Tag Archive for: stairs

Ghost in the stairs. Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2017.

Ghost in the stairs. Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2017. Get a print!

Another night at my favourite train station. This time I let the station’s dock in peace for a dive in its underground passages. It’s a good spot to get some low angles shots, with people going down the stairs.

I really like this photo. The light from the dock creates a great backlighting effect, anonymising the subject, making her almost disappearing in the shadows if the stairs if it wasn’t for the glow of her hairs. She almost seems… unreal.

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More about Ghost in the Stairs

For me, it’s important to share as much info as possible about the photos I take. Therefore, here are the EXIFs for this photo:

  • Camera: Canon 6D
  • Lens: Sigma 50mm f/1.4 Art
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 50mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/60s
  • ISO: 3200
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2017, all rights reserved

Thumb up! Bucharest, Romania, 2016.

Thumb up! Bucharest, Romania, 2016. Get a print.

Shot in the very same underground stairs where Run! was taken, Thumb up! relates to one of the aspects of street photography that I really enjoy: the contact between the photographer, and his subject. And the best contact is a positive reaction to the photography, with this man raising his thumb high to express his support. Ain’t it cool?

I know that a lot of street photographer insist on then fact that a photo must remain candid, in a way that the subject must not see the photographer taken a shot, in order to do not kill the moment. But when a genuine reaction like this occured, isn’t it a candid shot too? The fact that the photographer has been seen provoked this man’s interaction. And it gives us a much, much better shot than if he had just passed like nothing happened. As a result I enjoy much better when I get some interaction with the people I shoot, but without changing the way the things are e.g. stopping them while walking, forcing a reaction…

Besides, I like this photo for its graphical aspect. The chrome bar cuts the photo in two almost identical pieces at 45 degrees, with the reflection of the people in the marble. It would have been a cool shot. but with this finger up, it’s for me a great shot!

This photo kind of concludes a set of photos I’ve taken during two evenings spent in Bucharest. I can’t wait to go back and spend some time on the busy streets of the Romanian capitale.

Do you like this photo? Click here and get an original, signed fine art print in limited edition!

EXIFs:

  • Camera:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/125s
  • ISO: 6400
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved

Run! Bucharest, Romania, 2016.

Run! Bucharest, Romania, 2016. Get a print!

I took this photo in Bucharest in October 2016. I met there a local group of street photographers, and we decided to go for a photowalk at night. We went by Piata Unirii (Union Square), known for its large shops with loads of lights. A perfect place to play at night! There, we found this renewed underground exit, that became our main shooting spot for the evening. Reflective marble, bright lights, strong contrast with the night, what to ask more?

I know what to ask more! An interesting subject, to fill these stairs! For this poor man in hurry, it was not just a matter of fighting these stairs between him and the outside, he also had to go through a herd of crazy photographers 🙂

Anyway, it was a fun night, and I hope I’ll be back soon to meet again with this awesome group!

Do you like this photo? Click here and get an original, signed print in limited edition!

EXIFs:

  • Camera:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/125s
  • ISO: 6400
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved

Electric stairs. Bucharest, Romania, 2016.

Electric stairs. Bucharest, Romania, 2016. Get an original, limited edition signed print.

Continuing my very own “Bucharest Festival of Lines 2016”, in a similar environment. This time I’ve installed myself at the bottom of an underground metro station entrance, and waited for my subject. It was already late in the afternoon, the sun had already started to set for a few tens of minutes. This way, I could capture the difference of light between the dark inside and the shinier outside, but without a too large difference in light quantity. Unlike in a previous photo of mine, Stairway to…, I didn’t want to have a high contrast between the inside and the outside, so I needed to wait for the right time to get the right amount of light. As I’ve already said, preparing and owning the scene are very important!

Next to that, I had 3 goals for this photo. First of all, I wanted to get lines. Recurrent readers know that I love lines 🙂 Look at all those diagonals! It’s a heaven for me, it makes the photo so graphical and so dynamic in the same time. Second, it’s a scene with a lot of textures. There is this stone wall, the battled metal of the electric stairs, the steps, all of them have their own texture that I wanted to be very visible. That is why lightning was important for me, avoiding to have a too strong contrast. Lastly, I wanted to anonymise my subject. People are often only an element of the urban landscape, and she definitively is only an accessory to the real subject here, the stairs. All of that gives a punchy photo that I really like. And I hope you like it too, don’t hesitate to give me your feeling in the comments below!

Do you like this photo? Click here and get an original, signed print in limited edition!

EXIFs:

  • Camera:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/5.6
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/250s
  • ISO: 800
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved

Airport stairs. Munich Airport, Germany, 2016.

The Munich airport (and airports in general actually) may be my favourite playground for photography. It has pretty much all I love: slick and modern design with large windows, stairs, rushing people, calm crowd. They scream for a dynamic environment that is perfect for my kind of photography. Being a fan of geometry, strong lines and diagonals, I can find there all the graphical elements I need for street photography, Pierre Pichot style 🙂

I took advantage of a trip from Cluj-Napoca (Romania) to Frankfurt (Germany) via Munich (still Germany) to take a few shots. It was not the best possible scenario: on both go and back trip my first flight was delayed, making me rush between the arrival and boarding gates. So impossible for me to take my time and plan my photos. It was pure reflex shooting, in an instant. The photo above was shot while waiting for very long mechanical stairs to reach the last floor of the building. It was already late at night, the airport was pretty empty and I thought I’ll never be able to fit someone in my frame. At the very last second a group of passengers finally appeared, making my photo complete.

I once again decided to use the dutch angle, first of all because I really like it, but more importantly because it accentuate quite a lot the dynamic of the photos, multiplying the diagonals across the frame. The architectural complexity of this airport becomes much more obvious this way. It always reminds me those crazy science fiction movies and comics. Tsutomu Nihei’s manga Blame!, in this very case.

Do you like this photo? Contact me for obtaining an original, signed print!

EXIFs:

  • Camera:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/8.0
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/125s
  • ISO: 6400
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved