The key photos of this year
2024 is almost concluded. Here I share some photos, some of them unpublished until now, that are important to me and defined my year in a special way.
Before to start, if you are looking for street photography, i recommend you MY BEST STREET SHOTS IN 2024, already published in this blog. Here are some photos that have been significant to me, especially in terms of my career, photos that may not be spectacular but somehow mark a turning point or that have taught me something. Photos that have determined a change in my approach, perhaps, or that simply represent something in this year that is rapidly coming to a close. Because this 2024 has been very important as a professional photographer.
In February I was busy with my Carnival Experience in San Martin Tilcajete, Oaxaca. This photograph speaks to me volumes how a shot made with no preparation, shooting from a car, can resulting in a winning image with a good composition and a sense of the place, documenting the reality there. This photo has also a component of mystery where anything works very good.
3 portraits in San Martin showing that I am essentially a portrait photographer, but a documentary one in the sense that my portraits just like erotic or even certain commercial street fashion photography in my case is linked to real life experience and how certain portraits carry with them a realistic soul and are never ends in themselves. There is always a basis of lived life and this is what makes the difference in my portraying people. And after all the photographers that I consider my references have always had this trait. In San Martin the work was made before anything to be accepted by the small community.
My photos are far from being perfect, but that's not the goal either. You feel that there's some truth, some emotions that permeate the shots.
How many digital photographers do you know who dare to show that much grain? These photos highlight my fearless choice to go one week in a expedition with 2 old digital cameras: Olympus Pen EP5 and EPL2. The idea of a smooth, grain-free photo is something that belongs to the digital age anyway, while photography has always been naturally and beautifully imperfect thanks to grainy photos. And between us, for me there is no difference between film grain and digital grain. The important thing is how much feeling you can record.
Speaking of wonderful imperfection. This photograph highlights the rural environment in which I found myself working in Oaxaca and which allowed me to confront a part of me that has always sought out certain subjects. I documented myself a lot about the colonialist gaze and my commitment is always to avoid that. The anthropological work of certain rites and traditions must be done with a background of respect and through the understanding of the theme addressed as photographers.
The collaboration with Zayda represents a turning point for me as a portrait photographer because I have opened myself up more to experimentation. In that work done in just under two hours I have found several indications on what I want to propose as a portrait photographer, detaching myself from everything and everyone to meet my way of telling.
The purchase of the Canon 5D is a major change that happened during the year. An old camera but considered professional when I always worked with entry level cameras or, at the most, advanced point & shoot. A choice that goes in the direction of my needs to have a certain peace of mind when my clients contract with me. And despite we talk about a cvamera considered the past in 2024, I am really happy with the choice I made because it is a robust and reliable camera. I have to indulge only my photography and not the sirens of the marketing.
From my work on assignment for L’EQUIPE, these photos represent a little sample of what I achieved to do. To stay in the pit with my cameras equipped with normal prime lenses was funny to see for other sport photographers, but the important thing is that I achieved the goal as required by the client. A work focused on the emotions that is my speciality, and not just in the pit, I photographed the cities, the people, the everyday life, the food. And now is already published the work made in Guadalajara in the December issue of France Football magazine.
CONCLUSIONS
This year has been really important, but above all it will be preparatory to what is to come. My consolidation as a professional photographer certainly passes through the recent experience for L'EQUIPE, but it is not only this. The awareness is given by the determination with which I have approached everything in my profession this year. Going against the flow and taking several risks that have paid off. Experimentation has encouraged my pace. Today I am a different, more experienced photographer. And I am sure that brands and new clients will make a great choice if they will decide to hire me. I showed a little bit more this year, but I will improve even more because I know that my grow up is not concluded.
