The picture that won a camera
On becoming a street photographer
I don’t get out as much as I want to. It’s an artifact of being a dad with two young kids. There is never enough time. My wife and I trade the hours like they are gold because, frankly, time feels more valuable than anything right now.
So when a photowalk in San Francisco on a Saturday popped up on my feed, I had a decision to make: do I cash in some Matt time to go? Or would that time be better spent on an adventure in Point Reyes or a long bike ride? Or just sleep?
I thought camera stores were a dying breed. From the demand side, people are buying everything online and the same generally goes for camera equipment. According to analysis by Mordor Intelligence (yes…they have an eye on the camera industry), more camera units were purchased online than in person for the first time in 2024. Separate analysis from IMARC suggests that lenses are still overwhelmingly purchased in person (which makes sense given their higher variability) though I don’t completely buy it.
All that data aside, brick and mortar camera stores are suffering in the Bay Area. That’s for sure. Several were robbed in rather extravagant acts over the past few years. My local shop in Berkeley, Looking Glass, was the victim of a smash and grab where a vehicle rammed the storefront. Somehow the thieves only made off with $50k in camera gear or the equivalent of six Leicas. Looking Glass closed that location and moved to a safer spot in Berkeley, but many stores have been forced out of business by these multi-pronged threats.
So I was a little surprised when I saw that Camera West was opening a new location on Maiden Lane in San Francisco. Situated within an upscale shopping district, Maiden Lane looks like a typical civic space in a European capital with Hermes and Gucci storefronts nearby and bollards to restrict vehicle activity. This area of San Francisco, the red light district turned upscale shopping zone, has seen its share of struggles of late. It feels like every other window has a FOR LEASE sign. With that background, the shiny, custom-built, two-story glass storefront of CameraWest SF stands out as a downpayment on a recovery that is only just underway.
I’ve been many genres of photographer over my 20 years behind the camera. I started as a photojournalist of sorts in college, shooting for the Tufts Daily and dreaming of international assignments with National Geographic. By the way, one of my contemporaries at Tufts actually did it and her work is incredible: Nicki Sobecki. Then I got into a bit of travel photography…and landscape…and cityscape…and eventually wildlife rekindled my love of photography after a hiatus. But I’ve never been a street photographer. It scared me. What if someone noticed me taking a picture of them?
Berkeley, California has a lot of nice attributes. The lifestyle is chill, there is great produce and good food, the schools are fantastic, the houses are more spacious for a family compared to those across the Bay. There’s a lot to like. But I’ve struggled to feel fulfilled by my environment since moving here three years ago. I grew up in suburbia, but my entire adult life has been spent in cities. Proper cities. Boston, London, Washington DC, Boston again, Baltimore, DC again, Boston again. I came to love the density, the public transit, the bike lanes, the noise, the people watching…and Berkeley, well, Berkeley doesn’t feel like a proper city to me.
I miss the cacophony.
So when December 2025 came around, I made a little pledge to myself. Not quite a resolution, I have avoided those since the birth of my second kid. Only commit to something achievable, I tell myself. I would try to spend more time in San Francisco. Maybe a day every weekend. It wasn’t that far away from Berkeley, after all, and the kids at 6 and 2 were just starting to be old enough that life was getting easier. I would bring the camera, a single lens, maybe two, along with the snacks, water bottles, and diaper bag.
And I would start trying…
s t r e e t p h o t o g r a p h y.
My kids were naturals at it. Wing-kids, they were. We discovered the incredible ferry system from Treasure Island, Richmond, and Alameda into San Francisco. I started taking them on the BART on adventures every weekend. They came to understand that a “dada adventure” meant exploring the city together.
We started to have our routes: Ferry Building to lunch in North Beach to the Washington Square playground. Embarcadero to Chinatown to that park where everyone is playing cards and the skateboarders take over the pedestrian bridge. Sometimes a drive to Tunnel Tops (the greatest playground ever built). A walk along the nooks and crannies of the Bay Trail walk through the buildings along the Embarcadero to Fisherman's Wharf and back.
My right hand holding a camera; my left hand pushing a stroller.
And thus, kids at my side, I was slowly becoming a street photographer.
You could tell that Camera West put some energy into their launch. The night of, they hosted Hasselblad for an exclusive opportunity to try an exclusive piece of gear. They peppered social media with announcements. And, yes, they hosted a competition of sorts. A photowalk and photoslam led by photographer Dave Herring.
Maybe it was just the proximity to March Madness, but the competition rules made me think of a basketball tournament.
