Street Photography Tips, Interaction, Travel, Guides
*A series of guides on shooting Street Photography in cities around the world. Find the best spots to shoot, things to capture, street walks, street tips, safety concerns, and more for cities around the world. I have personally researched, explored and shot Street Photography in every city that I create a guide for. So you can be ready to capture the streets as soon as you step outside with your camera!
This Sunday’s Street Shot of the Week was taken around the Goldfish Market in Hong Kong. The Goldfish Market is one of the more unique markets you’ll come across. Goldfish are extremely popular in Hong Kong, partly due to their aquariums containing all five elements of Feng Shui. They’re used to balance the home and bring good luck, while also providing a pet that doesn’t require much space.
Thousands of bagged fish of different colors and shapes line the streets here. Inside the different shops, you’ll find aquariums, equipment and even more fish for sale. For this shot, I was looking at the street reflection showing on the aquarium of fish. I made a couple of photos closer to the reflection, but then noticed the scene inside the shop. So just as the woman took a phone pic of the fish and the man bent over to pick a new pet, I snapped this photo, while including the reflected aquarium. The Goldfish Market can be an interesting place to walk for street photography. There’s probably no other place you’ll see so many businessmen and other characters shopping for goldfish like here.
Stats:
With very little to no internet in Cuba, it looks like I’ll be mostly off the grid until the end of the month. After this upcoming week, I should be back to my scheduled posting.
For a quick update, though, through years of travel I’ve yet to have even a cent stolen, but that streak ended here my second day in Havana. I was robbed a good chunk of my cash so since I’m American and can’t use ATM or credit cards here, it looks like I’ll have to forget my planned travel in Cuba and stay right here to make the rest of my money last until my flight out. On the bright side, if I was to choose one city in the world to be “stuck” in with my camera, it would probably be Havana. So here’s a candid photo and a non-candid photo from here, and I’ll see you all once I land in Miami for the Miami Street Photography Festival!
Side story for the non-candid photo: I was walking back from confronting the thieves who stole my money when I snapped a candid pic of these two ladies drinking on their doorstep. They laughed and we started a conversation with my very bad Spanish, eventually touching on me being robbed. That prompted them to invite me for a beer and more good, but mostly lost in translation conversation. This is the second, less candid, but more memorable pic of the two of them by their doorstep before I said goodbye.
If I took a drink for every time I’m offered rum or a beer while out shooting in Havana, I’d be drunk all day. And if I said I often turn down a drink, I’d also be a liar ;) Cheers!
This Sunday’s Street Shot of the Week was taken in the Mong Kok area of Hong Kong. Mong Kok, located in Kowloon, is one of the busiest and most highly populated districts in the world. Its mix of older and newer buildings contain much of the character Hong Kong’s past is known for. It’s also one of the major shopping areas in Hong Kong, with some of the city’s most interesting markets and narrow alleys.
I was exploring some of these alleys when I captured this shot. Unfortunately, Hong Kong’s weather has aways been poor for me, but this day was extra bad. It had just finished pouring rain and I was standing under a canopy in the alley when I noticed this woman coming from around the corner. She was hunched over in an interesting position, with her hands behind her back, but what grabbed my attention was how her blue plastic honcho matched the blue rain tarp down the alley.
So I waited for her to walk by the tarp once the neon sign hit her, providing some light. The blues and atmosphere match the wet mood and alley character I remember most from those rainy days in Hong Kong.
Stats:
For any readers that don’t already know, I’m excited to announce here that I’ve personally joined up with The Street Collective as a new member, along with Yves Vernin. Other members include Fabian Schreyer, Dmitry Stepanenko, Gabi Ben Avraham, Vineet Vohra and Mats Alfredsson.
The photo collective was founded in early 2013 as an international group of street photographers, with members coming from different home countries. So, I’m happy to now represent the USA. Although, judging from my photos I need to spend some time there :) It’s a very passionate group of street photographers and I’m looking forward to what the future will bring working with them.
Nothing will change with the blog and my 100 city goals, but there might be some interaction included here. Also, our collective is not only about us, but offers other photographers the possibility to contribute to different public projects. So below, I’ll go over a couple of the community activities you all can participate in, followed by links to the member photo pages for you to check out.
