George Weir Photographer

NYC Untitled

I shot four frames yesterday on my way to a meeing in NY, kept two of them.

 

 

The Same Old Arguments

Two of the images I posted last week became the subjects of fairly intense, not heated, yet interesting conversations in my studio last week. The first argument, (n. discourse intended to persuade) was about this image;

"It's not a b&w shot, it should be in color"  "They're "yellow cabs" for goodness sake" "They need to be yellow!" and other such declarations were passionately given.

One of the reasons, or arguments, for shooting in or converting to b&w one often hears is that when one looks at a b&w image the eye is not being "distracted" by color. Assuming of course that color is not one of the primary elements of the image.

If we look at the same image in color,

 we see, aside from yellow cabs that is, that there are elements of color some of which do indeed contribute to the image and provide a little more information; the reflections of the brake lights for example, and some elements which are distracting; the blue bank sign and the purple shirt.

Personally I'm ambivalent about the above image and whilst I do like both presentations one might wonder did I argue for the b&w image? Well in this case I did so not only because I appreciate, and learn from, the arguments that my wife presents but also because I "saw" it as a b&w image.

That was my main reason, I also felt that;

as the title of the post was "NYC Irene" viewers had already been primed

the image preceeding it was in color with a "yellow cab" in it

having already taken care of the "need" to satisfy color requirements I could proceed with "my view"

Now should I or do I have to defend & justify it? 

Not at all, however it is a good exercise in "seeing" and "thinking" about our images.

 

The second image that prompted discussion was this one;

 "You shot a verticle!"

"I thought you hated verticle images and always argue vehemently against them?"

This from a photographer who visited me a couple of days ago.

Well yes I shot a verticle image, not my first and certainly not my last. 

While I don't hate them, verticle images, I do indeed hold firm opinions about them;

Many, if not most, of the verticle images that I see are lacking because there is all too often much, empty, space at the top and the bottom of the frame which contributes little to the overall composition. Consequently the content of the image has to work that much harder to gain and keep our attention. This is similar to the use, or abuse perhaps, of very wide angle lenses that we see in many images.

"If you're going to give me/show me a verticle image, there better be a dashed good reason for it! I don't want to see six feet of empty dance floor and lots of ceiling tiles ...." is my strongest admonition to anyone who shoots for me.

Good reasons for verticles? Yes of course there are indeed some, take a look at Marc Riboud's work for many stunning examples. Nobody does it better!

Going back to the above image, which I'm fond of by the way;

I actually framed and shot it horizontally prior to shooting the verticle.

Here's the thought process:  (nb zooming out not an option, 50mm lens only)

H'mm how to capture the essence of nyc, pre-hurricane?

This photographer's POV (and a photographer has to have a POV for every shoot if you haven't figured that out yet you still have a lot more images to shoot!)

Rain, steam, nyc, big buildings, people scurrying, a few elements that I was thinking of

ok, see the umbrellas

frame to left

steam above

face on billboard

ok here we go...

All right that's not too bad

One umbrella leads the eye in from lower left

face, on bus stop poster looking, seemingly, at pedestrians crossing street 

arm leading up to hands holding head

and steam 

and big buildings.

However it just didn't cut the proverbial mustard for me.

Look at the vertical image again:

We still have

the umbrellas, the pedestrians, the dramatic face on the billboard and the steam.

We don't have

the face on the bus stop poster

the tall buildings

We added a taxi (shutter speed adjusted to allow some motion blur)

We have, I believe a little more drama in the verticle shot because it's a tighter frame which keeps the eye where i want it to go and doesn't allow it to go wandering and wondering about empty space.

Shooting good verticle images requires skill, thought and practice, go for it.

 

 

happy Friday to all.

 

 

 

 

 

NYC Irene

I spent most of Friday and much of Saturday morning preparing for the arrival of Irene before heading into the city for a short shoot on Saturday afternoon. Having allowed a lot more time than usual for my travel into the city I found myself with some time to spare and so I took a walk around a few blocks where I shot the following;

More than a few businesses were taking the forecasts seriously and had boarded windows and closed for the day.

With the public transportation system shutting down in the early afternoon one might think that finding a taxi would become almost impossible yet there seemed to be no shortage of yellow cabs

 and for the first time that I can ever recall more than one cab driver pulled over and asked if I needed a ride.

There did not seem to be any sense of panic or worry no matter how hard one looked, except

for the slight panic one couple walking beside me expressed as they encountered yet another closed coffee shop.  I know, New York; the city where you can get anything at any time. I did find coffee a short while later and despite the horrendous price tag it was just grand and exactly what I needed before my shoot.

 

As I was loading up my car to leave, by the way the free parking was great, I must admit I was surprised that not only was the night club across the street open but also by how busy it was.

My drive down the West Side Highway was probably the quickest and certainly was the quietest I've ever experienced. My drive through the Holland Tunnel was different indeed as I had the whole tunnel to myself. It was erie and surreal. I doubt I'll ever experience being alone in that tunnel again and although I actually considered stopping to take a photograph of this empty space the thoughts of causing an accident and also being pulled over and ticketed as I exited kept my foot on the gas.

I feel lucky that we dodged the proverbial bullet as Hurricane Irene became a tropical storm and I'm glad that for most of us our clean-up is relatively minor and that our losses are much less than they could have been.

Happy Monday.