Curating Chaos: Two Years Of Street Photography in Bristol
Street photography, to me, is the practice of patient, thoughtful and curious exploration – ready to be excited and delighted by the life of the city around you. I took it up as a way to learn about two things; how to use a camera; and about Bristol, a city I had just moved to. I ended up learning about so many more things, too, but those are for another time.
When I first moved to Bristol I was studying my MA, and everyday that I had a lecture, I would get into the city an hour early to walk around with my camera. This is something that has become so important to me, even now: making time to wander and shoot in the streets. An hour here, 20 minutes there – I always have my camera with me, wherever I’m going. I had never lived in a city before, and especially not a city so vibrant. Whether an icy winter morning or a beautifully cool summer evening the city was full of light and life. I know many street photographers are character focused: they look for interesting, beautiful and striking people and build an image around them – the three photos above are examples of that in my own work, but it’s a theme that appears less so in my larger body of work. I find that I’m more drawn to light than to characters. I’m always looking for light, and for scenes, and I’m comfortable in the fact that my street style is more focused on the larger scene and story than individual characters.
I don’t think there’s any right or wrong way to shoot on the street. There are purists who believe a photographer has to use a 35mm lens, or shoot in black and white, or shoot completely manually – I think some restrictions are helpful in keeping your creativity flowing and reducing choice paralysis, but I think as long it is isn’t staged, you can shoot street any way you please. All the images I’ve shared so far have been shot on 80–85mm equivalents (I’ll talk more about gear at the end), but here are some examples of shooting with a 200mm lens:
And here’s one taken with a 50mm, and one with a 35mm, to show that it doesn’t matter how you shoot as long as you create an image you’re happy with:
I’m not claiming to be an expert – I’ve been doing this for just over two years, and I expect street photography to be a lifelong companion of mine – but this is just a small part of what I’ve learnt so far. Throughout 2019 I curated a series of my work that I had shot in the dark and in the rain, and exhibited it – but that series deserves a post all its own.
Gear talk:
For the last two years I’ve shot primarily with a Fujifilm X-Pro2 and a handful of prime lenses. Most commonly I shoot with Fuji’s 56mm f1.2, but did use the 50mm f2 for a short while. The other images here have been shot with an adapted Olympus 135mm f2.8, Fuji’s 35mm f2, and one image was shot with a Fujifilm X100f (which has a fixed 23mm lens) that I was trying out for a weekend. For those who haven’t used a Fuji system before, they use APS-C sensors, so you need to multiply the focal length by (roughly) 1.6, meaning a 35mm lens is effectively a 53mm lens, a 50mm is 80mm, and so on.
I’m going to try and write more about photography and my journey with it, both personally and professionally, over the next year, but to keep up with my work and new writing when it happens, find me on instagram or twitter as @sebjjp, or browse my professional work at sebjjp.com.
To end, here are some more images:
