So with everyone caught up in the elections I figured I’de post some shots from the city we all love. Despite the government craziness around here, it is a nice city. A lot of opportunities for photography if you ever get a chance to come through here.
I find D.C. to not be the friendliest city for street photography. We have a lot of opportunities and unique scenes and architecture…but the people around here are not as game about having a camera in their face. It’s much easier in LA and New York for example. A couple tips that might make shooting a bit easier…
- Use snapshot focus feature and set the lens to your preferred focus range.
- Set the viewfinder to black and white
- Using a 12 – 20mm lens allows greater depth of field. That way you can set the lens to F/4 – F/8 and get sharp results at the predetermined focus point even with some variation due to movement.
- Using manual mode, set ISO around 400 – 800 so you can get a decent shutter speed of above 125th if you want to stop motion.
These will allow the camera to respond quicker without worrying about exposures or focusing. Since you can see exposure in the viewfinder, you can easily adjust your exposure as needed without worrying the camera will automatically select something you didn’t want for the scene. Try it out. Manual exposing takes some time to get used to in an rapidly changing environment. Often it’s easy to rely on aperture or shutter priority. Many times that works great with a quick compensation adjustment. EVFs have really made working like that easy. I never put an SLR in a priority mode, always manual. I find I use priority way more often with an EVF though. Its fast. On the street, not having to adjust anything is even faster though. Just intuitively lift the camera, frame, and make the shot. There are a lot of great sites with information on this form of photography.
Feel free to share your favorite tips on street photography. I enjoy shooting the city more as a “landscape photographer” than a street photographer. Here are some shots from the city!
My name is Tony. When I'm not writing for this site, i'm often creating images for clients, recording music, or out in nature. You can always bet I have my E-M1 next to me...
The flip screen is indispensable for stealth mode street photography. Not crazy about the new fully articulated screen. Seems a little more clumsy.
I completely agree! In fact I wish they would give us the option with a form of double hinged screen that could be used both ways. I know i’ve seen a version of that somewhere… Fully articulated is great in certain situations, but it many situations I prefer looking at the screen in-line with the camera, not offset.