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Paris 1900 in 2003
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MY LOMO AN
ARTICLE ABOUT STREET LOMOGRAPHY
My first contact with Lomo came in 2001 en route to a holiday in San Francisco. Leafing through the Virgin Atlantic duty-free catalog, I saw an item that intrigued me: the Cybershot Lomo Action Sampler. This small plastic camera had four lenses mounted in two rows of two. Its small clockwork motor allowed the user to take a sequence of four time-phased action shots on a single frame of standard 35mm film.
I had a great time in San Francisco with both cameras and, I confess, I got more fun out of the toy camera from Lomo than the digital. The results were not always exactly as planned but after scanning them in and playing around with the editing software on my PC, I was really pleased with the outcome. However, I kept coming back to the little brochure that came with the camera/ Introducing me to www.lomography.com and the Lomo philosophy. Put simply, Lomo is about "shoot don't think". Take pictures because you see an image. Rather than seek to compose something, seek composition in what is already in front of the lens.
Along with the philosophy came a less-than-subtle sales pitch. Buy a Lomo LC-A compact camera from the site and truly enter the world of Lomography. So, what's the connection between the Lomo, Lomography and Street photography? Simple "shoot,. Don't think!" - just take your camera - any camera, any film be it 35mm, 120mm, Digital, SLR or TTL and go out the front door and start taking photographs. Now. Remember, don't compose - seek composition. Great images are out there, just go and find them. The street, any street is a rich treasure trove of great pictures. So - is Lomo about two Austrian students who went to Kiev, bought a camera and discovered a piece of retro design which just happens to have a superb lens and exceptional performance under low light? Is Lomo about the same tow guys who went home to secure distribution rights for the same camera and built a quirky retail web-site to sell the camera and introduce the Lomography philosophy using a neat but of viral marketing. No. It's more. What Lomography does is remind us of what is truly great about our art. Great images don't need to come from high tech, expensive equipment. Take a lo-fi approach. After all, isn't this how Atget and Cartier-Bresson started? Lomo, in it's true sense deconstructs photography down to just two elements, the camera and the photographer. Maybe it means you use more film but with film and development costs so cheap, does that matter? For more on Lomo, check out www.lomography.com or just do a Google search on 'Lomo'. Enjoy PS: I do own two Lomo LC-As (both bought from eBAY) as well as a Holga 120 and a couple of cheap digital cameras plus the original sampler I mention in the article. Visit
Steve's photo website at http://community.webshots.com/user/srcox_uk
Copyright 2002 Marc Voelckel Updates
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Having
returned to photography after a near 20 year absence as a result of a
generous Christmas gift of a digital camera, this little gadget intrigued
me and for €40, I bought it. 