Each of the 100 or so photographers could submit one image to the competition. Images would compete head-to-head against each other. One image would win by crowd decree and advance to the next round. Eventually, a winning image would be selected. The top three finishers would receive prizes.
But there was a catch: the images had to be straight-out-of-camera.
SOOC, as it’s known these days, has become a bit of a thing. It has become associated with Fujifilm (a sponsor for the event) whose film simulations enable specific desirable looks right out of the camera. But SOOC has taken on a life of its own too, becoming synonymous with purity, a focus on the craft, a way to signal that one is committed to composition and art and not editing in the digital darkrooms of today.
But for a photo competition, straight out of camera brought with it serious challenges. It meant that the image needed to be perfectly exposed in camera with no highlight or shadow recovery. The colors needed to be as desired, requiring thinking through camera profile settings. And, perhaps most importantly, the composition had to be perfect with no cropping.
Success on a street photography walk is as much about being present and observing as it is about hitting the shutter. The urban environment is a paradox. On the one hand, there are infinite compositions to be had. I believe that one could make a book out of walking any block on any day if they can find their “seeing eye.” But on the other hand, compositions can be hard to find. Shots that feel inspired in the moment appear tired upon review. We’ve all seen that shadow shot…
I am not qualified to speak on what makes a good, canonical street photo, but to me, it has to check all the boxes above and it needs a little oomph. A little tongue-in-cheek, a sense of humor. Irony, or odd juxtaposition. Or just a fantastic action captured in time. It turns out, the final round pitted these two ideas against each other: a special moving moment captured vs an amusing happenstance seen. In both, the special sauce comes from noticing something others might not and documenting it.
I have to plan for these types of outings ahead of time because of the commotion of home. Planning often consists of a few minutes of rapid fire analyses after bedtime. OK, it would be midday in San Francisco. Hmmm, not ideal light. Would it be sunny tomorrow? Yes. That’s unfortunate, that will blow out images. What camera should I bring? Which one has the best SOOC image. Sony or Nikon? I like the Nikon colors more, but I prefer the Sony lenses I own. The same 100 questions I answer every time before I go out. A photographer’s OCD checklist.
My kit of choice fell to Nikon. I put the Nikon Zf in my bag, a street photographer’s dream, alongside two lenses: the Viltrox 85mm f/2 (e mount version adapted to Nikon) and the Nikon 40mm f/2. I worked through the camera settings to make sure they included SOOC jpegs and my profile of choice: one that was gently reminiscent of Kodachrome. Bed.
We all gathered outside 120 Maiden Lane, creating a giddy vibe in the air. It is always fun to connect with photographers. Talk gear. Recount experiences. Take a few photos of each other. After instructions and a review of the photo walk map, we set off through Chinatown and North Beach. We’d be exploring an area I had traveled well on those walks with the kids.
I struggled to get going. I fiddled with my settings. Not in the groove. It was painful. I wanted to produce, but you have to wait for the muse to strike. As we hit Chinatown, I noticed a child’s mobile in a storefront. As it rotated, the light reflected and it made an ever-changing, but repeating shape. Finally, focus. I kept shooting, different angles, trying to get it right. I didn’t, but it was ten minutes well spent.
From then on, the creativity was smooth flowing. A shadow shot. Bubbles backlit. Laundry drying in a window. A face in the crowd. I was able to see the compositions.
After walking a few old blocks with some new acquaintances, I took a detour on Columbus in North Beach. Still the Italian area of San Francisco, this neighborhood has changed a lot over the years. There is friction here with Chinatown creeping in and rents rising. It is still home to dozens of coffee shops and restaurants and al fresco bars. It’s my favorite part of the city. Parklets eat into the street, creating extra seating and making the environment feel like a place for people. It reminds me of the North End in Boston and, ever so slightly, of younger years spent living in Europe.
A flash of light caught my eye.
It was as if I was watching an old, silent film on a slow projector. A man was sitting at a bar, drinking a glass of wine. In my tunnel vision, each car that drove by obstructed my view for a brief moment after which the scene would shift. A sip of wine. Flash. Then the glass was down. Flash. Glasses off, then on. Head in the shadows; head in the light. It was like I was watching someone thumb through a flip book from across four lanes of traffic. Glasses on again. Wait, glasses. Then I saw the 8’ by 4’ panel. An image blown up from the 1952 screening of “Bwana Devil,” the first full-length, color 3-D movie in Hollywood. (Absolutely incredible photo for LIFE by J.R. Eyerma).
Irony, happenstance, a laugh…a photo.
