What It Takes to Make Amazing Street Portraits: A Conversation with Gary Lashmar

In this episode, London street photographer and workshop teacher Gary Lashmar joins me to critique a set of reader-submitted street portraits. We talk about approaching strangers, overcoming the fear of rejection, and choosing between color and black and white, and Gary closes by looking back at one of his own street portraits.

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What It Takes to Make Amazing Street Portraits: A Conversation with Gary Lashmar

In this episode, London street photographer and workshop teacher Gary Lashmar joins me to critique a set of reader-submitted street portraits. We talk about approaching strangers, overcoming the fear of rejection, and choosing between color and black and white, and Gary closes by looking back at one of his own street portraits.

Introduction

Hello everyone, welcome back to the channel. Today I'm here with Gary Lashmar, photographer and YouTuber. How are you doing, Gary? Thank you for coming on my show.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you for joining me. So the idea behind this is that in our community we submit pictures every week, and this week's topic was portraits, or street portraits, maybe environmental portraits. I'm going to show you a lot of them, and I would love to hear what you think about those.

Great stuff, I can't wait, I'm looking forward to it.

Perfect. All right, so let's take a look at the first one.

@chetanclicks

Okay, the first portrait I absolutely love. It's in black and white as well, which I think is a good choice. In this scene, perhaps in this part of the world, it would have been an easier choice to put it in color. I don't know, because I can't see it in color, but I think there's a confidence in the photographer for making that choice, to put it in black and white.

Possibly, if I had something to say... I mean, these guys are characters, right? I love characters, for me that's at the heart of street portraits, so these guys are almost like they have to be photographed. I would possibly have taken a step or two closer in, there's a bit of space above, the guys at the top there. I wouldn't say it's taking away from the image, but I would probably have cropped in a little tighter on this frame. And that's just nitpicking. It's a damn good portrait, isn't it.

All right. I also know you teach workshops, is it something you teach in your workshop, applicable in this sort of situation?

Gary's workshops

I think so, in all situations. My workshop is called DARE, D-A-R-E, the Dare Photography Experience, and at the heart of the workshop is this idea that it's about fear. As a consequence of fear, a lot of our photographs are perhaps not as interesting as we want them to be. To overcome that fear, well, there are challenges in the workshop that will throw participants into the lion's den, for want of a better cliché. The workshop is set up based on my experience of overcoming those fears. The kind of photographs that inspire me, street photography, portraits, fashion, everything, the photographer is pushing it, they're taking risks. And our thought processes, they stop us. They say, oh, you can't get any closer, you can't take two or three steps closer, because this person is going to get annoyed. That plays out across the board. It's not just about taking two or three steps closer, you understand you're going to get better photographs, that's not always the case, but I think at the heart of my workshop, it's about supporting participants to take two or three steps closer, literally, and metaphorically, in how they approach their photography, full stop, and business, etc.

All right, so is that like one thing I should do if I decide to take someone's portrait? Or is there other advice you would give me, maybe to overcome my fear? Because sometimes you're kind of hesitant to get the eye contact, to get the permission, or not get the permission, you know what I mean.

Getting permission, it's like, for me, you can't overcome that fear. That fear is always there, and the idea that I'm going to somehow overcome it, we're always looking for that, but for me that's not part of the deal. If I want to take the kind of photographs that I aspire to take, sometimes I get them, but quite often it's like I'm moving in the direction of taking, I need to turn my attention, when I'm out shooting, to what's going on with me. Because if I'm not aware of it, then I'm just reacting to it all the time.

So, for example, a street portrait, I'm out on the streets, and what I've seen, I've seen this when I've been out on street walks with photographers, is that what they'll do is they have to get the photograph as soon as possible, because they don't want to take up too much of this person's time. Even if they've asked the person if they can take the photograph, they don't want to feel like they're taking up too much of their time, so they want to get the photograph quick, oh, I've got your photograph, is that okay, and the person says yeah, and then they move on. I do that as well, I'm guilty of that all the time. But what I'm always working on, and moving in the direction of, is not just hanging in there, because the more time you can spend with the person, the more you're going to see.

