Pixiq

Bruce Percy is mostly known for his oniric landscapes, but the photographer also has portraiture as a craft he explores. In a way that makes him transparent to the eyes of those he photographs.

Portraiture - a street's photographers' approach, an eBook from the photographer Bruce Percy is somehow a curiosity for many. Most people think of Bruce Percy as a landscape photographer so they never look beyond, to discover this side of the photographer. But Bruce Percy has been photographing people for some time now, influenced, he says, by the work of Steve McCurry.

Some 20 years ago it was, in fact, all landscape for Bruce Percy, but then the author, a travel photographer as he states, started to look at people with a new interest. Cambodja was the starting ground for an experience  that has shown the author that, after all, he was/is a street photographer, although he did not know that at the time

So this book is not a study in studio photography but the experience from a photographer that clarifies, at the starting point, that his photos "say just as much about me as they do about the people I've photographed."

Divided into three sections, Karma & Approach, Technique and Street Stories, the eBook covers, in nearly 90 pages, the various aspects of the craft of portraiture, as seen from Bruce Percy's point of view. It's a guide somehow different from others you'll find in the market, as this one delves into aspects that most technical manuals forget: stuff like having a karmic approach to the subject (be yourself and all you can be), having emotional intelligence (be aware of your subjects' feeling at all times) and not being The greedy shooter (the more you want, the less  you get).

I do feel it's important for photographers to learn all these lessons - and there's much more in the eBook - before venturing in the field as if they were "hunting" for preys to photograph. I especially like a note Bruce Percy writes about an experience during a workshop in Portugal, where he states that during a meeting with an old lady "my Portuguese friends were all crowded around her shooting images (...) so I decided to stay further away and give her some space". This episode gave him enough material to write about the importance of watching to define the "good moment", the importance of being unobtrusive, a, he says "transparent photographer".

All these are good advices for people starting and sometimes so eager to get an image that they forget about everything else. But this Portraiture - a street's photographers' approach is not all about the immaterial but all too important side of photography, it goes deep into the technical aspects, explaining lenses, the importance of natural light,  the importance of colour or of the camera you choose, and many other tips too, to close with a KYS : Keep It Simple.

The Street Stories chapter is a kind of case studies section, with 10 examples taken from Bruce Percy's portfolio, explaining options, limitations, techniques and aims. All in a simple way, so everybody, from the most seasoned photographer to the novice just starting can get some new bearings out from the reading. Discovering not just the worlds of Bruce Percy but also some new aspects of themselves.

Give this eBook a chance. Get it and discover how to renew your portraiture photography. Or buy the whole collection from the author and explore his landscapes along with these portraits of people.