Street Portrait Sabkha

Following on from last Friday's workshop, I wanted to take advantage of the momentum established in collecting portraits, as well as get back to the neighborhood of Sabkha.  I found it wasn't at all difficult to approach strangers here.  Everyone was friendly, even the street girls selling their services (who suddenly became self-conscious when I asked to take a picture).  Perhaps the biggest challenge still is to take more than three or four shots per subject.

Following are some of what I consider some of the more successful shots.

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I worked the crossing below for 10 minutes and took at least two dozen images, but no one would walk close enough - apart from the guy in the red shirt.  On the one hand I was disappointed that he is out of focus.  On the other, it makes it look like he just walked into frame.  The red in his shirt lines up nicely with the red Sham Optic sign, he's fairly middle of the zebra, making a nice bit of symmetry, and there is a nice diagonal line of sight from the HLW sign top left following red shirt's gaze to bottom right. 

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Then there are the shots that didn't turn out.  Here's another view of the same intersection from a different direction.  I like the guys on bikes pulling the viewer's gaze in opposite directions, but otherwise there not much else here.

I loved the Pakistani's beard, but he wouldn't stand in the light, the background was quite bright, and so I had to use flash, which made his skin shiny and the color a bit washed out.  And while I like the mannequin-like look on this Emirati, it also feels stiff and lifeless.  

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