plus something else maybe frame within a frame maybe some diagonals and then i put to that pictures the three stars for my five star edit i look for even more complexity i look for maybe rule of art layering interesting colors i start to look for interesting moments and situations that are going to give more the drama or more significance to the story for example here we have an interesting landscape of the of the city it's interesting because it's a little bit dramatic with the with the clouds and you can see the mountains in the in the distance and well i think it's okay it's interesting enough to have three stars there's this frame within a frame in the middle of the alley uh trying to show how small are the streets but in a nicer and interesting way what else talking about the subjects the this i mean and i you this younger generation than music i also have some more establishing daily life kind of thing that it's not super complicated as you can see so for example here we have something that it's not striking it's not super interesting but it's nice to have which is daily life is i mean with a motorbike in the streets it's i like it very much because here we have interesting enough composition there is depth light is okay but also what is happening is just normal and as robert franklin used to say i'm interested in what happens between decisive moments more than the actual decisive moment although it's fancy and interesting to have as well also as a three stars i count for example some details just these details of textures or or or situations as well for example the cat that's in the stall selling paper tissues that it's not a detail of something particular but it's a little of the feeling of the of the space very simple raw thirds nice light a little bit of depth and that's it so here we have something that looks a little bit more uh complicated but actually it's not um it's this photograph of this small alley where there are these restaurants is for working people and and you can see there's just two people one of them is the main subject and rule of thirds the other one is in silhouette in the foreground that creates this nice diagonal between them and that's it you can perceive a little bit of the kind of light that is there the kind of weather the kind of people that also maybe works there and because of the choosing of the background and the lighting and all that maybe looks dramatic but it's not a complicated picture to do one example of my five stars selection can be this picture we are inside of the riyadh where this group of people live and they are making the gene they're playing music so what's happening here is that i'm trying to express that situation in one frame and you can see that there is someone that is cooking there is a friend that is making it's annoying a little bit making jokes with with this instrument in the ear in the background you can see a youtube it's playing and singing and this is this other friend that is just looking and listening what's happening in the whole situation and it's complex because you have different layers of information of what's happening also it creates this geometric we have been talking about uh the rule of hearts and even though here there is not enough not an odd number of of people it creates the same triangle that makes the b-word go through the whole picture okay another example of a quite complex composition is this scene in the barbershop i made it complex because i'm talking about this smaller place small alley very local business uh very familiar with everyone and i wanted to give this sense of community the sense of things going on all the time that's why it's complex not just because that's important to to say one thing that i find interesting when you are doing this kind of editing that you look for one star three star and five star is that you will have not only a wider variety of pictures that you will need eventually to tell a story but also you will have a rhythm within the sequence because you will have something that is a little simpler that it's good enough to explain the mood of the place maybe or what kind of people is hanging out in a bar but also more complex stuff that is happening even though can be a simple situation like having a haircut in a barber shop but what i like to have is this dynamics is this rhythm if you think about it like a song for example you have instruments you have someone is singing maybe there is a guitar solo but the guitar is always it doesn't go through the whole the whole song it's just the moment it's a peak with a sequence happens the same thing that you need rhythms and dynamics through the whole sequence so after the selection one three and five star pictures you need to start to think about the sequencing that's the next step to put together um a sequence of pictures from having a beginning on an ending that is going to explain in a precise and a more intentional way your story so to start with the sequencing what is interesting to do is to think of course what do you want to explain and how you want to explain maybe you want to just put in internet in social media maybe you want to make a book maybe you want to publish the work in some magazine that it's important because it's different how you're going to do the sequencing for book format for an exhibition is going to be different as well or whatever you're going to send to an editor in a magazine also it's different [Music] we have been talking about sequencing and editing and having an intention with your work and your photography and here's an example of what you can do that it's very cheap it's very interesting to do for several reasons which is to put your work in a form of a book now there are many companies that you can do just one copy for you some copies for you and your friends or your family or you can try just to have a bigger print run just to sell it for example the point is to set yourself some limits and that's interesting because you're going to have a finite amount of pages to explain what you want to explain right for example in this book that i have it's called there is life on mars and it's about a journey about my journey through the desert in morocco and what i wanted to explain is how it feels to be there and i'm going to show you some examples of how i edited the book the sequence and all of that so i start with a picture that sets you in the place show its establishing shot i show what kind of culture is there because you can see a woman that is walking is not personalized but you can say you can tell enough i keep going with a little bit of establishing shots and i start to do some action it's not only what kind of people it's there but also what what is happening there right uh you can set the emotion the movement like the atmosphere of the place you can play with different sizes of the pictures double pages just a sequence of two pictures that are pair with each other that works well and what it's interesting also is that it seems like a book should be something huge something big with hundreds of pictures but actually in this one which is hundred and something pages it's only 38 photographs everything else is just a little bit of a design a little bit of double pages single pages text and all of that and in fact is this is not the normal thing so a book that is readable which is not a monograph something that tells a story usually works well with 40 60 picture no more one piece of advice is that try yourself get one of these companies and try just one copy do the design try to figure out if your story is well explained see how it feels to have your own physical work and if you like it do