How To Make Amazing Street Photos In India
Amazing street photos in India like this environmental portrait in Kolkata.
Kolkata, while a huge, hot and difficult city to get around, offers a wide range of opportunities for amazing street photos. Whether your preference is vibrant color or more subdued black and white images, I found the people of Kolkata provided me with incredible opportunities for great street photos.
Amazing street photos are created by photographers with an eye for detail, an ability to craft a strong composition and react to ever-changing environments. To make amazing street photos you need to be genuinely interested in the lives of others and have a compassionate and empathetic world view.
Composition In Amazing Street Photos
My time in India was filled with deeply moving experiences like when I met and photographed this young boy inside a small printers workshop in a Kolkata backstreet.
He was a lovely, gentle soul and I enjoyed photographing him inside his father's workshop.
Notice the repetition of the circular design element within the image. You’ll find it in these three very specific places:
The wheel on the side of the printing press
The young boys face
The old electric fan on the right hand side of the frame
Take another look at the photo to see just how well these three circular design elements work together to create a sense of balance and harmony in the image.
Imagine drawing a series of lines from the middle of the wheel up to the young boys face, down to the fan and, finally, back across to the wheel on the side of the printing press.
By doing so you would have created a triangle which is really important because it’s probably the ultimate symbol for balance and harmony.
While we can’t expect most folks who see our photos to recognise the specific elements of composition (e.g., shape, texture, color, repetition) which we’ve employed to design our pictures, there’s no doubt a well composed photo will be appreciated by with our viewing audience.
It’s the same for musicians. Most folks listening to a pop song won’t recognise the chords being played or whether a guitarist’s lead break is based around a major, blues or pentatonic. The point is if it’s a good tune, that’s well played and presented, it will be appreciated.
Create Amazing Street Photos By Learning From The Masters
It should be no surprise that triangles are a fundamental element of composition, commonly found in great works of art.
Take a look at Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting of the Last Supper as a case in point.
Can you see how the painting has been composed around individual people grouped together into triangular formations?
Why might Da Vinci have structured his famous Last Supper painting in this way?
There are 13 people depicted in the scene. That in itself is a challenge as such a large number of people can make it hard to place attention on the key subject or subjects within the scene.
The fact that Jesus has been placed in the centre of the image gives him prominence. However, by organizing the rest of the characters into a series of smaller groups, Da Vinci encourages the viewer to explore the relationships and discussions going on within each of those groups.
It’s really a masterful composition that introduces the notion of political intrigue into the image. And it’s been achieved by organizing each group of participants into separate triangular formations.
In doing so visual separation between each group has been achieved while, at the same time, multiply uses of triangular shapes brings a sense of balance and harmony to the painting.
Interestingly, Da Vinci has used color in a similar way. Notice the use of orange and blue color hues to, simultaneously, separate and unite the various groupings within the scene.
Da Vinci’s use of triangular shapes and color allows us to concentrate our attention on the relationships between characters within each grouping of people while, at the same time, maintaining an overall sense of cohesion throughout the image.
Amazing Street Photos In Black And White
Let’s take another look at the image at the top of this post of the young boy in his father’s print workshop in Kolkata, India.
You’ll notice that I opted for a black and white rendering of the scene. I chose black and white to enhance the old world nature of the workshop and to concentrate viewer attention on the strong shapes and tonality within the image.
“Sometimes color just gets in the way.”
The fact is the young boy was wearing a bright blue shirt, which would have attracted too much attention to an otherwise unimportant part of the image, particularly given the relatively low levels of color present throughout the rest of the scene.
Since I wanted attention placed on the boy’s face, and not his clothing, black and white was definitely the way to go.
Light and Gesture Lead To Amazing Street Photos
I remember standing with my back to the light when I make this photo. It was a very hot, bright day and moving inside the printer’s workshop provided a welcome respite from the heat.
To make the photo I simply asked the young boy to walk forward, into the light, and then rest his hand on top of the printing press. The open roller door, directly behind me, functioned in a similar way to a large window illuminating my subject with soft, indirect lighting.
A final direction for him to tilt (not turn) his head a little helped to illustrate the boy's gentle nature.
It’s my experience that such subtle changes in gesture can make a huge difference to the communicative power and emotional impact of an image.
Equally important is the need to be able to direct your subject quickly and efficiently, without causing them to become overly self conscious.
The entire process of meeting father and son; getting permission to make the photo, both from the boy and from his father; directing, composing and exposing the image, in camera, was undertaken within a few short minutes.
I then moved on, heading back into the heat and chaos of those Kolkata backstreets, happy with the interaction and exhilarated by the result I’d achieved.
Who decides Photo Meaning In Street Photos?
So what meaning can we derive from photos?
Let’s continue our examination of the young boy in his father’s Kolkata printing workshop to explore this idea.
Someone asked me if the cross on the young boy’s shirt was important to me.
Frankly I hadn’t noticed the cross prior to making the photo, but it has become more pronounced in the black and white rendering of the original color image.
Is that a good thing? Well, I guess it depends on the following:
The needs of the viewer to find meaning within the image
The needs of the creator (i.e., me)
The reality of the boy’s life
Working backwards I can say that I have no idea what religious tradition the young boy is associated with. However, given I photographed him in Kolkata, he’s almost certainly a Hindu.
