Tag Archive for: woman

Ghost in the 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
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Shampoo

Shampoo. Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2016.

Shampoo, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2016. Get a print!

Lately I’ve been chasing the lights and interesting subjects through shops’ windows. As the weather is going to be greyer and the sky covered in clouds, the light is going to get much softer than it still is. While soft light is great for street portraits, it’s far from being ideal when you want to play with the contrasts, using the sun rays to light you subject just where you want.

This is just what I did with this lady, waiting for her shampoo at the hairdresser parlour. They have this large vitrine where you can see absolutely everything that is going on. It is situated in a little, narrow street of Cluj-Napoca (Romania), where the sun doesn’t really have the chance to shine. However, a tiny ray of light manage to find a path between the narrow buildings, to fall just on this woman’s face.

Last, but not least, this photo has just been published on 1x.com!

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: 400
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved
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Surprise!

Surprise! Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2016.

Surprise! Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2016. Get a print.

The only perk of having the days shorter and shorter while winter is coming (yeah, mandatory reference here…), is that shops get illuminated much sooner, while they’re still open. This way, we get rid of the over-reflection in the outside, but also the lightning becomes more and more interesting, from the inside.

I think I’ve scared this poor woman to death on that day. The surprise on her face is quite self-explaining! I was having a hard time to frame her correctly in the natural border offered by the model’s arm as she was eating and moving. It took longer that I wished, and because of that she noticed me, stop moving, and looked at me with this “what the f*** is he doing” look that is absolutely awesome. The framing and the timing were just perfect, the shot was done, I smiled, she got back to her sandwich. It may not be the best photograph I’ve ever taken technically speaking, but it’s once again the proof that the content and the correct composition make everything. Beside her expression, I just love how the model seems to have its head in its hand!

I’ve seen her again a few days later. The shop she works in is close to where I work. She definitely recognised me, but unfortunately I didn’t have the photo with me at that time. For sure, the next time we meet, I’ll show her this photo, and maybe give her a small print. It’s a photo that has been having a lot of success on several groups and forums (over 2000 likes on Facebook!), it’s the least I can do, right? It may be a good… surprise, for her 🙂

Edit: Surprise! has won 2nd place at the 2017 National Awards of the Sony World Photography Awards!

Get a print!

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

More about this photo

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:Fujifilm X100T
  • Aperture: ƒ/2.8
  • Focale: 23mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/125s
  • ISO: 1250
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved
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Long legs in Prague

Long legs. Prague, Czech Republic, 2016.
Prague has been a long time travel destination. It has this beautiful architecture, those small streets, and all those tourists that make it perfect for street photography.

This photo was taken next to Prague’s castle, in the Little Quarter (Malá Strana for those who speak Jan Saudek‘s language). Just after going down the exit of the castle on the right, there is this street, with an incredible view of the whole city. But at the end of this street, there is these long stairs, leading to restaurants and bars hidden in nice old houses. But when you’re lucky enough to have the sun just in line with these stairs, it’s a festival of incredible shadows.

I had to wait quite a lot to get this photo. There are a lots of tourists, everywhere. It’s a real challenge to get a clean shot there! And don’t even get me started about the Charles Bridge! I wanted someone alone, just one single person going down these stairs, but it was too much to ask I think. I still managed to shoot this woman, with the longest legs in the world… according to her shadow at least! I also love the way the sun shines through her hair, like a bowl of fire above her neck. It’s definitely one of my best shots of this trip!

I also have a few more photos from Prague, I think I make some new entries in my portfolio in the next weeks. And a few other trips in the most iconic places in France are also planned for this summer, so stay tuned!

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

EXIFs:

  • Camera: Canon 6D
  • Lens: Canon EF24-70mm f/2.8L II USM
  • Aperture: ƒ/7.1
  • Focale: 70mm
  • Shutter speed: 1/60s
  • ISO: 100
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved
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Dutch angle

Dutch angle. Cluj-Napoca, Romania.

I called this photo “Dutch angle” as a reference to the famous camera tilt technique of “[setting the camera] at an angle on its roll axis so that the shot is composed with vertical lines at an angle to the side of the frame, or so that the horizon line of the shot is not parallel with the bottom of the camera frame”. This is typically the kind of composition I enjoy. I love to play with lines and stripes and tilting the camera in a way that the cross walk stripes are now going diagonal make this photo so dynamic! This combination of now diagonal lines, in two directions, makes a perfect graphical background for street photography.

I shot this dutch angle photo during a street photography workshop part of the Photo Romania Festival 2016 in Cluj-Napoca. It’s was the very first shot of the day, taken just before another picture that I’ve already blogged about. We were in a zone were road works has just been finished and those freshly painted stripes were just… tempting me, inviting me to do something graphical with them. How to refuse this invite? I’m happy this girl with her flowery coat just stepped in the frame, waiting for the green light to pop in. She was a perfect subject for this photo. The only challenge were the cars passing just in front of us, finding the exact timing was not easy but in the end, we did it!

The processing was fairly straightforward using Adobe Lightroom to turn the photo in black and white with Fujifilm‘s camera profiles. I just needed to raise the contrast between the asphalt and the white painted stripes, and voila!

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: 1/500s
  • ISO: 320
  • Copyright: Pierre Pichot 2016, all rights reserved
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