Only NY: Where are you from?
Allen Ying: I grew up in White Plains, NY, just north of the city, but I guess at this point I've been living within NYC about as long as I lived there, or longer.
How long have you been shooting photos/how did you get in to photography?
Since I was in highschool. At one point I got hurt skating, and a friend had a point-n-shoot camera and an SLR, so I just got into it.
What camera do you prefer to use and why?
It really depends on what I'm shooting. Point-n-shoots, rangefinders, and SLRs can each have different results, and excel in different situations. I've really embraced rangefinder viewfinders lately for the size, especially carrying multiple lenses, and for the viewfinder not going black during exposure. But composing through the lens with SLRs is still very useful, for seeing what the lense sees, and what the out of focus areas will look like, especially at longer focal lengths. It can be kind of unfortunate that the most modern camera technology is only being utilized on new digital cameras. People do like to shoot film with a camera that is not aging in function and for example autofocus ability.
What made you get in to shooting surfing at Rockaway?
I've always loved swimming and the ocean, I would spend a fair amount of time at the beach in the summers, and eventually a friend had a surfboard to mess around on, and we got heavy into surfing. At first I wasn't interested in shooting surfing, but I tend to end up shooting whatever I'm into, and when you see the endless beauty of the beach, day to night, through the seasons, ocean to land to sky, it's hard not to want to shoot some.
Allen Ying: I grew up in White Plains, NY, just north of the city, but I guess at this point I've been living within NYC about as long as I lived there, or longer.
How long have you been shooting photos/how did you get in to photography?
Since I was in highschool. At one point I got hurt skating, and a friend had a point-n-shoot camera and an SLR, so I just got into it.
What camera do you prefer to use and why?
It really depends on what I'm shooting. Point-n-shoots, rangefinders, and SLRs can each have different results, and excel in different situations. I've really embraced rangefinder viewfinders lately for the size, especially carrying multiple lenses, and for the viewfinder not going black during exposure. But composing through the lens with SLRs is still very useful, for seeing what the lense sees, and what the out of focus areas will look like, especially at longer focal lengths. It can be kind of unfortunate that the most modern camera technology is only being utilized on new digital cameras. People do like to shoot film with a camera that is not aging in function and for example autofocus ability.
What made you get in to shooting surfing at Rockaway?
I've always loved swimming and the ocean, I would spend a fair amount of time at the beach in the summers, and eventually a friend had a surfboard to mess around on, and we got heavy into surfing. At first I wasn't interested in shooting surfing, but I tend to end up shooting whatever I'm into, and when you see the endless beauty of the beach, day to night, through the seasons, ocean to land to sky, it's hard not to want to shoot some.
All photos by Allen Ying