Carnaval 2026, San Francisco
Every Memorial Day weekend, the Mission District in San Francisco hosts Carnaval as a massive celebration of the Bay Area's prominent Latino and Caribbean cultures. It’s a joyful recognition and a colorful display of people, their histories, and their valuable contributions to the Bay and the broader American experience. It’s also a great reason to drag my ass into the City with a camera or two and capture some scenes.
The thing I always have to remind myself about making pictures at events like this is that I need to pay more attention to the crowds than to the parade itself. There were a ton of photographers with photos passes buzzing around inside the barrier fences all over the parade route, which basically means that dozens of dudes—they were almost all dudes—got hundreds (or thousands) of photos of the same things. But lack of access (and lack of interest in access) and the desire to convey a different viewpoint means that parade processions aren’t super interesting to me as photographic subject matter.
So while I did nab some passable shots of parade participants, my favorite images from this outing were taken among the throngs of people who showed up to celebrate.
The square images in this photoset were shot with a Hasselblad 501C medium format camera and a Zeiss 80mm f/2.8 lens that I picked up earlier this year. It’s a fantastic machine, producing really nice 6cm x 6cm negatives, but it requires a much slower and more deliberate approach than shooting 35mm or digital, especially in the streets. The results included here are all from the Lowrider portion of the Carnaval Parade—slow moving targets—and, being stuck behind the fence, I tried to shoot with some layering in mind to make things more interesting. I’m still learning when and how to use this camera in the streets, but I had fun with it. These images were made with Kodak Gold 200 film.
The 35mm (not square) photos in this set were made with the Leica MP and Elmarit 28mm f/2.8—which is an especially good lens for shooting in close quarters with lots of people around—on Kodak Gold 200 and UltraMax 400 film.
All color film here, because this event is too much fun for black & white.
