Nico Baumgarten has a pretty interesting way to build photography reports. This is always a middle way between a pure documentary journalistic approach and a more personal way to shoot pictures. I believe that you’d like to go and check his “blocking the G8” series about the July 2007, G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany.
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YLP: What do you consider your worst weakness in photography?
NB: When I work on a personal project, especially those with a longer conceptual phase preceding the shooting, it happens that I really follow my idea of the story. This can lead to a situation where I struggle to realise that things actually are not as I imagined them to be and consequently do not photograph what’s really going on.
YLP: How you try and correct it?
NB: As I am very committed to documentary photography, I continuously try to reset all my information and ideas about the story I’m doing to zero. Maybe I take a break for a couple of days doing something completely different and then start again. Also I talk a lot with my subjects, I’m excited to hear what they think about the topic and this definitely changes my opinion.
Once I finished a project, I try to compare the idea I had about the topic before, with the one I’m having afterwards. When one really differs from the other, it was probably worthwhile doing the project.