Nostalgia

I was driving down State Street earlier today, and in front of the Granada I saw a vintage car, as well as a huge green screen. In front of the screen were a slew of men dressed in 1920's attire. Within minutes, I had parked and arrived on the scene with my camera in hand. It turns out, they were filming the introduction video for the SB Film Festival. So I stuck around for over an hour shooting photographs. 

It turns out that the classic automobile I had spotted while driving by was a Mercedes from 1920's. The proud owner was quick to shed some light on the significance of his car. The manufacturer of the car was Mercedes. Not Mercedes-Benz, just Mercedes. It turns out that Benz once was an entirely separate automobile company. In about 1926, a couple years after this car was made, the two manufacturers merged forces and created the luxurious cars that we all know and love. I also found interesting the fact that the symbol for Mercedes was a three-pointed star (See photograph), while the Benz logo was wreath-shaped. The emblems combined to form the current Mercedes-Benz symbol. 

The Decisive Moment

Shot @ ISO 1250, 1/1600sec, f/3.5

     "Photography is not like painting. There is a creative fraction of a second when you are taking a picture. Your eye must see a composition or an expression that life itself offers you, and you must know with intuition when to click the camera. That is the moment the photographer is creative. Oop! The Moment! Once you miss it, it is gone forever." - Henri Cartier-Bresson, 1957.

 H. Cartier-Bresson coined the term "The Decisive Moment." This phrase contains the quintessential difference between the masters of photography, and the mere hobbyists.

     If a sports photographer is shooting an LA Lakers basketball game, and he clicks the shutter a second or two after Kobe dunks, the photograph might as well be deleted. That is how important seizing that golden moment can be. 

   
     One way that I have been able to sharpen my skill of capturing that instantaneous moment is taking photos in the passenger seat of the car. This simple visual and mental exercise trains my mind to see a few seconds into the future, thus allowing me to imagine the image in my head before I see it on the LCD screen of my camera. More often than not, I smack on my 18mm lens, and either roll down the window, or I open the sun roof, depending on the environment. Sometimes, if the window is dirty enough, and I am trying to capture a grungy or morbidly urban image, I keep the window rolled up, to add to the grotesqueness.