Feature Hunter & Street Photographer

Thanyarat DOKSONE

Personally, I agree with what David LaBelle said in the introduction of the Great Picture Hunt about students’ failure to enterprise. Even though Albert Einstein once said “imagination is more important than knowledge,” I remain convinced that to garner solid basic knowledge would definitely give you a vital stepping stone to great success. Thus, I am very contented with what LaBelle provided in his book, as it gave a thorough prime knowledge about feature photography that could be very useful to a student who is “unsure where to begin.” Frequently found in his writing are thought-provoking ideas from everyday life that photographers and journalism students might have overlooked, e.g. “Good photojournalists are not in love with photography, they are in love with people and with life”. I found the notion was inspiring as I could foresee how obsessive we, journalism students, would be when we get ourselves involved and overwhelmed with skilled shooting practices and a lot of photo techniques. Sometimes those things could set aside what we were supposed to be focusing on. His detailed elaboration on quality of feature hunters and feature photograph were both knowledgeable and easy to understand.

Meanwhile, David Snider chose to be a “street photographer”, waiting patiently to record the priceless moments happening around him. Well-equipped with “Hunter Qualities” skills, he portrayed the lives of passers-by through his exemplary photos. My favorite picture from the Street Pictures collection is the first one from the set taken at the Rockefeller Plaza in New York City. Behind the scene, it shows the “moment” which could be a result of the photographer’s patience. Yet, it yielded a sense of simplicity, action and reaction. The impact from the picture could imprint in the viewers’ memories for a long time. Certainly, it is a classic work both photojournalists and ordinary photographers would like to take once in a lifetime.