Number of images in photo.net galleries

How many photos does it take to display your best work?

 

There are more great photos here on photo.net than any of us can take in, but when I choose to view a complete

gallery and am presented with nearly 1,000 images it really turns me off as far as taking the time to scroll all

the way to the end of the page, let alone view any of them larger.

 

My gallery image count is around 200 and I feel I need to weed out and change some things.

 

I have the Tony Sweet DVD "Visual Music", which was produced when film was still king. In one segment he

addresses slide submissions with students and says something to the effect of "Would YOU want 1,000 slides on

your desk?"

 

I recently sought out a photo.net member's gallery in order to add him to my "Interesting People" list, only to

find that his gallery didn't contain nearly as many images as it had when I first saw it, and they were all great

in my opinion. That's a good thing - it will keep me checking for more images in the future.

 

I realize that it is a subscriber's prerogative to post as many images as they want. But if gallery/image

viewings matter, I think some critical editing would help focus attention on images.

I find it hard to put more than about 20 images into a coherent portfolio.

 

I assume anyone with 1000 images is simply dumping most of what they shoot onto the site for some reason.

 

I'm really not going to wade though 1000 images or even 200 images.

 

I think Ansel Adams said he was very pleased if he made 10 good images each year.

Eric--

 

I agree with you. Generally, unless I am really, really moved by someone's work, if I come across portfolios with more

than a hundred or two photos, I skip them. Like you, I won't wade through that kind of clutter. I find editing my portfolio

periodically is important as a learning tool as well as an organizational one. What I do, because I want to be able to refer

to people's comments made on a photo I'm eliminating, is to put them into a HOLDS folder, which I mark to be

suppressed from view. That way, I save all my no-longer-visible photos but they don't clutter up my portfolio. Anyone

who wants may go to that folder through the folders list on my home page, but it won't be visible through the portfolio

itself. It's a nice little feature.

I also use a pseudo-hidden 'holding" folder so that I don't (by deleting an image) break any links to that image that I might have used in a conversation thread. But weeding out is a GOOD thing. 1000 images? What is this, "RemoteBackupService.net" ?

It's easy to upload images, it's more difficult to edit them. Most of the people I know here don't upload their best work anyway, because they don't want it ripped off.

Somewhere between 30 and 50? It's show business - give them a lot but leave 'em wanting more. Construct a satisfying performance: Only show the best of your best even if it is only a very few.

A lot of it depends on who your intended audience is. For fellow p-netters, a single "best of" folder might be adequate. On the other hand, you might have folders for friends, for family, for regional customers, national customers, editors, fine art for gallery owners, and who knows what else. Then you can direct folks to the material you want them to see by folder. It really becomes very easy to end up with 20 or more folders of 20 each.

I don't use PN to post my best work. I post family snaps mostly here, reasing being the family to view then anything else. I have my own domain and post my best there. Perhaps one day I will just post my best here too...need to find the time...

One of the most common pieces of advice on this forum that I've seen is "Go out and shoot, then shoot some more, practice makes perfect" Advice not to run out and buy lenses or new bodies,not to perfect one image before they take another, but to take lots of pictures. Why tell them to take lots of pictures and then tell them only to display their best work? The whole point of taking a lot of pictures is to improve, and part of that process for some people is to then post those pictures and ask what they did wrong or how can they fix something, and in some cases show off a lovely shot that they got because of all the previous shots they took and improved upon. I've never seen a critique request or forum post that asked that you look at all 200, 500 or 1000 of the photos in their gallery (I'm sure now someone will point one out to me). If someone's critique request or forum post interests you enough to prompt you to check out their gallery, and more than 20-50 images is to many for you to wade through, don't click the "view complete gallery" link.

"If someone's critique request or forum post interests you enough to prompt you to check out their gallery, and more than

20-50 images is to many for you to wade through, don't click the "view complete gallery" link."

 

That's exactly what I do. I just leave.

 

Just because someone takes a lot of pictures and gets helpful feedback on a lot of pictures doesn't mean those pictures

have to stay in their portfolio for several years. One is allowed to shoot a lot, post a lot, learn, delete, and move forward.

"Just because someone takes a lot of pictures and gets helpful feedback on a lot of pictures doesn't mean those

pictures have to stay in their portfolio for several years" - How long is long enough? Several of your photos

are from when you first became a member here. Dose that mean even though they are excellent shots you should

remove them if someone arbitrarily feels you now have to many to go through?

 

"One is allowed to shoot a lot, post a lot, learn, delete, and move forward" Yes, thankfully we are. And many

do. Some at slower rates than others.

 

I'm not necessarily saying large galleries are the way to go for everyone, but as a couple of people stated above

there are many varying uses for photo.net. We should realize other peoples goals are different than our own.