some more copies and give it to your friends or your family and see what they feel what they say about that i was asking him why the moroccans don't like pictures pictures yes because you know you know in the past yes there is some praise you know you come with the good image you know the good face and just say that we want to make a good video for morocco and and after you find that is not a good video for morocco you know and they make them amazing yes so now now when you ask some some people about taking pictures and video you have some people they don't want and some people didn't trust you know do you think that there is people that um it's not respectful we speak about tourism or you speak about the people live in morocco no tourists yes there is no there is some people for example there is some tourists when they come to morocco you think it's like on the move you know you think is it is a desert with just camels and all of the people did have money and you know didn't speak like uh like uh in in the good way you understand so he did like his you work with him you know or you work in his company yeah but in in my life you know i meet a lot of a lot of tourists just just the good ones so i think i'm lucky or i think i'm good you know it's because in life when you're willing to attract yes because in life because in life when you are good and you meet the good people you remember what when you me when you meet the bad people you take like experience you know so nothing is bad you know yeah yeah because when someone is bad it's bad for himself you know it's not for you no this is life [Music] ethics is important in everything in life and it's very important in photography but photography itself it's also important it's important because it's a great medium of explaining stories and the feeling of the place and i believe that it takes down barriers preconceives ideas that's why doing photography in an ethic way in an honest way so important what is okay what is right what is wrong what is right is more complicated to know that what is wrong it's very easy everywhere the wrong things are the same the right it might change because for example for me if you're in barcelona taking pictures in the street or in the u.s or in new york many people is more used to have street photographers there and it's okay nothing happens but here that maybe is not right so you have to approach that situation in a different way but that doesn't mean that what you are doing is wrong it means that how you deal with this ethical question it's different maybe explaining yourself more making you more visible not being sneaky and you know that by listening talking to people it's not just people see tourists and don't want them to take their photo like it's even when moroccan even like any photographer i assume you see a camera it could be like phone camera some people they don't mind but i think it's more often now because people especially to do with them there is a smartphones now and even a ticket picture some people you don't mind like they're kind of used to it especially in the younger generation the younger generation you could take actually the chicken as a fun yeah you kind of take a picture of me i'm a star you know but the other generation like you know is so like you want to have their own space you know there is always that like question why why why are you taking my picture yes and to explain that some people people understand it some people know and of course and we need to respect that you know like uh this is he's a human being of like someone like really to respect yeah so what what would you what advice would you give to someone who is coming here as a tourist and wants to take photographs uh the best way like uh try to understand the culture build a relationship with the locals actually and after that you will take a picture of them and stuff without realizing even but you don't mind it because they know that you know them there is a relationship but if not it's still a stranger you know stranger come take a picture of me why you know and especially if you don't understand what his photography for you know like uh that's my advice like try to just spend some times with local people understand your culture and you have to be respectful actually you don't want you to take picture of them or not a group of young moroccans and we've actually spent two or three days with them uh not so much talk taking photographs just you know we've shared a tagine we've been at their home we've been having a lot of fun and it's been super fun but now we're they know who we are they know what we're doing and we can now photograph them without with that maintaining that spontaneity yes they're still spontaneous because they're doing their own thing but they know that we're going to take pictures of them from time to time and that makes it really easy so um i love that you mentioned that because it is really important to build those relationships well that's very good you mentioned that actually even the picture you will think of them it will make sense for you as well exactly and you're going to have like a story behind that and you know like a draft like if you don't have a story behind your picture or photo you're not like doesn't make any sense you know like yeah one other thing that's very important and people tend to forget is that people is not stupid i don't know if we can say this thing here but the fact that i'm from the west i'm a tourist i'm a white person going to another country that doesn't make them stupid if they're okay with me taking pictures if there is another acknowledgement of what i'm doing and explain myself and everybody's okay it's okay i don't know better than them my only role here with my pictures is just to tell stories if they don't understand i make sure that they understand i have examples i show my pictures i try to explain myself as i mean said at the beginning of our friendship people think that this is some kind of movie when they come here but it's not of course it's photogenic and interesting and dynamic and and fun and different because it is but there's normal things happening as well people have social media and they work in offices and they do the same things that you do at home so it's it's a it's it's like almost colonialism to think that you're you know better you don't know whether everything goes together you have listening and trying to observe it goes with being open-minded and trying to understand that you don't know everything and by that you're going to tell better stories because you are going to be curious you are on to talk with people you're when you're going to try to understand more and do better pictures better better photographs [Music] we are going to the riyadh very late again [Music] and we were having pictures of these super talented friends with music and very nice food thank you very much and yeah it was great [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] foreign [Music] foreign i [Music] [Applause] [Music] my [Music] oh

Channel: The Raw Society

Views: 200,841

Keywords: the raw society, travel photography, street photography, jorge delgado ureña, christelle enquist, travel photography online course, fuji camera, fujifulm, leica, leica camera, documentary photo, how to do street photography, how to do documentary photography, how to do travel photography, national geographic photographer, street photography tutorial, travel photography tips, travel photography tutorial, street photography tips, travel photography gear, photography

Id: bLMjr3YQMMQ

Length: 95min 52sec (5752 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 16 2021