A Twenty-Year Evolution: The Creative Path of Francois Pierre Rannou

In April 2025, I went to Barcelona, and while walking in the small streets, I found this sculpture, and I was impressed by its size and style. Winning this prize is a confirmation of my long efforts in photography and that a lot of people could be inspired by my works.

There were a lot of pictures that I wanted to share, but for this photo, I chose the most simple but also the most impressive.

When I was 7 years old, my mother gave me an old photo camera (Sony floppy disk) and I used it for around 10 years. 

I love landscape and wildlife, because every moment is unique and could never happen again, which I find the uniqueness of it wonderful.

I don't have a huge setup, and I prefer to use the camera on my iPhone, which I find to be the best because it is light and can take fast and wonderful pictures. But if I want to take a picture of a specific moment, I would take my other camera.

I would like to make them feel small or to be immersed in the moment.

There were a lot of people around me (because it is in a popular place), so I waited when there were fewer people to take this photo, and I didn't stay long.

Barcelona was very impressive and each street was a treasure to be discovered.

My biggest inspiration for photography is my mother, because I cannot see her without a camera in her hands.

If you want to participate in a photography award, go for it and don't try to think too much about a picture, sometimes the most simple is the best.

For beginners, I recommend taking a lot of pictures because every time you take a picture, you refine your style and test which style that you like or dislike. But don't work just for yourself, and you must keep the passion, because it is a passion. 

I don't do editing in my images, but I could understand the merit of it. I try to make them the most natural and sometimes too much editing can remove this aspect.

For me, AI is compared to a painting or a drawing, and it has nothing to do with photography. A photograph that waits for hours to take a picture has nothing to compare to AI. A photograph captures the real moment in the picture, while AI takes the unreal moment in the picture. 

I did a lot of AI images, and it is because of them that I was invited to Barcelona, because one of my AI images won a prize, and I was invited to an Art Gallery there. Without AI, I would never have been to Barcelona, would never have taken this picture and would never have participated in this photography award. For me, AI is more like a hobby, and it must be separated from photography.

I would want to go to Japan and maybe see the Bamboo Forest and other places there.