I've taken photographs where I've been hanging out with someone for just two minutes, and then they've shown me an old wallet with a photograph of their wife. I did this just last year, it was in Camden in London, they showed me a photograph of their wife, and the wife had passed away a few months before. If I'd just quickly got the shot, I never would have got that photograph. I have hundreds of examples like that, not just street portraits, just hanging out in a scene, whereas there's a big part of me that just wants to run for cover. But hanging in there, that's where the juicy stuff is, in my experience. I could be wrong. All right, so let's take a look at this one.

@jr_pillai

I love the vibrancy, the color, it almost has to be in color, this. It's kind of what I was suggesting with the last image we were looking at, so that's fine. And the composition, I kind of like this, maybe cropped in a little tighter. I love the yellow, the three colored dots on the wall, they're playing a part, right? That's part of the composition. I just think here, this is almost like a post-production thing, I would just bring the shadows up a little bit, that's it. So it's not necessarily anything to do with the composition itself, which I think is spot on. Perhaps crop it in a little closer, so there's less space at the top, less space on the right, less space on the left. Just bring the shadows up, so that we can just see a little more detail in the faces. Simple as that. Great portrait, guys.

@gettons

Moving on to the next picture, I mean, these are great portraits, right? I really like this, this is pure street portraiture for me. This isn't necessarily asking for permission, this is capturing what's going on.

I'm having a little bit of a conflict here, I love the color. My first impression when I saw this was, it's got to go in black and white, but now I'm looking, I'll probably leave this in color. This splash of color, this pink, is part of the composition. It's like she's looking at that, what the hell is that, and I don't know, but that's fine in this instance. Sometimes I don't like that, if I'm thinking what is that person looking at, and that's all to do with the composition and the storytelling, but this works.

I'll say here, and this is being very, very fussy, I will probably warm this image slightly, the temperature, warm it slightly in post-production, I think the white balance is slightly off, it could be my screen though. But I don't really have too much to say. My thing is, because I used to do these critiques at workshops and post-workshops, my thing is I always want to find something I could improve about the photograph, not necessarily being critical. I'm struggling with that one, because this is just a great portrait. Maybe just warm the image slightly, that's it.

@theboldshutter

All right, moving on to the next one, again, there's not much room to maneuver here, but I would crop this in slightly. Again, this is a really nice portrait, obviously the photographer's asked permission. The thing is, if this is a great portrait, if I'm asking somebody if I can take their photograph, I've got a little bit of access, I really want to work that, that extra little bit of time I've got with them. And it looks like the photographer's done that here.

So if you get the access, and the person says all right, what should I do, how do you pose your subject, because that's something you just have to expect. Now, I'm a portrait photographer as well, that's how I make my money, so I have the capacity to work with the subject in that way. But it's not always the same, if you're just stopping someone on the street, it's not like when I'm shooting a fashion model or something like that, or even just portraits, in this instance, it's not about posing, you understand, it's about, for me, having a dialogue. That's all I can do, really, it depends on the person. Sometimes you'll literally stop a model in the street, that's a whole different ball game, you can suss it out, you can tell they've had experience, and then you can kind of direct them and they're fine with it.

But if I'm just talking to somebody on the street, I don't even know what posing means in that context. What I'm doing, when I'm shooting portraits, I've got access to them, but I've only got so much time. So what I see with a lot of photographers, especially at my workshops, is that they have an idea, almost the kind of shot they want to get, in their head, not always, sometimes they don't even have that, but they have an idea, and then they get the shot, and then they're so busy congratulating themselves on the back of the camera with the shot they got, and then all of a sudden the subject moves into this beautiful little symmetry with the background, and they're missing it, because the difference between that shot and that shot is worlds apart. So we just need to always be looking at what's going on. We don't have to be trigger-happy, but just looking for that click. And I don't think we can come up with a shot as good, in our minds, as the universe can conspire to put in front of us by accident, we just need to be vigilant to it. That's what I think.

