The new street photographer's manifesto

During the trip to Bradford I purchased a few things from the shop they had there, these were a photography journal, a picture and Tanya Nagar's book 'The new street photographers manifesto'. 

Tanya Nagar's book is a really interesting book, i originally purchased it so it could give me in-sight into street photography but through reading it i discovered it has much more to it. It shows you in detail what street photography actually is, the history of street photography, street photography today, the mind of a street photographer and also whole chapters on 'where and what to shoot', 'seize the moment', 'equipment', 'digital processing' and 'showcase'.

The main part of the book i liked was how so explains in-depth what the mind of a street photographer is like, it helps you fully understand how they work and also it tells you what you need to do and what you need to achieve to be a successful street photographer. 

I think this is a really good book for aspiring street photographers to read because it explains every aspects of the style of photography and it would help them out a hell of a lot, i don't have a bad word to say about this book. 

Tanya Nagar

I couldn't find a lot about Tanya Nagar on the internet so i managed to find a few facts about her in her book.

Tanya in known on the internet as 'Tanya-N' and her website is 'www.tanya-n.com if you wish to go check out her work. Tanya has won numerous awards for her street photography. Her passion for street photography stems from a deep interest in human psychology and culture.

Many say she has a distinctive urban eye, she has the ability to home in to her surroundings to capture the best shots and to notice the slightest thing that you and i many not always notice. 

She has been photographing the streets of London and Mumbai for years. This is what got her noticed and ultimately lead to her work being widely published, and seen BBC and CNN.

The mind of a photographer

The thing Tanya mainly discuss' in this section of the book is 'conquer your fear'. I think this is a good tip to be perfectly honest. I myself have an issue with fear of taking photo's of strangers.

I really like how she break's it down and talks about it in a different way that is easier to understand. Tanya said to think about photography as hunting. That you, the 'street photographer' is the hunter and the 'decisive moment' is like capturing the prey.

She puts it like that because a hunter has no time to hesitate if they want there prey and this is very much the same for a street photographer, you cannot hesitate because you will almost definitely miss the moment you wanted to capture. 

Tanya also in this section advised you to smile. She says as this is simple gesture of kindness it almost instantaneously defuses any hostility between you and any person who is unhappy with you taking photos of them or others. I also thought this was a really good tip because many people just don't know what to do in rather hostile situations.

To sum up

I would highly recommend this book to any aspiring street photographers. It helps you a hell of a lot in understanding it as a form of photography.