Assignment 2: The first Weekend

The Oktoberfest is now in full flow, starting with the full pomp and ceremony Bavaria is associated with.  All the usual stereotypes were present, oompah bands, leather shorts, huge glasses of beer.  I shot the preparation for the opening parade and then headed to the Wiesn (local name for the fest site) Saturday and Sunday afternoons.  My current plan is to go as often as possible, but not each time spend no more than an hour or two shooting.  This should give me around 20 hours with my subject during the next two weeks, long enough to build a set of images for the assignment.  

I am shooting the fest with my 7D, the odd sheep in my camera family, a rather rash purchase that did not get anywhere near the usage I planned.  I do shoot with crop sensor Canons, but those are the 40Ds I use underwater.  Otherwise I shoot my 5D2 when using a DSLR.  Most recently I have switched to much smaller cameras that can be used unobtrusively in the street.  So why a DSLR now and why the 7D?  First of all the fest is a very much in your face experience, people generally don't care whether you take a picture or not, so a DLSR is fine.  I almost only ever use prime lenses with my smaller mirrorless Samsung system, the zooms are not good optics and very slow.  For the crop sensor Canon I have a 17-55mm f/2.8, permitting rapid response to different scenarios and delivering good quality images.  The 7D is also weather sealed which is valuable not just in case of rain, but also beer.  Finally and with the latter comment in mind, people at the fest get drunk, very drunk.  I need a robust camera, but also one that I can afford to lose if things get really rough.  I do not expect trouble, but I have seen it before and who knows.

This is not, however, about technology.  It is about imagery and documenting a great event through the people who attend.  My goal is to use the fest goers as the background for a study of people relating or interacting with each other.  I have in mind a kind of Rake's Progress, beginning with the joy and fun of the fest, but touching on the human impact of so much drinking.  On the opening Saturday 3 years ago, 790 people needed medical treatment as a result of drinking too much.  There is a German term for what happens when people get caught up in the fun and forget that the beer averages 6% ABV - Bierleichen (Beer Corpses).  I do, however, want to make this a study of the joy of the fest so need to be careful not to dwell too much on the darker side.  After all 6 people we know met each other at the fest and are now married.

I am quite pleased with the start I made, some good photographs that might work, others that are fun but fail to meet the brief.  In fact it is very difficult to not get carried away with the colour and ever changing forms that present to the eye.  I am also now fully committed to colour for this set, especially after the shots I got this weekend and these during the day.  At night it becomes far more vibrant and mad.  I plan to go back a couple of evenings this week around dusk and at least once I need to be there when the tents empty out at the end, it can be quite a sight to see 10's of thousands of severely drunken people trying to remember where they live. 

So where I am I right now.  I started with the preparation for the fest, nice shots, but not really where I am going with this, they are too posed and the interaction is not really there.

However, once at the fest things got better.  This is not a great shot, but it is one of a type that I want to get, young guys having a great drunken day out, roaring and shouting, acting like idiots.

The next shot might make my final cut.  These 5 ladies are clearly waiting for something and the avoidance of eye contact is quite amazing.  The interaction is plainly visible, but it is in a sense a deliberate non-interaction.

Smoking, the ongoing bane of Germany, so healthy in so many ways, this is the German blind spot.

There is also always a good chance for the me shooting you shooting them shot, although in this case a German TV camera crew, the fest has its own TV channel.  Lot's of interviews with the good of the city and very drunk people.

Not everyone does the traditional thing, I liked the colour and attitude of these guys.

Now a couple of shots of people taking a break between beers, first the guys and then the girls.   Pink seems to be this year colour, there always is a colour trend for the Dirndls worn by the younger girls.

This is shot I want to develop.  If possible it is interesting to reference art in my own photographs, this area could develop into a sort of play on Cartier-Bressons famous photograph of the people easting on a sloping river bank.  The second shot then contains the river of humanity.  The interaction element is not so clear, but I might bend the rules a little to add context to the set.

People, 100's of thousands of people, attend the fest every day.  The average is about 500,000 per day, Sunday probably beat that, I have never seen so many people in one place before.  This again is a riff on modern art, almost Jackson Pollock in the spray of colour, but maybe more "Where's Walso"

These girls just had to be photographed, so miserable...

And as I mentioned at the start there is a down side to the drinking, these guys were pretty busy during the day.  There are special facilities to handle the very drunk, they really take good care of people and ensure that they are safe until sober enough to leave.  A tent exists with beds and nursing care for those who cannot make it home.  When I think of the UK and the attitude to alcohol there, this is much more pragamatic.  People drink, at a beer festival they drink too much, some will get very ill, so plan for it and ensure that they survive the experience.