What inspired me to pick up my camera and hit the streets? Long story short, for me it was the birth of my daughter back in 2013 and a photographic exhibition in 2016.
Flashback to December 2013. The birth of my daughter was the impetus to intensify my involvement with photography. Like so many new fathers, I wanted to have “good” pictures of my kid. Therefore, I started exploring the web and got myself a Sony RX100. Used to photo quality of a mobile phone, I was at first stunned by the image quality of the little Sony. However, the camera itself was way too small for my taste and I never felt like a “photographer” when using this camera. Also, the constant fiddling with the menus was starting to get on my nerves really quick.
After some web researches, I stumbled upon the Fujifilm X100T. I was lucky, because a friend of mine borrowed me his X100S, so I could get an idea how it feels like using this very similar camera. Then I took the plunge and ordered my X100T.
What could I possibly tell, that hasn’t been told before about this camera? It was love at the first sight. I loved how this camera felt in my hands, the easy access to important parameters such as aperture and shutter speed (I have the ISO on auto anyways). The image quality and character of these pictures are just a class for itself. Also, the loss of the zoom lens, which I had with my RX100 was something like a relief for me. It made me even more aware about composition and getting close to my subject.
For the first time ever, I somehow felt that I was really “photographing” and the camera got out of my attention when taking pictures.
It became more and more important for me to tell a story with my photographs. Up to the point when I bought my X100T, I exclusively took close-up portraits of my family members. However, most of the time, it is challenging to tell a story with that types of photographs since it is difficult to interpret the situation and under which circumstances the picture was taken due to lack of surroundings. So when I finally had my X100T, it became my story-telling machine.
So, what inspired me to start taking pictures of strangers? It was a visit in the exhibition “Eyes Open! 100 Years Of Leica Photography”. I was simply blown away from the sheer intensity of the pictures from Bresson, Cappa, Korda and many more. I instantly knew, that street photography is perfect for me.
So here I am, roughly one year after my photographic awakening, and this is just the beginning of my photographic journey.
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