Street | Urban | Travel | Photography by Marcus Puschmann
To everyone out there, but particularly to all the many magic people I’ve had the blessings to meet through my blogging on the “Streets of Nuremberg”, I wish a peaceful and merry Christmas and much love and laughters together with your family and friends.
Merry Christmas from the Streets of Nuremberg
Marcus
Photography literally means „drawing with light“. The sun is the principal lightsource out in the streets. But unlike a studio lightstand, you can‘t move the sun around to direct the light to where you want/need it. Obviously there are some workarounds, like using a reflector to throw back the light on the subject and brighten up the shadows. But in street photography, this is not practical and we need to shoot with what the sun gives us.
In this example, I was drawn to the weathered face of the man sitting behind the window of a coffee shop. The way he was sitting, the sunlight illuminated the back and the side of his head, but not his face, that was all in the shade. For one, standing outside in the streets, I couldn‘t direct my subject to turn his face in a way that would have, lets say, created a nice Rembrandt lighting effect (a triangle of light underneath the eye on the shadow side of his face).
But on the other hand I loved the textures in his hair and beard that the harsh sunlight created. And I knew that a conversion to monochrome would really bring out the lights and shadows of this scene and still show the traces of life in his face. So despite the lighting being not ideal, I still took the portrait shot with which I‘m quite happy the way it turned out.
If you are looking for more street photography tips, check out my free “Learning Center”.
Wish you a great Monday!
Marcus
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Street Photography Below Street Level
Finally on Christmas break. And finally some time for photography. The Significant Other and I headed into Nuremberg’s Old Town this evening. Main event was the performance of the wife’s trombone choir on the stage of the Christkindlesmarket in the main square. But I brought my (almost) vintage Fuji X-T2 together with the much less vintage Fujinon XF18-135mm F3.5-5.6 R LM OIS WR. I did recently acquire a used copy of this zoom lens, as I wanted to have a bit more focal length on my X-mount Fuji. And 135mm where there was only 55mm before makes a lot of difference.
And the buzzing market provided plenty opportunity for some 135mm (about 200mm full frame equivalent) street portraits shot through the passing crowd.
Fore the second image click below…
Continue reading “Portraits at the market”
To add to my last post, here is more curly hair. Once more taken with the Leica SL2-S with the Vario Elmarit F/2.8 24-70 ASPH. Jpg out of camera (taken with the Leica’s high contrast monochrome profile). Have I mentioned before how awesome the Leica plays with the light?
After one of my last post the question came up whether I ask people in the streets whether I can take their photo. The honest answer is not always. But often enough. I wrote about it in my post “A Street Photographers Dialogue”.
If you are looking for more tips and inspirations around street photography, check out my free Learning Center.
Have a great Sunday
Marcus
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Instant Inspiration (8) -Make a portrait of a stranger
A quick street portrait today of a man with curly hair. Taken with the Leica SL2-S with the Vario Elmarit F/2.8 24-70 ASPH. Jpg out of camera (taken with the Leica’s high contrast monochrome profile).
If you are looking for tips and inspirations around street photography, check out my free Learning Center.
Have a great Friday
Marcus
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Street Photography Quick Tip (15)
With the third Covid wave rolling with full force through Germany, we are now facing a socially distanced Easter holiday. It’s been more than a year since the pandemic started. A year of failed promises from the countries leadership. People are worn out, it is visible everywhere. We are all in need of closeness, being able to able to physically embrace our friends when we see them. You remember the times when complete strangers stood in our pedestrian zones holding up signs offering free hugs? Instead we now only talk from a distance. But what is the photographic lessons learnt?
Continue reading “From a distance”
Anyone home? This would be the title to this street photograph. But it also would have been the right question to ask the “Streets of Nuremberg” in the past weeks, the last post already dating back to the end of February. No worries! I’m still here, alive and kicking (as much as the Covid restrictions allow).
I simply took a break from blogging. I needed it, after five years of continuous content creation. But now it’s time to be back and continue to share my photographic ventures. Will need a few days to answer all comments and catch up with all of your blogs. I hope that you all got through these pandemic time unscathed.
Have a great Tuesday!
Marcus
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How do you call it, when you are sitting hungry in a bus, trying to decipher big red letters on a brown paper bag? Right….the hunger games…..
Have a great Sunday!
Marcus
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Street Photography Quick Tip 4 – Shoot out of a moving car or bus
The last day of 2019 is upon us, and so the last episode of my five-part series looking back at my photographic ventures during the past year. And as the “Streets of Nuremberg” are principally a street photography blog, here are my fav street images of 2019…
Continue reading “My photographic journey through 2019 (5)”
No, this is not me. But this is how the life of me (the aspiring photographer) has been the past two weeks. Almost literally.
Continue reading “Man at work”
During our recent visit to the Estonian capital Tallinn we also passed across Freedom Square, which features the Cross of Liberty and the Monument to the War of Independence. The 23.5 meters tall pillar made of 143 glass plates commemorates all those who have for freedom in the Estonian war of independence. While nothing particularly spectacular, it was still worth a documentary shot to be part of my Tallinn travel photos. Let me show you the contact sheet with my shots of Freedom Square.
Continue reading “Contact Sheet (1)”
I’m sure you have witnessed those situations, where people wanting to take a portrait of someone else place their subject to have the sun shining directly onto them. Because it looks nice. Objects look sharp, crisp and colorful when the sun shines on them. That’s definitely valid for landscapes, buildings and stationary things. It’s less favorable for human beings. Because they tend to squint when facing the sun, and you get unfavorable shadows in their eye sockets, especially when the sun is high.
Continue reading “Shoot against the sun”
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