Those of you who have followed my blog for the past few
months might have realized that like thousands of others, I learned and carried
on street photography based on the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson, justly
considered as the father of photojournalism. And yes, like thousands of others,
I bought a 1954 Leica IIIF to “bend like Henri”!!!! Of course, we all quickly
realize that the camera does not make the picture, but the photographer does.
Yet, the tool has to be reliable and appropriate for the specific task.
While having the eye for a story and the quickness to
capture it, one has to also learn composition very early on. It is said that
Cartier-Bresson did not allow any cropping of his prints: the composition was
always during the taking of the picture and not in the darkroom.
Well, rare among us are able to apply that rule as a
principle. Instead, we try to compose in the field knowing that we will
re-frame in the darkroom. In this area of film photography, I am not a purist.
In fact, for me reframing is almost a necessity for
the following reason: nowadays I almost exclusively use medium format. In my
case, that also means using a “normal” lens the equivalent of 50mm on 35mm
cameras. Unless I am ten feet away from my subject, the 50mm lens will capture
a vast amount of detail around the subject I have in mind for the story. So, I
have to enlarge (that is why they call the apparatus “an enlarger”!!) to
isolate and reframe the subject. The result is a cropped picture.
The rather philosophical question that can haunt us is
the following: is street photography supposed to show the setting unaltered? Or is it
ok to rewrite history?
For me, the part is integral component of the whole,
so it is ok to focus on that part alone. Does it represent the whole? Probably
not always, but my goal is to tell a story, not do landscape photography.
Ok, with these considerations in mind, I will use
three pictures and their “before and after”—you decide.
Picture
One: Paris, Seine River Bank
On the negative, the woman shown above occupied perhaps 1/50th of the frame. Around her, the shot included the following:
The critical factor here was that I saw the three
sitting at the edge of the wall, I did not see any detail about their faces,
but knew that the woman with the black stockings was perfectly perched atop
those stones. In short, I saw the scene, the potential it had, and what I can
do in the darkroom. This assessment, contextualization, focusing and clicking
took about 3 seconds.
Which picture do you prefer?
Photo
Two: Saõ Paulo
This one was a reject photo since it did not turn out
as I intended: the man did not turn around to give the shot the 1950’s flavor I
was aiming for. Still, I printed it and
used it in my discussion of failed shots.
However, the full frame encompassed more than what is shown above. Here it is:
Clearly, instead of the man at the phone turning
around, a bystander saw me and spoiled the shot even further. But cropping
would have worked if the main subject had done what I was hoping for.
Photo Three: Paris, Champs Élysées.
This is also a published picture. I took shelter
from the summer rain under a balcony and caught this shot with a 1969 Nikon F, 50mm
lens. It has movement and the woman blends with the off-focus tone except for her left foot that is in perfect focus. It gives the movement a freezing, just for a
split second.
But there was an invited young man in this frame and distracted the viewer’s eye. So, under the light of my 1950’s enlarger using a
75 Watts tungsten bulb, I gently asked the “intruder” to leave the frame…
So, cropping: is it Zen or sin?
January 31, 2014
© Vahé Kazandjian, 2014
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