A man plays the guitar for money to help fix his car on Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Oct. 6. UP photo by Brian Quijada.
Los Angeles, California is the second largest city in the United States with 3.8 million people. The cultural diversity in L.A. is huge, with different types of fashion, religion, races, genders and more.
A street artist makes a sculpture of a girl on Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Oct. 6. UP photo by Brian Quijada.
Street photography has always been my favorite thing to shoot, going out to a populated area and capturing the emotions and moments that are going on around me. I usually shoot street photography in black and white, but L.A. is a colorful city and I wanted to capture that.
On Hollywood Boulevard, I noticed people hustling for money on the Walk of Fame, from selling rides inside of Lamborghinis to Spider-Man and Elsa taking pictures for some change. Artists were drawing portraits or making sculptures, and others were singing and playing instruments. One particular man offered to use stick-on letters to put tourists’ names on one of the stars.
A man sits on the ground cutting up letters to put on stars for tourists on Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Oct. 6. UP photo by Brian Quijada.
Walking the streets of Hollywood, one notices how there’s always something happening. It was street photography heaven. People move fast in L.A., so you have to time to be perfect in order to capture the moment.
The key with something like this is to know when to shoot and what moment to capture. I usually like getting off guard shots of people because that’s what portrays the truth. If I go up to them and ask for a picture then the shot will lose its authenticity.
A street drummer yells as he plays the bucket drums on Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Oct. 6. UP photo by Brian Quijada.
Going to the West coast as a Southern native, one can really see the difference in cultures. The lifestyle in California is calm but fast.
A security guard laughs as a man tells him a story at Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Oct. 6. UP photo by Brian Quijada.
I love shooting the diversity and capturing the different ways of life.
Nowadays, most of what we see online is staged or posed. Street photography is about capturing raw emotion and moments. It is a pure artform. It’s real life in all its beauty.