@rogeliogodinez2

All right, all right, moving on to the next one. Okay, the next portrait, I love the tones, the blacks and whites, the grays. For me, I'm not, I don't know, I'm not really learning anything about the character here. It kind of feels a little bit almost like a paparazzi-type shot, the depth of field, the fall-off, the subject in the background. I have to be careful here, because this is not necessarily my kind of favorite shot, it doesn't necessarily mean it's not a good shot, but there's very little to connect with here. At the very least, I don't necessarily need the subject always looking in my direction, but I just want a little bit more. The technique here, there's nothing wrong with the technique, right, everything's sharp, everything's in focus, the photographer knows what they're doing, I just want a little bit more to connect with, I think. But yeah, it's a fine shot.

So what would you do differently if you were about to photograph something like this?

It's not complex for me, I just want to see, so, for example, I'm guessing here that the photographer isn't connecting with this subject, they're not chatting here. I'm assuming this is taken with, I don't know, maybe even 100mm or an 85, I could be wrong, I don't know, it's not a 50, is it? But I just want to get, listen, portraits, full stop, for me, and I suppose you are asking me, for me, I'm not shooting any portraits at all unless I'm pretty much this close to them, like 35mm or 24, occasionally, very rarely, a 50mm. I just need to connect with them, which for me, quite often, is having a dialogue. That's it, that is street portraits for me. I don't really take street portraits where you just walk up to somebody and quickly click them, I don't.

All right, so basically almost everything with permission?

Yeah, with permission, because I want to get that access. Occasionally it's too good to be true, and you sense that you're not going to get time with this person, and then occasionally it's just getting the shot, there's a few images like that you'll see on my Instagram, perhaps, but mostly a lot of the people that I photograph tend to be quite sensitive. So, for example, I quite often shoot homeless people, not because they're homeless, you understand, but quite often, unfortunately, homeless people just tend to have a whole bunch of character, they just have this character. For me, I don't take pictures of homeless people without their permission, I don't care if other people do that, I'm not religious about it, but for me it's a selfish thing, I want to get time, and I want to get the photograph that I want, and I can't just snatch at that. And also, yes, it is kind of sensitive, I just don't really want to be getting into that.

Gary's approach

Okay, maybe tell me this, this is going to be interesting for many people, so you're working on a street, and then suddenly you see an interesting character, an interesting subject. What do you do? You see a man or a woman, someone just walking in front of you, how does the interaction look?

Okay, I know I'm waffling a bit, so I want to keep it a little bit shorter for you. I have two ways of shooting. If I stop someone on the street, if someone's just walking towards me and I want to get their photograph, what I kind of do is I'll click it, and that might be the best shot, that's just a safety shot, really, and then I literally will, you can see this quite often on my YouTube videos, but I will say, wow, you look awesome, guys, please let me take a photograph of you, or words to that effect, so I'll be a little extrovert about it. And I would say probably six or seven times out of ten, they'll be fine with it.

It also quite often depends on how long I've been out that day, if I've already been out an hour, then I'm more confident. But if I've only been out five or ten minutes, that fear, that hesitancy, is more prominent. But quite often, a lot of the photographs and the portraits, Martin, that you see in my portfolio, I've been chatting with those guys for a long period of time before I even take the photograph, sometimes not even that day, sometimes I'll come back, because there are three or four streets in London that I work over and over, so they're used to me being there. It's easier, so you're almost shooting anonymously but in plain sight, because they're used to me, they've forgotten about me, sort of thing.

@stefankurzeja

So let's take a look at the next one. I love this, everything's technically wrong. Like, what should be in focus is not in focus, and the guys at the back that are in focus kind of shouldn't be in focus, they should be perhaps out of focus. But I love it, you know, that textbook part of me, that brainwashed part of me, is kind of, it's inverted, but I love the way it is. I don't really know how I would improve this frame, I would maybe, if you focus on the guys at the front, I think it's almost as good, it'll probably be almost as good, I don't know, I'd have to see that. This is, yeah, great portrait. Portraits, there's lots.