 

I suppose if we want to technically answer the original question the answer would be "1". Only one photo can be

your best work, but it wouldn't be very enjoyable to have to choose just one, or go to members sites that only

had one. You can say 20-50 is enough, for others, that's just getting started.

"Dose that mean even though they are excellent shots you should remove them if someone ARBITRARILY feels you

now have to many to go through?"

 

The key is in CAPS above. Those of us refusing to go through certain portfolios aren't being arbitrary. We are giving

decent reasons for our behavior and preferences. If someone has a decent reason for not going through my portfolio,

then they shouldn't go through it.

 

You've kind of made my point. I've kept "excellent" shots, even older ones, in my portfolio, but still edited out lots of

stuff that wasn't so excellent (even if more recent). I never said that all older shots should be purged from a portfolio. I

said that out of 1000 shots, there are likely a vast quantity that are not excellent and it would do a photographer well to

go through them and get rid of some. I'll stand by that. I see this as a learning site and I think part of the process of

learning is editing. I don't believe the purpose of this site is to post family snapshots or client folders. So anyone who's

doing that is out-of-bounds with regard to the goals of this site. At the same time, if that's what they want to do and the

administrators allow it, it's not my place to make an issue of it. And I don't. I simply don't wade through their photos.

I think it is exceedingly foolish to judge one's talent based on how many or few pictures they place in their portfolio here at PN.

 

Did it ever occur to anyone that people have MANY reasons to post pictures here? For me it's a central place to post family related snaps, and that is all. I post my best work elsewhere. Do I care if that makes others think this way or that way about me? Nope!

 

Lots of control talk in this thread....where is the flexability, the tolarance? I think some of youse guys take this and other like sites way too seriously, and this is no slam on the site, but rather on certain attitudes, to be sure.

 

As to this site, I think it is one of the best places to hang out and talk with other photographers. And to those that use this site to showcase their best, that's great and all the power to them.

ok Eric I spent less than ten minutes looking at your portfolio and I found two pictures that I absolutely LOVED. I identified with them and I loved your WHOLE portfolio.

 

You have it set up really nice and I think you don't have too many pictures for what you have. You have them seperated out into different places that you have been which is good.

 

If you had 150 pictures in one folder I would never look.

 

Since I have lived in Hawaii I looked there and skipped (honestly) over the Mexico stuff a bit faster to go down to the other stuff.

 

I did like to look at your captions and then was frustrated that your captions were not on your bee shot and other stuff (probably before they had captions).

 

I LIKE captions as it tells me something about the picture. You can put your pointer on the picture and know something about the picture.

 

For me as long as a portfolio has a good separation of folders I'm fine with a few more pictures.

 

I do, however, know of people with dial up that can not access LARGE portfolio's.

 

People with over 1000 pictures and stuff.

 

I would also love to see people have "new work" folders.

Dan--

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Here's the mission statement of PN, from the home page:

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"Photo.net is an online community with hundreds of thousands of active members and many more casual viewers

visiting daily. We started in 1993 and strive to be the best <b>peer-to-peer educational system for people who wish to

become better photographers."</b> [emphasis added]

<p><p>

The purpose of the site is not for you to have a storehouse of family snapshots, although the administrators don't seem

to actively discourage that by deleting photos or accounts for such use and I certainly have no objection to your using it

that way or anyone using that way for that matter.

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Please accept the fact that there are those of us who take what we're doing seriously and do use this as a learning and

critiquing site. We have an interest in making the critiquing tool as effective and easy to accomplish as possible. A

conscious and concise portfolio, many of us feel, helps that process and is a good learning tool for those wanting to

learn self-critique and self-organization and growth.

<p><p>

Can you quote the person who "judge[d] one's talent based on how many or few pictures they place in their portfolio"? All

most of us said is that we wouldn't wade through a very large portfolio for critique or other purposes. Chances are, those

using their portfolios as a place to post family snaps aren't here for serious critique anyway, so it wouldn't be an issue. I

was more talking to people like Eric who may be after critique and don't realize how having 1000 photos inhibits other

serious members from really taking a careful look at their stuff and assessing it.

<p><p>

You haven't recognized the difference between trying to be controlling and trying to be helpful. No one really told anyone

what to do. We mainly shared what our own behavior is and why. You may keep 10,000 photos in your portfolio. I was

merely saying I would skip over your portfolio if I came across it. I doubt you would care about that. But if you did care

and wanted to know why you were getting less attention than you thought you should, you would then consider that the

size of your portfolio could be the reason.

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Fairly straightforward and not really intended to be adversarial.

<p><p>

Enjoy!

When I edit my portfolio, I try to leave the images that have the most helpful critiques. They are not necessarily my most favoured ones but they are the ones most useful to others. Unfortunately, critiques aren't what they used to be.