Harsh Light and large crowds
Last week, I decided to head into Manchester to photograph the weekly Palestinian march. Over the previous 39 weeks, I had seen bits of these events and taken a few shots as they passed.
I find photographing these events a bit strange. On one hand, people gather in large groups, bang drums, chant, and want the world to take notice. On the other hand, unfortunately, due to how the world works, people cover their faces to protect their identities. The police were ever-present throughout, filming the crowd from various angles and taking notes. In fact, the week prior, the police decided to react violently towards the people in the march.
I got the information about when and where they were planning to meet from the Manchester Palestine Action Instagram page.
So, on Saturday, June 22nd, I took the tram to St. Peter's Square for 12 pm.
While on the tram, I was setting up my camera, making sure some of the base settings like ISO, white balance, and shutter type were set. I was trying to think about the best way to shoot a large crowd and be respectful of the people there, all while looking at the rare cloudless Manchester sky with a baking summer sun right overhead—not ideal conditions, especially for how I like my images to look.
I normally have my Nikon Z7 in manual mode with the light meter set to matrix mode. As a rule of thumb, I set the aperture and adjust the shutter speed to get the exposure to how I want it. My thinking on this day was that things would happen quickly, and I didn’t want to have to mess around too much with settings. So, I first experimented with shooting in Aperture Priority mode. The first couple of shots like this were terrible. I set the exposure compensation to -1.3 to try and underexpose the image slightly, but that did not help. I thought maybe the contrast between the bright areas and the darker parts (people's clothes, shadows, flags, etc.) was too extreme for that setting. The other light metering setting I like to use is Center Weighted, which basically means the camera assigns the greatest weight of the metering to the center of the shooting display. It still takes some information from the edges but mostly looks at the middle of the image and exposes for that. I thought about using Spot Metering, but again, if I’m focusing on someone in dark clothing, it will blow out the rest of the image, which isn’t what I wanted to do.
After changing the camera back to Manual Mode and taking a couple of test shots of people setting up, I tried my best to see what they looked like on the back of the camera. I thought I was ready to go.
In an ideal world, I’d have every lens known to man and a couple of camera bodies to jump between. A nice wide-angle lens and maybe the classic 24-70mm or 24-120mm for a bit more reach. But I’m not that rich, and I’m waiting for an operation on my back, so just walking around is painful enough. I'm not in a position to carry a bunch of lenses and camera bodies around for any length of time. I have my trusty 50mm f/1.8 Nikkor S Lens, and I love it. It’s small and discrete, super sharp, pretty quick at 1.8, and snaps into focus! As they say, if you want to zoom in, walk closer. This forces me to get in amongst the crowd, which I feel gives a more intimate feel to the images I take. (I would love a 24mm or 35mm lens, so we shall see what the future holds.)
At first, it was a bit daunting taking photos, but pretty much everyone was focused on the people speaking. I find it best to hold my camera by my shoulder so everyone can see I’m taking photos. You tend to be ignored as you’re not skulking around hiding what you’re doing. A few people had their faces covered, and I really wanted to take a few of their pictures. Instead of trying to get candid images, which is normally my go-to, I felt I should get permission since they don’t really know what I’m doing or if I’m working for a company. So, when I made eye contact with them, I gestured with my camera slightly, and most gave me a thumbs up or a nod. I took a few shots, smiled, thanked them, and moved on. I was only asked once not to take someone's photo. I said, "Sure, sorry, no worries," smiled, and walked away, and they said thanks.
All in all, it was a good day. Challenging lighting, a lot of things going on while moving, and trying to get good compositions without getting in the way was interesting!
