Rick Elkins : Night Vision

There are eight million stories in the naked city, but as Rick Elkins says, “When you’re photographing in New York, you realize those eight million stories have been shot by eighty million photographers.”

Rick’s approach to coming up with something different involves equal parts observation, planning, timing and flexibility. “When I’m walking around, I’m looking at everything and making mental notes,” he says. As an art director (who’s thinking of making the transition to pro photographer), he knows the importance of planning, and many of his photos are the result of previsualizing the shot he wants to get and then figuring out how to make it happen. As for timing, Rick knows that “New York can change completely depending on the hour. Neighborhoods are completely transformed. The financial district, for instance—during the day it’s this beehive of activity; at night it becomes a mysterious, desolate place with a lot of the film noir quality I like in a picture.”

And flexibility? Well, things change in a New York minute, don’t they?

“I can walk out with a picture in my mind,” Rick says. “I may even have sketched it out, but then something else happens. The umbrellas photo—I’d gone out to shoot close-ups of raindrops hitting water. I saw the three women, the light coming through their umbrellas. No way was I going to lose that shot. I really have to be completely open to changing direction.”