Henri Cartier-Bresson

I’d known of Henri Cartier-Bresson. The father of photojournalistic style shooting. Often mentioned in the same breath as “Leica”, and “the decisive moment”.
Wasn’t until I did a bit more reading up on him today when these words spoke directly to my heart.
“He never photographed with flash, a practice he saw as ‘[i]mpolite…like coming to a concert with a pistol in your hand.’”
There is nothing I hate more than strapping a flash on my camera. When I do, it’s almost insulting. Coming to the admission that my equipment is inadequate for the moment at hand. If I can *see* the subject, why can’t I capture it as is? Why must I announce my presence, and destroy the entire moment with a blinding flash of unnatural white light?
That is what drives me to accquire the fastest primes. The best low-light performers. The challenge of producing pictures from the most miserable conditions. Because then I can capture the scene I saw in my mind’s eye. A flash changes all that, makes it artifical and different.
This Henri dude and I would probably get along just fine!

March 9, 2007 - 5:45 pm
ditto… i’m not even a fan of using flash at all, either. i still need to get myself a fancy prime someday soon. flash just kills the natural tones out of a subject…
March 10, 2007 - 10:12 am
gabe.. then why buy d30 with flash? buy 5d or 1d no flash FTW!!!
March 10, 2007 - 10:45 am
Um.. its 30D.. not D30, and Gabe has a 20D. More QQ needed! :)
March 11, 2007 - 11:07 pm
20D was the hot body that time before a 5D came out…
don’t worry, eventually, i’ll get a hand on those top of the line body + lens in the future…
March 13, 2007 - 3:39 am
agreed.