What happens when two of the world’s most respected photographers meet the PureView power of the Nokia Lumia 1020? We’re going to find out very soon.
We handed our pocket powerhouse to David Bailey and Bruce Weber, giants of the photography industry, whose images have helped shape modern photography, and set them to capture images of people at work and play on the streets of New York’s Harlem district.
More-used to toting a Leica or a Hasselblad, before the shoot, neither had experience of the Lumia 1020’s imaging capabilities: Weber hadn’t even used a digital camera for work before. But it didn’t take long before they saw the benefits, though:
David Bailey: I have always said the best camera I have is the one I have on me. If I have it on me, it’s great. I always have some kind of image-making machine on me and this makes phone calls as well so I suppose it has the edge. I would be upset if I was the people that make small cameras because you may as well get one of these because it’s an all in one.
Bruce Weber: I don’t do digital and this is the first time I have really gone out in the world and done like a digital sitting but David uses film and digital so it was interesting for both of us to work with the camera … I was impressed with the resolution and the beauty of the colour… Sure, of course I would use this camera again.
Bruce Weber: With the Nokia Lumia 1020 I think its the kind of camera you can go back out on the street and do reportage photos and people are interested in this beautiful little object, you know, and you don’t look like everybody else walking around with a camera and they think it doesn’t look like a cell phone, it doesn’t look like a camera, what is it?
The idea is to get people to be in your pictures to have a curiosity about who they are and who you are and that is why I like this camera.
With the Nokia Lumia 1020 you are running around the streets and you see something you want to capture and it gives you a chance to do it, it gives you a chance to take a picture quickly and have this beautiful little photograph you can take home with you.
David Bailey: If people have these kinds of cameras, it makes it less hard to take pictures…
This Nokia camera helps you capture the moment, which is the most important thing. Even me, you look back five years ago and you see a picture and there is something you have forgot and with this 1020 it’s there. You have got it… you’ve got it.
It makes you re-look at things that you take for granted in a strange sort of way and now everyone is an artist, they all have a camera it is like the new folk art isn’t it – digital photography.
Bailey and Weber will be showing the fruits of their day in Harlem at a photo exhibition at the Nicholls and Clarke building in Shoreditch, London from 13 September.
There will be an exclusive preview of the exhibition for Nokia and Telefonica already on September 12. The Nokia Conversations team will be there and we’ll be sharing some highlights from the show right here on Conversations and look out for more news from the pair later this month.