@zoximage

All right, moving on to the next one, yeah, this is great, because she, I was going to say she, I don't know if the photographer is a she or he, has got them posing a little, right? I love this. I mean, I haven't seen, perhaps the photographer's got a whole bunch of clicks from this, but for me this is like a sweet, nice portrait, there's nothing wrong with this portrait at all, it's a nice family portrait. I've got three children, if I had this photograph of my kids, I'd be happy with it. For me though, I want something a little bit different, perhaps if I had a wide lens and I'm closer in on these guys, because kids are great, right, kids will be jumping up at the camera and pointing and all this kind of thing, look at that girl on the left, imagine getting really up close to the camera with her, those kind of photographs I love. But these are great, this is great, I mean, perhaps, if this is a full-length composition in effect, I can see the feet, I can see the top of their heads, perhaps a little bit tighter in if I was going to keep this frame.

@mzanotti

All right, moving on to the next one, these are great portraits, right, I wanted some bad portraits, this is great, I don't really know what, look at the finger, the finger is the portrait. I mean, I love that, and the guy's face, he's a character. The light here, I don't know if this is just, I think this is just available light, right, I don't think there's anything, yeah, that I don't really, I could look at this photo for ages, but that's great, great portrait.

@salman_almadoug

Next one, next one, okay, I think this is beautiful, the color, everything, the smile, it is kind of a textbook portrait. I don't know, really, I mean, I'm definitely getting in closer here, right, for a few clicks, I think the difference here is that the backdrop is part of the composition, and it all works, the lines, the reflection, the color, the blue on the left, and obviously the coat is to die for, they've probably saturated it a little, I would have thought, but it works.

For me, portraits and street photography, the color has to be playing a part, almost has to be part of a story, and here, I'm talking about telling a story, it has to enhance the composition, and it's definitely doing that here.

But can you imagine flipping this in black and white?

It's still going to be a beautiful photograph, but in black and white, maybe it would be cropped in a little, which would lose some of the blue on the left, it would no longer be blue, so you'd have a whole bunch of, I don't know, it would still probably work, because you've got the lines. But yeah, okay, simple portrait.

Martin's photo

I think for me here, I'm not really, this is difficult, this is almost like a bit of a headshot but wider. I don't know if it's really the best, the light's fine, but it's not ideal, I think perhaps directing the subject, first of all, this frame, I'm cropping this in slightly, even in post-production I'd be cropping this in, maybe even make it square, a square crop. I think if this was cropped square and put in black and white, for me it's a better image. The whites in this, I think it's almost like maybe even half a stop overexposed, but the light here is very flat, and I think even in post-production it could do, I mean, I'm not big into post-production, I wouldn't want people thinking that's a way out of trouble, but I think, digital, and I think this is a digital frame, digitals are either very flat or very contrasty, so it needs a little bit of work, and I think this probably will benefit from that.

It's a simple frame, I can't be overly critical, but I just want a little bit more of the person's personality revealed, somehow. That comes about from me hanging in there, having a dialogue, it could be as simple as asking her, what would it look like if he was playing with your hair now? If she was doing that, it's a different photograph. You can get yourself out of trouble with anybody by just asking that, what would it be like if he was playing with your hair now? Or if he was putting headphones in, what would it look like with one hand? Or what would it look like if you were fixing a tire with one hand? Not her, but, you know what I'm saying, just asking questions. Some people will get you out of trouble because they're more animated than others, so you don't have to go looking for it, but sometimes you just need to have a few questions, and then a little bit, because everyone's a statue in a photograph, and we want a suggestion of movement, unless the character is so striking, it could be what they're wearing, it could be the light, because it's not about necessarily getting people doing cartwheels here, we just want a little bit more animation, I think. Also, well, you can't, a suggestion of movement, that's my feeling.

Do you sometimes get negative responses, either after you ask permission, but also before, when you take the shot?

