52 Projects week 4: Have a ‘no viewfinder’ day

February 19, 2023February 19, 2023 Tim Moss52 weeks, black and white, Malvern, Melbourne, people, Photography, Ricoh, street, urbanLeave a comment

Here we are in week 4 of following the projects in the book 52 Assignments: Street Photography by Brian Lloyd Duckett.

Took a few weeks off there – the demands of my day job, plus a long-overdue (for me) road trip, meant I wasn’t able to attend to a project. I’m back now though!

Sharon joined again this week, where we explored the ‘no viewfinder’ prompt. The task is to spend half a day taking photos without composing using your viewfinder or the back of your camera at all. Just stick the camera out in front of you and see what happens. This is a good opportunity to play with different camera angles, and see just how interesting some of the ‘happy accidents’ can be. I was really pleasantly surprised with this technique. In some ways it reminded me of film photography, in that it really separates the act of taking images from the subsequent review and editing process, and that’s quite nice in terms of getting ‘into the groove’ of noticing. But film photography requires great care and attention to composition and exposure so as not to waste film, whereas this was more spontaneous and free ranging. Sharon and I spent an hour or so walking the streets of Malvern together, and then I spent another half hour or so in the CBD to see what else might come my way. The results are below – there was no ‘quota’ or limit this week, so there are a few more shots this week than usual!

Malvern:

CBD:

52 Projects week 3: Rules? What rules?

January 21, 2023January 21, 2023 Tim Moss52 weeks, Camberwell, Fujifilm, Hawthorn, Melbourne, Photography, Ricoh, street, urbanLeave a comment

Here we are in week 3 of following the projects in the book 52 Assignments: Street Photography by Brian Lloyd Duckett.

Still free ranging rather than following the order though – this week I selected the project “Rules? What rules?” – where the task was to produce nine images that break the ‘rules’ of photography but still work… that might mean breaking rules of composition, rules about not ‘chopping off’ limbs or heads, shooting with a straight horizon, and so on. See if you can spot the rules I’ve broken in the images below…

This week it was great to have Sharon joining in on the task, although her images were amazing and very quickly made me think I possibly shouldn’t be bothering at all… but with another look, I’m actually pretty pleased with how these came out. I did suggest a trip into the city, but Sharon (rightly!) reminded me that I’d said in a previous week that the city was really the ‘easy’ option and I should challenge myself more. Challenge accepted!