Street photography– a genre that records everyday life in a public place. The very publicness of the setting enables the photographer to take candid pictures of strangers, sometimes without their knowledge. Street photographers do not necessarily have a social purpose in mind, but they prefer to isolate and capture moments which might otherwise go unnoticed. The images can be of people, places, things, or anything in the public realm.
Why shoot street photography?
I was in Denver, Colorado at the end of July attending the Outdoor Retailer Summer Show. For the past seven or eight years I’ve attended the show as a photographer, at times actually shooting, but primarily focused on networking, building relationships, and hanging with friends. As an introvert these meeting-filled weeks take a huge toll both mentally and physically. Those first few shows were terrifying. Socially awkward, stammering, ignorant, and completely insecure, I walked the aisles trying to muster the courage to introduce myself to brands and organizations. Show after show it slowly became easier, but only a little. So this summer after three days in the Colorado Convention Center I chose to skip out on the final day.
I’ll be honest, my first inclination was to take that day and bolt into the Front Range for some running, climbing, or riding, but instead I chose to step away from the outdoor thing and work in a genre I don’t have a lot of experience with.
Things started painfully slow in the Highland neighborhood where I had no idea what to shoot. At first, I thought it was architecture, but then it became morning commuters. That didn’t feel right so I headed over to Union Station, which is a cool building, but it still wasn’t it. A detour over to the revamped Milk Block, super cool, but not very busy at 9 AM, was followed with a quick stop by the shopping and restaurants of Larimer Square. But I still wasn’t feeling it. On the way back to the car I had a brief encounter with On the Road Coffee Bug, a Volkswagen Beetle coffee shop, that finally gave me something to chew on. There was one last stop before heading back to Utah – the River North Art Neighborhood. Murals, bars, shops, traffic and people rounded out the morning of fun.
See you out there,
Louis