Yeah, well, I deal with it, because it's fine with me. I think one of the things, I know one of the things from dialogues I've had with hundreds of people at my workshops, is that this is one of the things that stops people, again, from keep moving and keep progressing and growing as photographers, the fear of rejection. And you know, it's impossible to be rejected, what we do is we give our power away, and then that all accumulates inside us. The way that I look at it is, the more no's we get, statistically you're closer to a yes, that's the way of looking at it. I'm not saying we can't be rejected, you understand, but it's just a way of looking at it. There's a process I do at my workshop, I purposely, around about 45 minutes to an hour in, make sure the participant has an experience, fast-tracked, of feeling rejected. It's horrible, it's horrible, and then, you know what, well, it's not that bad, there's nothing going on, it's all up here. So I understand the feeling, and you never get used to that feeling, even after what I've just said, it's not like I don't feel rejected, I do feel rejected, it's just fine, it's just part of life. I think what it is, we feel like we shouldn't feel like that, so then that's not the feeling, it's what we tag on the end of it. But life is about that, life's full of that feeling, and if we weren't meant to be feeling like that, we wouldn't feel like it. So it's fine, guys, go out and, I'll tell you what to do, there was another street photographer I saw, he had an awesome thing, similar to what I did at my workshop, where you practice getting, I think it was Eric Kim, where you have to get, I think, 20 no's before you can come back to me, or something like that. So even if everyone says yes for two hours, you still have to get the no's. I think that's a great process, could you see how excited I am about that.

@locknain

All right, moving on, yeah, I think here the color is a distraction, because the story is the hand here, and the color is a distraction, and if you put that in black and white it's a totally different photograph, for me.

How do you decide when the color is a distraction, and when to use black and white instead?

There's no thought process here, in actual fact, straight away, as soon as, I understand it's more difficult sometimes with our own photographs, that's why it's important to get a distance from them, because we took the damn thing, and quite often when we're taking the photograph there's a whole bunch of other subjective stuff going on, so we're not necessarily seeing, for me, that photograph might mean something totally different because of my day and everything I'm bringing into that. So that's why it's important, sometimes, to at least get a couple of days' distance from it before I edit it, I mean, I'm the worst for that, I usually don't want stuff stacking up, so I tend to edit pretty much straight away, but I've been doing it quite a long time, so maybe I have a little bit more experience than some people. But having a distance, I would think, is a benefit. For me, to answer the question, it's an instinct, especially looking at that photograph, I see that was an easy one for me, because straight away, black and white, straight away, there's no, the color's a distraction, I don't have to think about it or analyze it, it's a distraction for me, so I will put that in black and white. And also the space, all of the negative space, the photograph's not benefiting from that, I don't think, in black and white it would be less of a consideration, because there's a lot going on at the bottom, so maybe the space at the top gives it room to breathe a little, but in color, I don't think it's helping.

I actually think if that frame was cropped in now and black and white, I think that's a pretty good photograph. Maybe the thumb, if now I'm getting really picky, as we're looking at the right eye, if that was covered by the thumb, I think it's even more powerful, but I'm just being nitpicky. I think that's quite a striking photograph in black and white, cropped in closer, I really do.

@go_rideyourbike

As for this photograph, oh yeah, I think, I love, I mean, listen, sometimes the simplicity, you know, I really think, and what I talked about earlier about the character, I mean you can see this guy in what he's wearing, the color here is part of the story. The yellow on the yellow is a great spot, it's almost like they've moved this person into that background, and if they haven't, well, it feels like that. And the reflections, are they like telephones, like smartphones in the background, in a reflection? I think so, or maybe it seems like chaos, like from a restaurant, like McDonald's, when you make an order, I guess. This photographer, I just know that's part of the story, or at least part of the composition, and if those kiosk phones were not in the frame, then it would be cropped in a lot tighter, definitely. And I think that's definitely why, you look at the phone on the right, the composition, everything is falling into the grid, into the thirds, and it works. I mean, I would say that, yeah, it's just great, great portrait.

@jacob.moore_photography

All right, moving on to the next one, the last frame again, for me, instinct, black and white, that's what I'm feeling here. I think with a little more contrast added to the picture, as well, the shadow on the left, I think the image would be a better image in black and white. All of these lines, all of these windows, everything, they're going to become part of the story, and then it works, it's a better frame for me. I don't know, I mean, for the image to be in profile, there has to be something special, there has to be something else for me to connect with in the photograph for the image to be in profile, and I'm not sure there's anything really here that I'm connecting with. I don't know, obviously he's looking at something, but like I said, black and white, you can, for me, I would improve, I don't know if it can be improved, the image is fine, it's fine, for me, if I had taken the photograph, I would add a little bit of contrast to this, and it would be in black and white, and the highlights, sorry, the highlights and the shadow, that contrast would just be a little bit more striking, I think, and I would straighten the image slightly.

