Paris!

Second post on “My Mind’s Eye.”  Welcome.
I intend to share some of the stories involved with my images on this site.  How I took them, but not necessarily the technical settings.
Good time and place to start:

We just returned from a spur of the moment trip to Paris!  Our first visit.
Gorgeous city.  Great food.  Friendly people (that’s right…I said friendly people!).  And plenty of historic sites.
I had fun photographing the faces and places on the streets.

Let’s start off with this one, from the Marais District.
We were walking down the street and passed this VERY old synagogue.  And there was a flurry of activity at the door with people going in and out, scurrying across the street into another related building, it appeared.  I realized that the building was full of character and that there was a great cast of interesting people and situations.  So, I planted myself right across the street and set my zoom to “wide angle” which ended up being 24mm.  So, that made me stay very close to the scene.  I stood there for about 10 minutes or so, capturing the people traffic and activity and thought I ended up with some interesting images.
When I looked at the images on the computer, I realized that I succeeded in capturing the girl in this photo looking at the Rabbi while he was oblivious to her.  And I also liked the way the image was divided in half, so to speak, by the post on the sidewalk.  This gave me a feeling of compare/contrast between the two cultures…the young modern girl with her stylish glasses, earphones, trendy shoes, etc. compared to the Rabbi in his traditional garb and plain attire.  She’s carrying a purse and he’s carrying a book.  Etc.  The ancient wall behind them served as a perfect backdrop, I thought.
This photo screamed “black and white” from the start…which adds to the timeless nature.

There were a few more scenes from that spot.  I thought they all “worked” to some degree and captured what I saw and felt.  Here are two samples.

Hope you enjoy this!
Please let me know what you “see” and what you think.  Feel free to leave comments below.  And please share this link with others!
Thanks for stopping by.

And please go to this link to take a look at a bunch more “Faces from Paris” and let me know if there are any other images you’d like me to explain or discuss on these pages!

-Stephen M. Levin
www.stephenmlevinphotos.com
Twitter – @stephen_levin