Henri Cartier-Bresson

March 9, 2007 | Filed Under Uncategorized 

I’d known of Henri Cartier-Bresson. The father of photojournalistic style shooting. Often mentioned in the same breath as “Leica”, and “the decisive moment”.

Wasn’t until I did a bit more reading up on him today when these words spoke directly to my heart.

“He never photographed with flash, a practice he saw as ‘[i]mpolite…like coming to a concert with a pistol in your hand.’”

There is nothing I hate more than strapping a flash on my camera. When I do, it’s almost insulting. Coming to the admission that my equipment is inadequate for the moment at hand. If I can *see* the subject, why can’t I capture it as is? Why must I announce my presence, and destroy the entire moment with a blinding flash of unnatural white light?

That is what drives me to accquire the fastest primes. The best low-light performers. The challenge of producing pictures from the most miserable conditions. Because then I can capture the scene I saw in my mind’s eye. A flash changes all that, makes it artifical and different.

This Henri dude and I would probably get along just fine!

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