Posts tagged ‘Street Photography’
her name’s chrissa. she loves it when anyone is watching any episode from the second season of smallville. she’ll stop whatever she’s doing and sniff around in a circle like she’s going to pee but she’s not going to pee because she’s housebroken and I housebroke her when she was only a few weeks old but not everyone understands that. some people get a little touchy and i can see that they’re a little uncomfortable with my little fucking dog doing that little fucking circle pee dance on their carpet.
Leon Kogut. Newkirk Plaza.
If you don’t know, now you know . . .
it’s exactly what you thought it was.
Meet Jabari and Azizi from the Prospect Park Zoo. They are baboons. That big motherfucker sitting on the woods there? That’s Simen. If you look at him funny, he’ll come up and slam the glass and scare the living shit out of you. No kidding.
So back to Jabari and Azizi. They’re really cute. They’re extremely playful. And yeah, they’re half-brothers.
I take my three old son to the Zoo on a weekday. Good thing to do these types of things in New York City on a weekday because it’s crowded as all shit on the weekends. We love the baboon exhibit at the Prospect Park Zoo, because most of the times the keepers are late feeding the Sea Lions.
So there they were playing around with sticks and some of the carrots and kelp the zookeepers insist they love to eat. My son and I have seen this several times. Then Jabari and Azizi run down to the “lower platform” of the exhibit, which has a different viewing station. It takes us a couple minutes to get to that viewing station because it involves stairs and if you have a three year old, you know how long it takes to walk down five sets of stairs.
And then there they were with Simen the alpha fucking male looking on. My son asks, “Hey dad, what are they doing?” I replied, “Hold on dude, let me just take some pictures.” So one picture turned into like fifteen pictures and then 1) I started thinking what kind of freak am I and then wished I had a Nikon SLR with continuous mode and number 2) oh shit, what is my son thinking? Then I say something to him along the lines of, “It’s this thing the young ones do but hey, look at that bird over there!” At this point they’re using their hands on one another and then I try to press the shutter again like a complete freak again but my camera goes kaput.
Good thing we had the whole exhibit to ourselves. Or so I thought. I look up and I see the security guard at the top. I said to myself, “Great, I’m going to get arrested for this.” But when I looked closer, I noticed the guard’s eyes transfixed on what was going on between Azizi and Jabari. I wanted to tell the guard, “Does the press know about this?” But when she caught me looking at her, she quickly turned and walked the other way.
in five years, do you think they still will be friends?
alright fine, we’re related. but that doesn’t mean i told her how to do everything. and even if she did pick it up from somewhere or another, you still have to be an olympic trained gymnast like me to do those moves.
TO: LEADERS OF THE HUMAN RACE
FROM: THE BATTLE STAR LION FORCE
RE: SUMMER
THIS IS TO INFORM YOU THAT SUMMER WILL BEGIN ON JUNE 20, 2012 AT APPROXIMATELY 7:09 P.M.
PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU RELEASE THIS MEMO VIA THE PROPER CHANNELS, PARTICULARLY TO THE ONE AND ONLY HECTORISH LEE.
children in new york city evolve much faster than the rest of the population. and new york city girls, well, even quicker. sure, you can try to keep them safe but when everyone lives in a blender at a constant mix and pulse, sooner or later that innocent girl of yours that loves to play with carebears and watch ni hao kai-lan is going to see that real life kind of grime that is starkly different than jumping in puddles or playing with finger paint. and the thing with new york city grime is that it doesn’t just sit there on the corner or in the alley or on the subway. the fucking thing talks to you in all kinds of different voices but it always ends with, ‘come on and look at me and then when you’re done why don’t you give me a little touch.’ you can tell your child lots of times to ignore it but sooner or later, the city you are trying to prevent your child from swallowing all of a sudden swallows your child.
I remember waking up that morning with a long tail, thick whiskers, and an insatiable appetite for subway water runoff and fermented garbage. I wrapped the tail around my leg with duct tape, shaved the whiskers off, and then drank a large cup of coffee. By lunchtime my tail had disappeared. My whiskers never grew back. I never realized then that I had an ongoing medical condition.
Nothing ever happened again until a few months later when I began smoking massive amounts of the Purple Spike. Purple Spike looked like prime California Kush. Thick, golf ball size buds covered with purple hairs and crystals, and the kind of scent that just blasted through any container it was in. But the Purple Spike didn’t smell like weed because it wasn’t weed. Purple Spike was the last original strain of Dehydrated Free Will cultivated by the now infamous Clan of
Jompa. More on that shit later, because I have to get some preliminaries out of the way. Otherwise, you are not going to understand or even be prepared mentally for what you are about to learn. There’s a good chance that your body could just shut down and cease operating.
dear friend,
to begin, i want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for following/visiting my blog this year. it’s nice to know that people other than myself are actually taking the time to look at my photos. i am extremely humbled and privileged that you take the time out of your busy schedule to actually visit this and my other sites. it means a lot.
i’m not a professional street photographer. i don’t do workshops. i don’t sell prints. i don’t troll facebook. i don’t post youtube videos or have my friends create “biographies” of me. i do this here because i love doing it. even if no one read or visited this blog from today on, i would still be doing street photographs.
and that leads to the one thing they don’t say enough of on those “how to” street photography blogs about the “secrets” to street photography. you have to love it. that’s where it begins, because more than the camera, more than the lenses, more than the technique, more than the top ten lists, more than the flickrbation, is your heart. follow it first before you start wondering how to market yourself.
and in that regard, share share share your heart and passion with others. if you take lots of photographs, then share them, but with the understanding, first and foremost, that you take those photographs for yourself. if that concept is hard to understand, shoot a couple of weddings or for a client then you’ll know exactly what i mean.
it’s hard for me to figure out why some out there insist on “only showing your best” because you only have “ten or twenty” photos in your lifetime that are “good.” maybe so, but that’s living a photographic life in fear and with a hyper consciousness that you have a place in history. just let the chips fall where they fall. sure, self-edit but never self-censor your photographic expression. when you get your solo exhibit at the MOMA, then spend the time trying to figure out your place in history. but i imagine by that point, you’ll have someone who’ll do that for you.
have a happy 2012. and make every moment count, because life is one fickle ass bitch.
blessings,
eli a/k/a rufus
e v e r y d a y aperture 