Whether you shoot street photography, landscape, or anything in between, it's helpful to remember the acronym DIE. "D" stands for design, "I" is for information, and "E" is for emotion. Henri Cartier-Bresson (if you don't know who HCB is and you're interested in street photography, google him when you're done here) said that all good pictures have a sense of geometry, and this is what is meant by design. Information is important for telling a story, and emotion is imperative for giving information and design impact. It's easy to get one of the three elements in a picture, more difficult to get two, and if you get all three, you've got a real banger, as they say. The DIE concept is just as effective in spotting good pictures after you've pressed the shutter and are editing your contact sheets or digital files. Some of the pictures shown here are stronger in one element or another, but they all exemplify the "DIE" concept to a greater or lesser extent.

Coming from Germany, moving to New York, I opened my eyes, looking into the world close-up and personal, I immediately grabbed a camera and started capturing life in the urban jungle. I adapted to my surroundings and quickly learned to move in closer, to better illustrate the intimacy of the streets and the interactions of people with their environment.