I want to pursue editorial travel photography with a mix of street and documentary.
In mind, when I think of travel photography, I don’t want to limit myself to just the architecture of the place. I also want to grasp the photography of the culture mostly the people! I want to be able to do editorial work with the locals, this may look like actually having them model for my camera. (Something like this: http://www.paperboats.me/article/photos-day-super-yaya)
In cases like this, for those of you who have done travel photography or know about it, how often are locals willing to do things like this? How to build that connection for them to feel comfortable? If so, do you compensate them by giving them the photos you take?
When it comes to the street photography aspect, was there any backlash from that, were locals thrown off? Safety? Etc.
I’ve been looking of possibly doing a trip with an organized organization who does things like this (which wouldn’t be too long term) or I’m thinking of attending a missions school to get accredited and a degree that builds a travel trip inside of the degree program.
I find it slightly confusing what you want to do. Usually photographers who shoot for NGOs are serious documentary photographers and not really wanting to do quirky fashion shoots with the locals. NGO photographers are interested in travel work and that in some way is part of the brief. You seem to want to cover quite a few areas, that in itself isn’t bad (i like the ambition!) but i think you really need to nail down your intentions and aims for any trip.
For sure! I’m definitely going to nail it down a bit more. It’s completely new. I’ve done fashion editorial photography for about a year and want to take that within traveling now.
In my mind I want to: Do editorial travel photography were I take quirky fashion shoots of locals and or doing street photography in the area to get a grasp on the culture. (This would be for my own personal interests)
Then for the financial aspect (because we do still need to live): I plan on opening a non profit to teach my skills to students in these areas that want to learn creativity. It would be photography of course, and my other gifts such as dance and fashion. This would require a 501c3.