Silhouetto: the visual appeal of tiny figures

[Donald]

https://www.theguardian.com/artandde...-a-photo-essay

This is a link to a feature in the UK's Guardian newspaper. I think it should very interesting to many members on here.

[davidedric]

Thanks, Donald. I read The Guardian daily, but I'd missed the article. As well as the photographic interest, many of the images took me back to my childhood in 1950's Oldham in Lancashire

[Donald]

Thanks, Donald. I read The Guardian daily, but I'd missed the article. As well as the photographic interest, many of the images took me back to my childhood in 1950's Oldham in Lancashire

It's on the online edition.

[Manfred M]

Thanks for posting the link Donald. It's nice to get the view from a well known photojournalist.

I remember when I first started taking landscapes and urban landscapes where I waited patiently for everyone to clear out of the scene. Over the past 5 - 10 years I came to the same conclusion; in some images, including people resulted in a much stronger image than one that did not, so I started looking at scenes from a different point of view and now frequently try to incorporate a human element in these types of shots.

As a Cartier-Bresson fan, I have studied his work to understand why he chose certain images and what struck me that the "decisive moment" is more than that. Yes the exact right time to press the shutter release is critical, but so is the size and position of the figure. The human element has to be just right in terms of how much of the image it fills; too little and one wonders why did they bother and too large, it can overwhelm the image and the figure(s) become the subject rather than complementing it. The same thing goes for the direction that the figure it pointing; into the camera, away from the camera (in my view the way that is often the least effective approach, but the easiest to do) and of course moving parallel to the sensor plane.

I also find that sometimes, shooting a scene that is normally very busy with no people in it can be more effective than having even a single person in it. There is no magic solution,

[Donald]

For all its majesty and spellbinding scenic views, one of the best images I got from my month in Yosemite and the Eastern Sierras back in 2016 was this one.