Early morning photography from the streets of San Francisco

But Jensen never considered himself a photographer until he was staring down the barrel of 30, when the myriad images that come from any street in any big city started to press on him. “I realised that photography was a natural extension of skateboarding; both things are about being on the street, soaking in the energy and the vibes, repurposing your environment. I don’t think it’s a coincidence I’m now a photographer.”

He signed up for Instagram in 2011, when it was brand new. He signed up because he was hearing talk, “but at the time there wasn’t any street photography on there”.

“People weren’t using it at that time for serious photography, because it was so new,” he says. He used it, at first, to experiment with photography, to try to find a voice. He did not take it seriously until around a year ago.

“My feed is very organic,” he says. “I’ve never participated in one of those Instagram campaigns, when you see someone go from a thousand followers to 500,000. My following has grown slow and steady, and I get the sense that the people who follow me are interested in what I’m trying to photograph.”

Engagement is important to him: “Photography is a form of show business now, these larger-than-life celebrities, and I think Instagram has created that. Some of these people are my friends in real life, but I always wanted to be accessible. If somebody has a question, I answer it. I tell people: ‘If you’re local, we can meet up. Drop by.’ People trip out that I do that, but my satisfaction as a photographer comes from meeting people in the real world – the handshakes and the hugs and the nods of the head.

“I want to show people how I’m the same person. It’s weird how social media can create this character split. I’ve done it myself; when you meet the person online, you meet a totally different entity. I’m out on the street, talking to people, taking risks, building relationships.”

Tom Seymour

Tom Seymour is an Associate Editor at The Art Newspaper and an Associate Lecturer at London College of Communication. His words have been published in The Guardian, The Observer, The New York Times, Financial Times, Wallpaper* and The Telegraph. He has won Writer of the Year and Specialist Writer of the year on three separate occassions at the PPA Awards for his work with The Royal Photographic Society.