ChangshaNotes
Regular
- Location
- Changsha, Hunan, China
- Name
- Colin
My preferred form of photography is street photography and living in China, there are always people on the streets and culturally different or unusual (from my perspective) things to shoot. However, I have one problem. I stick out like a sore thumb. Stealth is near impossible as I live in a suburbs of a city in south-central China and I’m the only non-Chinese here. The closest other foreigners are about 30km away. Wherever I am, people notice and usually stare at me. They are friendly and I speak Mandarin, so if I liked doing street portraits, it would be quite easy, but I don’t. I like candid shooting of everyday life.
I’ve been trying out the Fuji Camera Remote app for iPhone and I think it may change how I sometimes shoot and even how I carry my camera. Fiddling with your phone is a more common sight than reading a book. So if I stand in one spot and play with my phone, people will eventually turn back to what they were doing and ignore me. Without the phone, this just doesn’t happen. I need to practice and these are not great shots by any means but I see some potential for me to get more shots where my presence doesn’t overly effect the scene.
I usually carry my camera in a bag and pull it out when I want to shoot, but I can see myself slinging the camera around my body more often now.
This first shot I took with my back turned. I was using a neck strap and had the camera slung messenger bag style across my back. Using the phone app to ‘see’, I was able to shift my body to get the framing. Even with my back turned the guy is still checking the big, weird foreigner out. (or maybe just wondering what all my body convulsions were about)
This shot, I was sitting with camera facing the dancers while I faced away.
In this last shot I was just walking by and saw the lady picking her nose. I’m not really interested in capturing this kind of thing but I just wanted to see if I would disturb her. I was walking while staring into the phone and took the photo on a hitch step.
The lag is not too bad and pretty easy to get used to and the touch screen focusing is excellent. I just shot on P mode for these.
Have any of you tried using the app in this way?
I’ve been trying out the Fuji Camera Remote app for iPhone and I think it may change how I sometimes shoot and even how I carry my camera. Fiddling with your phone is a more common sight than reading a book. So if I stand in one spot and play with my phone, people will eventually turn back to what they were doing and ignore me. Without the phone, this just doesn’t happen. I need to practice and these are not great shots by any means but I see some potential for me to get more shots where my presence doesn’t overly effect the scene.
I usually carry my camera in a bag and pull it out when I want to shoot, but I can see myself slinging the camera around my body more often now.
This first shot I took with my back turned. I was using a neck strap and had the camera slung messenger bag style across my back. Using the phone app to ‘see’, I was able to shift my body to get the framing. Even with my back turned the guy is still checking the big, weird foreigner out. (or maybe just wondering what all my body convulsions were about)
Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)
This shot, I was sitting with camera facing the dancers while I faced away.
Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)
In this last shot I was just walking by and saw the lady picking her nose. I’m not really interested in capturing this kind of thing but I just wanted to see if I would disturb her. I was walking while staring into the phone and took the photo on a hitch step.
Join to see EXIF info for this image (if available)
The lag is not too bad and pretty easy to get used to and the touch screen focusing is excellent. I just shot on P mode for these.
Have any of you tried using the app in this way?