I just got back from a 3 week trip to Italy and had one particular photographic goal: to get portraits of people who stood out to me. I purchased a used copy of Nikon's 50mm ais ƒ1.2 lens prior to leaving. From changing the aperture to focusing, it's a fully manual lens. It slows me down and has, when wide open, a very shallow depth of field which is exactly what I am looking for. It stayed glued to my camera for about 90% of my trip.
I took the images below of the only fishermen I saw over the course of my entire trip. I saw these two men from a bridge that crosses the Tiber River in Rome not far from St. Peters. I knew I had to walk down and talk with them, I don't know Italian, and try and get a portrait of one of them if not both. Knowing some Spanish went a long way in talking with these two men.
Portrait of a Fisherman. Tiber River. Rome, Italy.
These two men were fishing for carp and the catching had apparently been slow. Recent rain had caused the Tiber to go brown. They tied off the butt of their rods to a small wooden stake to lessen the odds of a fish taking one of their rods downstream for a ride.
Tools of the trade.
Fisherman. Tiber River. Rome, Italy.