Street Portraits - Zoe the poet. I met Zoe about three years ago and asked her to write a poem for me. She asked me what I might want her to write about. I told her the story of when I bought my first camera when I was 16 years old and couldn’t afford to buy the lens. I was happy walking out of the store with my first camera which cost me $400. My Dad lent me a 50mm 1.4 Nikkor lens until I saved up $150 to buy my own about 3 months later. Well, she chose to write about my first lens and what it meant for me to finally have my own “complete camera “. I was awestruck at her putting into words that moment then and bringing that feeling forward to today and what it means and meant to me. No tears, as most people react to her writings once she pulls that 4 x 5 inch (I think) piece of paper from the roller of her vintage yellow typewriter; ink still barely dry with its slight smell of blue black color as it makes contact with the page. Her poem took me back to that moment when I was finally complete and ready to record everything that caught my interest on black and white film. It took me back to that moment of gratitude of finally owning my first camera, the Nikon FM. A number of years later, as most photographers do, I traded my FM in and upgraded to the Nikon F2A; still sorry till this day of letting go of such a great and trusted friend. Still, a part of her/him remains as I kept my first lens, which Zoe wrote about. In comes Natalia, my amazing poet daughter who on a trip to Puerto Rico had her camera stolen from her Grandpa’s car. It’s a camera I bought her for Christmas when she was about 12 years old, a Nikon as well - the F10 I think. So last Christmas Eileen and I surprised her with a new camera, the Nikon F3, top of the line back in its day. I attached to it my other faithful friend to make it fully functional. This time there was no feeling of loss for me or the lens as we would see each other on a regular basis as well as its offspring, carefully curated with Natalia’s heart and creativity. What a feeling - giving my daughter one of my most treasured possessions that had just turned 45. Possessions are nothing if we can’t share with those we love…
This beautiful image would be even better if the subject or the photographer had moved to the left so that there would have been some separation of the subjects face from the brightly lit tree. Also, in post-processing one could decrease the brightness of the sunny areas in the background.
The image captures and expresses the feeling about Zoe in the story. You captured her kindness. Technically the image is excellent. well done.
What a sweet story to accompany this portrait which reminds me that even though it seems that there is nothing original left to say and that it's all been said or done many times over, we the craftspeople with real cameras are still relevant and worthy of respect and distinction. With so many people now possessing something to shoot with (i.e. a phone), we the true craftspeople, who still believe that creating an image is more than just pointing a phone and uploading it to social media, and all of the work we might do in post to perfect that capture, as well as the capital we spend on our tools, it is still worth the investment in time and it shows in our work. You have demonstrated that here perfectly!
A beautiful, and sensitively captured portrait!