For a moment, I forgot about the competition and took a photo from across the street. It was instinct born from wildlife photography. Get the shot. It would be ok, I could crop in. No, wait, no cropping. SOOC. I had to move. I quick-walked up to an intersection and across the street to the bar, hoping the scene wouldn’t shift.
Immediately, I knew I would have to ask permission. Not so much because it was inappropriate not to, but because it would be so glaringly obvious I was taking his picture. There, standing in front of him, back to the edge of the street constrained by a parklet, there would be no question what I was doing.
So I went up to the gentleman.
“There is a competition, you see, and I think your portrait would be a good submission. Would you mind?”
“Oh, were you that guy across the street?”
“Yeah, that was me. It’s too good a shot, I’ll show you.”
“Sure, why not?”
There was a little bit of a laugh in his response. I couldn’t quite read him. Why me? perhaps. Or OK…sure buddy. It didn’t matter, I was already standing 10 feet away, carefully framing the window, him, and the panel in my composition. Noticing the corners more than I ever would and trying to get everything just right. Adjusting the exposure to avoid blowing the highlights. Bumping the shutter speed to 1/8000th of a second to maintain the wide open f/2 aperture (arguably a risky decision in retrospect).
I got it. Irony. Composition. Colors. Interest.
Competitions with a social angle can be awkward. We all gathered back at Camera West SF after submitting our images. Giddy again. The set-up became obvious. There were two large flatscreens set up. We could see thumbnails of the 98 images submitted. We would be voting, voting on each other’s image. It was like a beauty pageant, except our photos were on the stage.
The images were displayed head-to-head. Laughs, ooh’s, and ahh’s. Irony in pairings and excitement in potential. It’s amazing how much things matter when you have skin in the game. I stood in the back, waiting. My image was towards the end, so I got to see how the dynamics played out first.
Sometimes, there was a clear winner. The voting moved quickly. Sometimes it was more challenging for the crowd. SOOC meant less isolation. Less color drama. Less affect than you might see on instagram these days. The images were RAW in a sense, less refined through edits, but they felt more real as a result. It showcased the challenge that is photography when you peel away the tools we’ve introduced. After every vote, naysayers shared their opinions with each other in snickering undertones.
Then my image came up for the first time. I heard some noises from the crowd. I couldn’t tell if they were good or bad. Were they talking about my image or the competition? The new Garmin on my wrist registered “High Stress.” I turned around and checked out the beautiful leather bags adorning my section of the store. A security guard eyed me carefully. I nodded to try to reassure him that I was looking for distraction, nothing more. One round down. I had advanced.
Round after round, my image came up against some amazing shot. Round after round, my internal monologue kicked in. “They’re oooing at the other photo, surely.” “That other portrait is so good!” “Ooof, I wish I had an easier pairing.”
Round after round, my image advanced. Then it came down to the last pairing.
I went up against Josiah’s image. Josiah is a fantastic guy and a fantastic photographer. The energy was palpable, at least for me. I commiserated with the guy next to me. Whew, this is intense. Josiah’s image and mine reflected those two types of images. His photo was an action-packed moment frozen in time. A black and white focusing attention on a dad and kid crouching on the ground, two pigeons flying in opposite directions out from the center of the frame. My image was tongue-in-cheek. A story of contrast and similarity. A funny happenstance, an irony of time and place that wouldn’t exist in quite the same way ever again.
The debate felt like it went on for an hour, even if it was just 5-10 minutes. I overheard comments but couldn’t quite make them out from my spot in the back. “On the one hand…” It felt close.
When I won, I didn’t know how to react. A crowd of 100 people who had just stood through an hour or more of head-to-head competition knew my photo well after seven rounds but they didn’t know me. I threw my hands in the air, made some funny faces, and tried to process it all. I know it’s just a camera competition, but I had won. Meeting all the amazing photographers from the Bay Area made it feel all the more special. I was up against proper artists, faculty of art colleges, and so many Leica shooters. ;-) I smiled at the guy I had been commiserating with.
“There’s no one I would have rather lost to.”
“Wait, you’re Josiah!?”
I left the store. Got in a Waymo. And took a deep breath.
I guess I am a street photographer now.
Congratulations and I sure can appreciate the musings about camera to carry and where to snap a picture and when to include people, when not. A recent class with Mike's camera challenged me with street photography. I never had even considered it since I spend most of my year on a lake with wildlife, landscape beauty and northern lights. I spent 4 months in San Francisco walking (averaged 5.5-6 miles a day during my time there) from Mission Bay, Portrero Hill, Chinatown, Embarcadero I found some amazing moments and loved every minute of it. My favorite is a bicycle with "wings" I accidentally found on my walk.