Charlie “Two Cute Dogs” Kirk – A Documentary

I liked the documentary. He seems like a funny guy and he must have amazing talent to do all of his photos in film. “I don’t respect people that shoot digital”, funniest line of the film. Thanks for sharing Eric!

Good film. Gave me a impression how Charlie is working on the street. Very honest, close to people, and often with a smile. It gives also a good impression of the local culture that seem very open minded against the camera. Makes me want to go to Japan to shoot SP. Other cultures would react differently or could be more reserved. Thanks for sharing this..!

Thanks all. Elliot – I trust them and I’d rather spend time shooting than developing. When I talk about difficulty I am meaning at the taking stage, not the making stage. That said, given that the company I use has now put its prices up quite a lot, I will be developing myself more often going forward. Cheers.

I’m glad he took part in this documentary, I used to think very differently about his mannerisms and his approach as a “Gaijin” shooting the Japanese people, and even his opinions on other people’s photography. But this video opened him up 3 dimensionally and showed that he actually IS pretty respectful and not egocentric as I assumed. I’m glad that has changed for me.

As to him talking about the the people who don’t like him, and even him not liking certain styles. Everyone deserves to have a feelings and opinions about a photograph. But just because you don’t like it, doesn’t mean it should automatically be thrown in the “garbage” section of the brain.
I notice this often in the “old school” style street photographers, if it doesn’t look like their genre and format, then its automatically weak and inferior. But at the same time these modern film street photographers and just trying to make a career out of mimicking the original works of old masters.

I shoot film, but kudos to you new schoolers shooting digital. You’re doing something new, beautiful, and skillful in your own right. But keep an opened mind towards Charlie’s work in the same right, maybe that’ll make him more open to your works. To each his own, but that doesn’t make someone else’s work bad.