Kavala is not a city that is the metropolis of street photography. Since I live here for the last 47 years, I guess I have seen it all. Or so I thought… You see most days, walking in the city feels like a chore. I literally would prefer to iron 10 shirts than to go outside in the same place again for the thousand time, only to be bored to death.
But when it rains…. Well…. that changes everything.
What rain does is transformative.
People walk faster, more people hold umbrellas and wear clothes that add visual interest.
The hooded figure walking head down under the sign, the older man with his particular unhurried stride, the woman whose red umbrella became the only warm tone in an otherwise cold frame are all subjects that are a byproduct of the rain.
And all these people were captured from roughly the same position, within the same hour.
The location did not change. What changed instead was who walked into it, and when, and at what pace. And the thing we need to always remember is that sometimes a scene is static, but the content is not, and our job as photographers is to understand which elements are fixed and which are in flux.
So we can use the static elements to create our frames and composition and then wait for the subject to be at the right place and at the right time.
/And I will leave you with this: maybe you feel like me: your hometown might look boring but give it a chance when it rains and stick to a place where people walk by often.
You will be probably surprised.