Gary's photo @ the_street_thief

Let's take a look at the last one. So that was Chris, and I took that last week, well, I don't know when you're posting this video, but the time I'm talking, I think it was last week or the week before, and that was in Leicester Square. Oh, no, I met him in Leicester Square, and he was a bit cheeky, Chris, I wanted to get his portrait, and basically there was a two-way thing going on there, so I had to buy him breakfast for that.

Okay, well, I'm quite often hesitant, like I said, I was talking about how quite often a lot of the subjects, the people I shoot, are quite sensitive, you've got to be careful about handing out money, you have no idea, do you know what I'm saying, I don't want to be too pie-in-the-sky about stuff, I wouldn't necessarily be paying for photographs, contradicting myself totally, I kind of did that, so I brought in breakfast. But we did have a chat, and you'll see in the video I posted on YouTube, it might even be the last video, you'll see me taking those photographs of him, it's with a GoPro, so it's a bit, you've got to take it or leave it, but you'll see, when I met him, the initial shot I got of him was just, a second I saw him, so I would have had that shot anyway, and he was fine with that, but then I thought, no, this guy's face is, you can see the last 20 years of his life in that forehead, it's just, and he was a wonderful guy, he was really sweet. But again, it didn't work for me in color.

What is best focal length for portraits?

Maybe, you mentioned shooting with 35 or even 28, there is this idea that portraits are supposed to be shot with, let's say, 50, or maybe even 75, because of the distortion of the face. What do you think about that?

Well, first of all, that's why it is a learning curve. I know, I'm a portrait photographer as well, I shoot fashion, I shoot editorial, so I shoot all that stuff, but I shoot those with a 24mm and a 35mm. Quite often, what you'll see with my photographs, my portraits especially, in actual fact with all of them, the subject is in the center, they're in the center of the frame. And like with the photograph of Chris, the last image that you showed, this image of mine, it kind of doesn't matter too much because he fills the frame, but even when they're further back, partly because I'm a huge fan of that kind of single point, even a lot of my work, there's always something in the center, I love that Wes Anderson kind of consistency.

Yeah, it's not consistent in that way, because it's street photography.

But there's a slight symmetry through it, if you put one of my blogs up you'll see everything's kind of centered. But there's that going on, also as a byproduct of me shooting really wide, because of the Fuji lens, the lenses that I'm using now, when I was shooting Canon it wasn't so much, because the lenses took care of the distortion, they were a lot, but with the Fuji, I'm on a 16 millimeter, I'm shooting most of my portraits, so I think the equivalent of 24, because the Fuji, obviously, it has that crop sensor, but there's a bit more distortion, and you've got to be careful, I mean, I don't want to get into that, especially with people on the street, they don't want to get into grotesque territory, because that's kind of, I think, taking too much, I don't want to do that. But even with Chris there, you can see it's a little bit borderline, the nose is coming out, but I think with Chris, that photograph, I don't think it gets into that grotesque territory, I think it's the eyes, everything in that photograph, for me, that's the, so the nose is almost, although it's coming out, it's almost like, that's why I took that photo right away. But it's a very nice photo.

Closing

So thank you very much for joining me today, it was a great conversation.

Yeah, thanks, Martin. I know, sorry, I do tend to waffle on a bit, I take after my mum, especially when I'm on the phone or something, you have to shut me up. But thanks, guys.

Yeah, and they were great photographs, they were easy, I wanted some, there wasn't one bad photograph, was there? So, maybe next time, if you have me back, I'll make sure to bring some bad ones. I'm kidding, I'm kidding.

But yeah, all right, so thank you, and have a great day.

Thanks, thanks, guys, thank you.