Tourists at the Louvre – Paris, France

No photographic law states you can’t use a zoom lens for street photography. Though because of history and perhaps convention, many people prefer to use prime lenses — that’s also my preference. People have their favorite focal lengths, from 50mm to 24mm. I started at around 50mm but have used 35mm extensively with the Fujifilm X100S and X100V. More recently, I’ve even dabbled with 24mm which is definitely on the wide side.

When I went to Paris, I brought one lens, a Fujifilm 16-80mm giving a 24mm to 120mm equivalent range. Thus I was forced to use a zoom for everything. However, they do have advantages which you can see here. I noticed these women immersed in their smartphones, surrounded by gorgeous architecture (I hope they were at least posting to Instagram.) I quickly created three images two seconds apart.

None of these photos are at the classic street photography focal lengths, though I think they are composed reasonably well. The first is at 41.5mm equivalent, the second at 81.75mm, and the third at 114.45.

As you will see from my coverage of Paris and Switzerland, I take a lot of photographs. Though I have an advantage, I don’t use a smartphone for photography and don’t feel compelled to share the pictures on Instagram or other social media. It’s so quaint that I have a dedicated device designed specifically for image-making and nothing else.

The online posts of my keepers will have to wait. I made these pictures in September 2022, and only ten months later, I’m sharing them with the world. I’m not a journalist covering breaking news. There’s no hurry to post images ASAP.

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