Street Photography Has Been Changed Forever

F8 and be there is truly a reality these days. You can crank a camera up to nearly any ISO, make it black and white, and you can get a great street photo. You can also be totally fine with softer images. Nothing needs to be totally sharp. That means that autofocus isn’t really necessary. By all means, we’ve reached peak street photography. There’s so much that’s possible these days that can work as long as the aesthetic is there. And to be honest, you can do great street photography with just your phone like photographer Gretchen Robinette — you don’t need a dedicated camera. Seriously, human street photography can’t possibly improve anymore. However, street photography in and of itself can surely improve. But that has to do with photographers actually being original and telling stories that we haven’t seen yet.

There are big things now that can happen for street photographers. In fact, they’re so large that we’re not even sure how to talk about them.

However, today, there are loads of pieces of technology available that are all so good that we’d strongly say that the gear doesn’t matter. Yes, you can shoot street photography with a pinhole camera if you want and make it a unique take on your creative vision. Ian Wilkening did this.

Is it something that everyone can relate to and get behind? No. Is it unique? Yes. He doesn’t get as much praise as Olga Karlovac, for example. She makes street photographs that look like sketches. Indeed, they’re doing whatever they want and making it their own. And in the end, that’s really all that matters. Heck, you can even do this with a telephoto focal length. That’s to say that gear truly doesn’t matter right now. You can take a specific genre of street photography and combine it with so many other things these days.

In that way, I’d even say that it’s a nearly intersectional part of photography these days. It can be combined with portraiture, landscapes, etc. I’m not sure about how it can be combined with weddings or wildlife. I’ll leave the greater intersectionality for fine art — which truly can dive into every single genre of photography and has done so already. It’s another one that doesn’t matter too much about the gear.

What’s even better about this is that when it comes to good street photography, we have to come down to the human elements. The rest doesn’t matter anymore. Someone is bound to like it as long as you make something part of your identity and grow into it. That, ultimately, is human.

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