We’ll always photograph Paris
Me, paraphrasing the famous line from the 1942 movie, “Casablanca”
Back in November 2019, I flew to Paris in order to pay a visit to a good friend of mine. By all means, it was a short trip, spanning over, more or less, 72 hours in the French capital (though, seemingly even a lifetime might not suffice to get a full grasp of this city). It goes without saying that the primary objective was to spend some meaningful time with my pal. But who said I couldn’t do some street photography whilst wandering the Parisian streets?
Three favourite French things
Now, when it comes to France in general, there are three things I’m particularly fond of: food (including the wines), history, especially the napoleonic period, and the country’s private international law tradition.
In my November trip to Paris (which was actually my second visit to the city), I enjoyed all three of them. I ate soupe à l’oignon and steak tartare accompanied by a glass of Bordeaux wine at a brasserie, I went to Bonaparte’s final resting place in my favourite military museum in the world, aka Les Invalides, while, on the flight back home I flicked through some arbitration related decisions of the Cour de Cassation (the French Supreme Court). Plus, we had a jolly good time with my friend. All in all, a more than fruitful visit.
Here comes a fourth…
There is however, one more thing, a welcome addition so to speak, which I came to appreciate during this trip, namely the endless photography opportunities that Paris presents itself with. Quite literally, a descent shot awaits at nearly every corner. This time, I was staying at the 15th arrondissement, therefore most of the photos you are about to see were shot there and few more at the Jardins du Trocadéro, on the other side of the river Seine.
I’m going to save you the trouble for finding out yourselves and I shall admit that there is indeed an excessive presence of the Tour Eiffel in many of my photos. Apparently, I couldn’t get enough of the renown Parisian landmark.
The geeky staff
Technically speaking, all of the photos were shot without a tripod, on my Nikon d5600 body, mounting either the Nikon AF-S DX Zoom – Nikkor 55-200 mm f/4-5.6G ED VR or the Nikon AF-P DX Nikkor 10-20 mm f/4.5-5.6G VR. Moreover, the raw files were slightly processed in Adobe Lightroom.
So, without any further ado, here’s the result of 72 hours of street photography in Paris!
























Of course, I understand that there are a ton of other areas to photograph in Paris from Montmartre to the Jardins du Luxembourg. Who said I only intended to photograph Paris once?
As per my personal urban photography rule, all shots were taken with respect to the city of Paris and its people.
Copyright © Anastasis Kardamakis 2020