Photography, art, gallery, & much more...

Photography

People are the principal subject of photography, both amateur and professional, and although a significant number of portraits are made in studios, most photography of people is on location, showing them as they appear and behave in normal life. In particular, they are the main concern of reportage photography, and this mainly professional field has a powerful influence on all photographers.

Reportage photography is essentially journalistic, and so usually searches for effect, impact and summation. The almost universally accepted ideals of reportage photography are that it should be visually strong, and so catch the viewer's attention, and that it should, within a single picture, con- centrate as many as possible of the subject's qualities.

Candid photography
A major technique of reportage, candid photography makes the most of photography's unique ability to freeze movement, catching fleeting glimpses of people at their most natural and revealing. The photographer remains unobtrusive, recording events without ever getting involved. This is not the same thing as appearing to be unaware, as frequently happens in involved reportage, where the presence of the camera is known but accepted. The great value of. candid photography is that it allows situations to be recorded naturally, without the inevitable distortions in behaviour and expression that occur when people become self-conscious and start to worry about their appearance.