Street Photography – Creative Vision Behind the Lens

by Valérie Jardin

This book is another present from my daughter Emz. She obviously thinks that I need some help with my photography.

The author is a well-known X system photographer, Valerie Jardin,  who is variously described as a street photographer, a documentary photographer and also as she calls herself – a narrative photographer. She says in her blog:

Whether my photographs are taken on the streets or at the beach, whether they include people or not, as long as they trigger the imagination of the viewer they qualify as ‘Narrative Photographs’.

Valérie Jardin

I tend to agree with this point of view.

The book, Street Photography – Creative Vision Behind the Lens, is excellent. The book is split into two parts.

Part one is called The fundamentals of street photography which goes into the legality of the genre, how to approach people, composition, light, elements of a strong image and techniques.

The second part of the book is called Photo Walks and Valérie shows some of the excellent pictures that she has taken in various parts of the world. There are some really nice photographs in this book and the writing style is a delight. There is no pushiness, no speaking -down and the conversational way that she talks about her passion feels like you could be sitting and having a coffee with her whilst she tells you about her photographs.

As you can tell I really like this book and it is one I shall return to many times I am sure.