First-Person Street Photography in a Blizzard

Grab a hot drink, sit back, and watch some street photography from the perspective of the photographer, in a blizzard in Chicago.

This first-person style video has become a bit of a trend with street photographers, and unlike most trends on YouTube, I love this one. There's something soothing about cities when you're watching somebody else walk through them. If you add in a blizzard and night time, you've got the makings of an enjoyable watch!

Pierre T. Lambert has created a few of these videos now and they really give you a sense of what street photographers look for. When I'm walking through cities with my camera, I'll typically look out for lights, unusual situations, and action. Lambert appears to do exactly the same as he snaps back-litĀ figures, shop lights, and movement. The blizzard adds a haunting, post-apocalyptic feel to the scene and that atmosphere comes across in the final images.

I've never thought to fix a GoPro to my body when shooting but every time I see one of these videos I think it might be fun to watch back. That said, you have to use live view rather than your viewfinder which I am not a fan of!

Do you have any tips for street photography? Share them in the comment section below.

Rob Baggs's picture

Robert K Baggs is a professional portrait and commercial photographer, educator, and consultant from England. Robert has a First-Class degree in Philosophy and a Master's by Research. In 2015 Robert's work on plagiarism in photography was published as part of several universities' photography degree syllabuses.

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9 Comments

I signed up for Fstopper notifications and I am really impressed by the good stuff coming my way. Good authors, good articles, and good comments. Keep them coming.

Really? That is instagram style and not photography. Point and shoot with a machine gun like camera lens combo (e.g. watch from 17:00 ...). Ridiculous! Why don't you walk around the streets while shooting an 8k-60fps-video. I am sure, you'll find the perfect photo later. (Edited: typo)

I think you'll find street photography existed before instagram and why is the lens ridiculous? You use different lenses to achieve different looks... how's he going to capture telescopic photos with a wide angle lens?

Sam, taking photos (e.g portraits) in the streets is not necessarily street photography. And I rather meant shooting in continuous mode or quickly than using this long lens. Still bokeh and street photography are somehow mutual. Anyway, everybody is free to do as he likes.

But this is just running around, point and shoot a (very) lot, cropping (framing) later and post process to give a pleasing look. Not much of real photography here. More styled for instagram and alike: Just take a short look and go on to the next. Do you know insta_repeat? You might want to take a look.

Gatekeeping in photography? Well I never!

Really? You're making a mountain out of a molehill. More than the majority of the video he was NOT machine gunning it. And, when he did machine gun it, it was a fast train moving towards him.

Insightful. I like this kind sharing of how photographers reveal their trade. For Pierre's work, I think some might be misled into seeing him machine-gunning the scene. What is not directly obvious is Pierre already got the feel of the environment, the moments, the lights, the subjects etc so much, that his photo taking looked so seamless and instinctive.

For the aesthetic part, everybody has her own taste and preference, I have no problem with Pierre's post pro. Because I myself have the opinion that photographs are what they mean to the photographers themselves (and the intended message for the audience).

lol

Can anyone write and post articles on Fstoppers?