I was brought up a Catholic and attended Catholic primary and secondary schools.
While I’m fascinated by world religions, I’m not associated with any particular religious tradition or practice. I do, however, consider myself to be a spiritual person.
Once upon a time I considered categorizating oneself as spiritual to be a cop out. Needless to say, that’s no longer the case.
I do find the fact that the cross on the young boy’s shirt resembles the Christian cross to be visually interesting but, from my point of view, it’s not what the photo is about.
However, that opinion may differ from person to person which is why I think it’s really important for creator’s like me to be sensitive to the needs of the viewer.
If the symbolism associated with that cross has meaning for you, or anyone else, I think that’s fantastic.
What matters most is that images I create connect with my audience and, as we’re all individuals, each of us has the right to determine the meaning associated with any particular image for ourselves.
You could call that personal truth, if you like. Because, in my world, fact and truth are two completely different things.
I see facts being associated with science and logic, while truth is more closely associated with belief systems, whether personal or based around formerly structed religious doctrines.
It’s for each of us to navigate our way through these two, sometimes conflicting systems.
About to Travel?
Amazing Street Photos That Depict Life
I met this local man as dusk was descending. It was a typically balmy evening in Kolkata and I was walking through, what looked like, an impromptu street party.
Once again I opted for a black and white rendering of the image to concentrate attention on the shapes, tones and textures within the scene.
The relationship between the fire and the man sitting in the background is key to the success of the image.
Notice how the man’s right eye and the blackened end of the longest branch poking into the fire are positioned diagonally opposite each other on opposite quadrants of the image.
He’d told me that he’d created the fire. From what I could see, he seemed to be enjoying it. Nonetheless, he appeared to exist quite independently from the many characters actively involved in the street party happening around him.
Like a typical street photographer, he seemed to be there as an observer of life, rather than a participant. That struck me as interesting, which is why I decided to concentrate my camera’s attention on him.
Amazing street photo opportunity of a man in his store in Kolkata.
Amazing Street Photos With Wide Angle Lenses
Wide angle lenses are commonly used in street photography to visually stretch perspective and, as a result, produce more interesting images.
The visual separation between the subject and other, potentially competing, elements within the image can be minimized through the impression of extended space and depth provided by the use of a wide angle lens.
This image of a man squeezed into his tiny spare parts store in the backstreets of Kolkata, India made for a really interesting photo opportunity.
As you can see the store is incredibly narrow. It’s the nature of the wide angle lens I employed to make the photo that provides the impression of a foreground that’s wider than it was in reality.
Can you see that it’s the visual stretching of the foreground in the photo that I’ve used to place attention on the out of focus boxes and shelves that helps lead the eye through the picture and onto the subject?
Do check out this post if you’d like to learn more about how to use a wide angle lens. It features great images from Antarctica, Austria (where it’s hard to find Kangaroos) and Australia.
Kids in backstreets provide opportunities for amazing street photos in Kolkata, India.
Amazing Street Photos And The Human Condition
I discovered this group of kids while exploring a backstreet in Kolkata. While only a few minutes walk from Park Street Road, the city’s main street, backstreets have the capacity to immerse the photographer into another world from what you’d expect to find on a normal tourist experience.
That desire to explore life, beyond and outside of the main tourist areas, is a key component in the motivation of travel photographers wanting to make amazing street photos.
India is certainly a great option if you’re interested in using your camera to explore the Human Condition
Actually, this kind of image is easy to make, so long as you love kids and kind it easy to interact with them.
For me, it’s a fun and joyful experience interacting and photographing children. That’s certainly an advantage I have over lots of other photographers.
What’s more, the fact that I see myself as a photo maker, rather than a photo taker is of critical importance in my desire to make amazing street photos of people all over our world.
Of course I always try to seek permission from parents, teachers or guardians before I approach and photograph kids.
My view is that, while I’m no danger to the kids I meet and photograph, I recognize that the next stranger approaching them might have a completely different agenda and I don’t want the kids to think that all strangers can be trusted.
It’s a sad reality of our world, but one I feel we all need to be aware of as we strive to make amazing street photos.
Amazing Street Photos And Why I Return to India
India, from my experience, is an amazing place for photography. Dramatic mountain landscapes, tropical environs and incredible temples and palaces await the enthusiastic travel photographer.
But it's the people that I always remember with the most fondness. And that's after undertaking five grueling travel photography trips to India since 1988.
Each time I’ve undertaken a travel photography adventure to India I’ve become extremely ill.
Let’s face it, illness can be a really demotivating experience causing havoc to your travel itinerary and making it really difficult to realize your photography goals.
Fortunately, I’m mentally resilient and highly motivated. While I’ve often had to pivot and adapt to the situation I find myself in, I always find a way to create beautiful, life affirming images whenever I undertake a travel photography project.
If you live in or around Melbourne, Australia and you need help understanding how best to use your camera to realize your own creative potential, feel free to contact me for assistance.
Take it from me, this is the knowledge you’ll need before you embark on your own travel photography adventures.
With this new knowledge, together with the right motivation and pure intentions, you’ll be well on the way to making your own amazing street photos.
In the meantime, if you’d like more information on how to make amazing street photos take a look at these posts I’ve created.
