If you like street, Check this guy out.....

Thanks for the link Andy,

Thomas is getting a lot of attention lately, specially in the flickr community. He now is an Olympus visionary and I believe Amin got him to hang around mu43 until some trolls rather quickly scared him away with "this vs that" and "that is not street photography" questions.

I like his work. not crazy much, but he works hard and has some incredible shots as well. And like Ray, yes he only shoots two cameras according to him. an EM1 with the O17 and a EM5 with a O45 or viceversa.

thanks for the link!
 
I was following Thomas on 500px but since I rarely go there now, had no idea what he was up to. I mentioned it here .. just once .. whoever it was, panning him on mu43 must have been here also. I've not mentioned him since. I like his work. Glad you found him on flickr, Andy :) Thanks!
 
Thanks for the link Andy,

Thomas is getting a lot of attention lately, specially in the flickr community. He now is an Olympus visionary and I believe Amin got him to hang around mu43 until some trolls rather quickly scared him away with "this vs that" and "that is not street photography" questions.

I like his work. not crazy much, but he works hard and has some incredible shots as well. And like Ray, yes he only shoots two cameras according to him. an EM1 with the O17 and a EM5 with a O45 or viceversa.

thanks for the link!

I saw some shots at 12mm f2.0, so he must have added a lens...

-Ray
 
It's nice to see someone who just does some straight processing for a change. And I'm not saying that to put anyone down who does heavy processing....Lord knows I overdo it, but his just seem very neutral (or maybe natural), and he lets the compositions and images stand on their own. For me to leave them so straight would be an act of bravery...I wonder how many others would be comfortable leaving them so unprocessed?
 
It's nice to see someone who just does some straight processing for a change. And I'm not saying that to put anyone down who does heavy processing....Lord knows I overdo it, but his just seem very neutral (or maybe natural), and he lets the compositions and images stand on their own. For me to leave them so straight would be an act of bravery...I wonder how many others would be comfortable leaving them so unprocessed?

They do work perfectly and I think one reason why it works is because each image has the same processing so it's consistent so he has a style. I would love to do what he does but as you can see in some of the images that some of the people obviously do not want to be photographed. I couldn't handle that! LOL
 
I didn't recall when I saw these photos that this was the same guy who's photos (and videos of him making them) were discussed extensively on mu43 about a year ago. As I said in that thread in a lot more detail, I like some of his shots a lot, and seeing his Flickr page again as a result of THIS thread reminds me of that. My feelings about his techniques and invasion of personal space are a lot more complex than that...

-Ray
 
I didn't recall when I saw these photos that this was the same guy who's photos (and videos of him making them) were discussed extensively on mu43 about a year ago. As I said in that thread in a lot more detail, I like some of his shots a lot, and seeing his Flickr page again as a result of THIS thread reminds me of that. My feelings about his techniques and invasion of personal space are a lot more complex than that...

Yes, I recall that thread well and the ensuing rather ugly turn it took. Like a lot of people I wasn't a fan of his "shove a camera in someone's face and trip the shutter" method either, but he also doesn't use it very often and the best photos in his portfolio were never from that technique anyway. Unfortunately though that technique and the attitude that went along with it rubbed a ton of people the wrong way and appreciation for his excellent photos got somewhat buried in the mix.

I've not checked out Thomas's work recently but I follow him on 500px and did find a number of really great street and travel/documentary type shots in his portfolio that I enjoyed very much. I'm not generally a fan of street photography as a whole, unless the compositions are showing very emotive scenes, or unexpected insight and juxtaposition. Thomas has a knack for nailing scenes with a strong atmosphere - for example the very first shot in his photostream currently ("Tessies"):

Tessies

I also read his free ebook Going Candid, despite the fact that I don't shoot street photos much or have a particular interest in that area. Interesting read and gives a lot more insight into how he works and why.

http://thomas.leuthard.photography/ebooks/
 
yes he uses the 17 1.8 and before that one he used the P20 exclusively. also uses the O45 for most of his portraits and yes he had a few shots with the O12 but not much really. just one or two shots.
 
Thanks for the link Andy,

Thomas is getting a lot of attention lately, specially in the flickr community. He now is an Olympus visionary and I believe Amin got him to hang around mu43 until some trolls rather quickly scared him away with "this vs that" and "that is not street photography" questions.

I like his work. not crazy much, but he works hard and has some incredible shots as well. And like Ray, yes he only shoots two cameras according to him. an EM1 with the O17 and a EM5 with a O45 or viceversa.

thanks for the link!

I was following Thomas on 500px but since I rarely go there now, had no idea what he was up to. I mentioned it here .. just once .. whoever it was, panning him on mu43 must have been here also. I've not mentioned him since. I like his work. Glad you found him on flickr, Andy :) Thanks!

I really like his work. As for negativity, it sounds like someone needs to label themselves and his body of work somehow threatens them. I shoot a lot of architecture. I'd prefer that neither I nor my work gets labeled in that manner. But I note that the Wiki definition of street is: "Street photography is an art photography that features the human condition within public places and does not necessitate the presence of a street or even the urban environment."

So some of my architecture can probably be called street? Ha!

Labels (as in "that isn't this or that") are for people who like boundaries. This normally would not be considered a part of some kind of artistic or even journalistic aesthetic. I am hoping that the more mature and enlightened among us can accept the general idea of a label and why it might exist, and then immediatley push ourselves beyond that boundary. In short, one can live with labels without living within them. In my opinion, we should.

I like very much what Thomas sees. I suspect that he does not limit himself to one vision or label. Perhaps that is what it most threatening to some...

woof!
 
[...]

I like very much what Thomas sees. I suspect that he does not limit himself to one vision or label. Perhaps that is what it most threatening to some...

Nah, it wasn't the "street" label or anything like that. At least in the dust-up at mu-43, it was really his aggressive street portrait technique (example) that ruffled a few feathers and sparked a pretty heavy discussion.

Like I said, that's not where the vast majority of his work comes from (nor are they better shots in my opinion). Thomas himself said that it's not something he uses often and is generally not the way he captures his best work. It's one technique among many.

I love a lot of his work otherwise, and as I said in my earlier comment he truly does capture some great emotive/interesting scenes.
 
Thomas Leuthard is a much better and more considered photographer than his youtube videos would lead you to believe, but he deserves to be called out if he wants to link to those videos as examples of "how to do street photography". The silly thing is that his best work has nothing to do with using that sort of technique.
 
Yeah, many of the newer shots in his Flickr stream do not seem to be from that highly aggressive, almost Gildian, street portrait technique. Which allows me to enjoy it more, either consciously or subconsciously.

And no Woof, it was never that people were threatened by his vision - some people were offended by his technique which he made widely known in a couple of videos he put up of him walking the streets and shooting. He did a lot of serious invasion of personal space, taking a shot directly in someone's face from a distance of inches, maybe a foot, and often leaving his "targets" - his word, not mine - looking stunned and upset. There are a number of street shooters whose technique is invasive enough that, if I'm aware of the technique, I can't look at the photography with as open a mind as I otherwise might. This is of course a slippery slope because many people might find my technique invasive even though I don't. And it's not like people like Thomas or Bruce Gilden (or me) are going to change their technique because some people in photo forums don't like it! So ultimately I'm better off just looking at the art and not being aware of the technique and judging the photographs on their own merits. Which, when I'm able to do it, I find his (and Gilden's) work to be generally really good.

-Ray
 
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