#10 Peace!

Top tip: 'Listen to their stories.'

This lady stopped to watch Emil photograph a couple sitting on a kerb. While waiting for the guys to finish off their shoot, we started chatting and she told me all about her life, her stint as an actress, her hippy days in 70s, her memories of the protests she attended, the abusive relationship she was in with a guy she met in a pub nearby and how proud she was when she managed to leave it behind. She was one of a kind! The guys ended up waiting for me while I stood there listening mesmerised by her stories. All of which were directly related to the place we were standing in: Portobello Road.

#3 Straight from Japan

A visitor from Osaka. She was the very first stranger I photographed on my first outing with Emil. A lovely girl with very little English and yet very happy to pose for us. We certainly got along as soon as we started talking designers and clothes. Portobello Market is the perfect place for quirky looking characters.

Not the best photo technically but at the moment of taking it, I was more stressing about the fact that I was taking my first street portrait.

When you take a street portrait, there are a number of the usual things you need to consider: aperture, exposure, natural and strobe lighting, background, pose and obviously the overall composition. However, the major difference is that you usually only get two or three takes before the subject you photograph on the street gets impatient. I started off my photography journey with a self-portrait project meaning I had plenty of opportunities to take, review, attempt to edit, bin, re-shoot, edit, bin again, re-shoot self-portraits. Not so much on the street when photographing strangers though. I tend to keep them busy with a bit of small talk and lots of smiling and it usually pays off but all this takes practice and I still find that when I get the rush of adrenaline photographing a stranger, I still forget to stop and think before pressing the trigger or review the photo once shot. I rush, I know I rush too much.

#2 Sir Alex Ferguson lookalike

That's probably why he asked me if I was going to put his picture on Twitter. I spotted him sitting in a cafe with two other elderly gentlemen on King's Road, quite a well-off area of London. As soon as I saw him take out his pipe, I knew I wanted to shoot him. There's something special about portraits with smoke. He spoke in a very educated manner with upper-class accent. 'I take up photographic exercise myself in my spare time', he said.

B&W

Colour

How did it all get started? I've been doing photography for four years now and have always enjoyed shooting candids and city scenes. A few months back Emil posted an invite on London Strobists on flickr inviting people to join him to shoot street portraits and since I hadn't tried that before I thought I'd give it a go. We headed out to Portobello Market on Saturday, 12th February 2011 and that's how it all began. I enjoy the hunt. I enjoy watching people and going up to them with a smile asking them to pose for me. London is full of fascinating personalities waiting to be photographed.