After this week, I am more settled on what I’d like to do my project on – and so I thought I would research into a candid photographer more.

Pete Souza is one of my favourite photographers, and I have been inspired by his work for many years. I thought that researching his techniques and tips more would help me when putting together my own project as I would love to do mine in a similar style.

This is more research to add inspiration before I 100% settle on what my project will eventually be based on.

 

Pete Souza

Born: 31st December 1954

Nationality: American

 

He graduated from Boston University with a degree in public communication, and later went on to do a master’s degree in journalism and mass communication at Kansas State.

He started his career in the 1970s at the Chanute Tribune and the Hutchinson News. He became a photographer for the Chicago Sun-Times in the early 1980s, and soon served as the Official White House Photographer for President Ronald Reagan from 1983 to 1989.

At the end of Reagan’s administration, Souza stayed in Washington D.C. He was a freelance photographer for National Geographic and Life magazines.

After the 9/11 attacks, he was also one of the first journalists to cover the war in Afghanistan and the fall of Kabul.

In 2004, Souza was asked to take some photographs for a project documenting Barack Obama’s first year as US senator.

He covered Obama’s arrival to the Senate in 2005 and met him for the first time on Obama’s first day in the Senate. He followed Obama on many foreign trips. In the process he became close to Senator Obama, and ended up following his rise to the presidency.

In 2008, he published the bestseller photo-book The Rise of Barack Obama featuring photos he took between 2005 and 2008.

As the Official White House Photographer again, Souza once said that he would produce up to 20,000 pictures a week with Obama’s administration.

In November 2011, Souza was included on The New Republic’s list of Washington’s most-powerful, least-famous people.

As well as high-end cameras for his presidential photography, Souza said he occasionally took shots on his iPhone too.

In Souza’s book Obama: an intimate portrait, Obama said that apart from his family, he spent more time with Pete Souza throughout his presidency than anyone.

 

Some of my favourite shots:

His Style:

• natural colours (post-production editing isn’t obvious or extreme)
• mix of portraits and further-away shots
• mix of subjects – eg. although Obama is the main subject, not always just him as the focus of the shot
• almost always candid

 

What I like:

• My favourite thing is that the shots are all candid – I feel as though I’m seeing the real person. In my opinion, candid shots tell you more about a person or a situation than any portrait can, it’s why the shots are so effective
• I like how he focuses on one broad subject, a person or a situation (like in Afghanistan) – the shots are all different so they’re all interesting in their own way, but pieced together they form a portrayal of an overall event or show the true nature of a person
• Like Mihaela Noroc (see my research here) he uses a mixture of short and long writing to accompany the images. Some are more impactful when you read the context behind it, whereas some need fewer words and are impactful by themself.

 

Inspiration for my own project:

• I could do a similar idea with a person – following a person of interest for a few days and capturing the essence of what they do or who they are. I am inspired by the fact that his candid shots all pieced together show the reader the reality of who that person is
• I definitely want to include a similar style to his written words, by including some long chunks of text, and some images that have only a line or two to accompany them. I also like how his written word is a mixture of quotes from people he has interviewed, and his own words describing the person or what was happening when he was taking the photo

 

Researching Pete Souza’s work has been very exciting and inspirational for me. It’s showed me that I have a real passion for photography and photo-stories, and it has given me even more ideas for my project.

I will be compiling a brain-storming post of some ideas for my final project some time this week – I am particularly excited by a couple of ideas that I have after researching Pete Souza’s work.