Our Public Projects give a theme for others to submit their photos to. The last one was “Public Transport,” which is where Chu Việt Hà’s photo above comes from. The best shots are selected by the collective members and featured in the project’s gallery, while the project-winner is featured with his portfolio on the collective website.
The public project submissions work through its own Facebook group page so feel free to participate there!
Our new “Street Sequence” Flickr Group is one I’m especially excited for. What started as a collective project recently exhibited during the Brussels Street Photography Festival has now turned into something everyone can participate in. The theme and sequence behind it should turn into something really great, especially with all the top street photographers already submitting. Below are the specific details and you can check out the included video to see what it really looks like. I think it’s a great idea, so hopefully many of you all can participate!
What is it all about?
-“Street Sequence” is a street photography group initiated and curated by the members of “The Street Collective.”
-What started off as a collective edit, (“What’s next?”: www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_fgXqItiu0&feature=youtu.be), will now be continued as a public project. With submissions from the Flickr community.
How does it work?
– We want to create an ongoing street sequence, where each picture in the queue relates to the previous one
– The connection may be based on narration, mood, graphic impact, matching colors etc. It may be obvious, but also try to think of clever, subtle connections
– It’s a street photography group, so make sure your submissions match the broad understanding of this approach (candid, taken in public, human element)
– You can submit a maximum of two shots per week, which match the above criteria
– Shots can either be from your archive or new work
– Once a week, the group-admins pick the favorite submission from the previous week and add it to the sequence
– Then the new submission period starts!
Thanks to everyone that read this post and hopefully I’ll be able to see some of your photos in these community projects. Currently, I’m about to leave to Cuba for a couple of weeks so my internet access might be minimal, but I’ll have some posts scheduled and try to keep contact. Also, I’ll be in Miami the first week of December for the Miami Street Photography Festival, so if anyone wants to meet there, just shoot me a message or comment below.
Cheers!
The Street Collective:
Website: www.thestreetcollective.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/thestreetcollectivedotcom
Facebook (public project group): www.facebook.com/groups/356974127846089
Instagram: www.instagram.com/thestreetcollective
Living in Ho Chi Minh City, I had to make a visit up to Vietnam’s capital. Hanoi quickly became one of my favorite city’s in Asia for street photography, with endless character, charm, places to shoot, and people just as photography friendly as back home in Saigon. Being thousands of years old, you feel the city’s age when exploring the streets. From a city of over 3 million people, there’s an authentic, old world atmosphere it exudes.
So here’s 33 photos that I was able to capture during my time in Hanoi…
This Sunday’s Street Shot of the Week was taken at September 23 Park in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Taken in the same area as a previous Sunday Street Shot, this long, skinny park runs along Saigon’s backpacker district up to the popular Bến Thành Market. In the heart of the city here, there’s always something going.
After shooting in the park some, I noticed this little white dog at the edge of the grass. I really liked the colors, with the bright white dog inside the red cloth set on green grass. As I walked over to take a photo, his owner came over too. The short, older man leaned over and started playfully talking to his dog while clapping. Due to how short the man was, I was able to tower over them by stepping on the grass side curb. I tried to compose the shot directly above the dog to accentuate the combination of colors, while also creating a sort of illusion with the man’s hands and feet only showing from under his hat. While it was a little difficult balancing above for the shot, the old man got a good laugh once he noticed what I was doing.
Stats:
*My time in Bangkok came before the recent passing of Thailand’s long beloved King Bhumibol Adulyadej. The nation is now observing a 30-day period of mourning and I’d like to wish the people the best while dealing with their great loss.
In-between leaving Vietnam on my way to some work in Russia, I decided to stop in Bangkok, Thailand. I’d been before years ago, but only as a short stop before visiting the beaches for vacation. So it was my first time really exploring the city for some photography. Bangkok is one of the more well-known cities in Asia and if you’ve seen much of the quality street photography coming out lately, Thailand has been producing much of it. While I couldn’t find much street photography info online for Bangkok, outside of the main tourist section, I luckily had some help from some of these local photographers in the street photography community here.
Bangkok is known for the Grand Palace and temples, amazing cuisine and street food, wild nightlife and backpacker streets, and a mix of grit, lights and big city life in Thailand. Much of this is easily found around certain areas, but navigating around Bangkok looking for street photography spots can be exhausting if you don’t know where to go.
So here are my first impressions of Bangkok, from my personal Street Photographer perspective…
