Critic: Baby picture series

[Uhooru]

"*All* pictures of kids and babies taken with a single, on camera flash *suck*, look like snapshots, deserve our ire, and have the creativity of an empty beer can. Shots one and two for that matter could have been taken with a disposable camera and Max 400 film for all we know."

 

Absoulutely, catagorically, along with *all* pictures of bridges, lighthouses and flowers. Straight to the trash heep!

[stephen_persky]

Barry,

 

I sure hope you are kidding. After seeing Scott's recent rampages, I am not surprised of what he said.

 

Regards,

 

Steve

[bernhard]

Actually I'm with Scott here:

 

The fundamental error here is a very frequent one: Making a picture of something you like and thinking this will always result in a picture others like.

 

Sorry, but these 3 baby pics are not good, in no respect. The 3rd may be a little better but still. And, again sorry, despite (or because) your use of some gizmo B&W conversion utility, tonality in those pics just sucks. I've seen better pics shot on Inferia 400 Xtra Color printed B&W on a strip mall Frontier for a few cents a print.

 

But more important than technicalities, the pics just look like composed by a robot: Cute kid *beep* compose centered *beep* snap away *beep*.

 

There is no way I would hang these anywhere in my house.

 

What these pics are lacking and what you should work on is to give the viewer more than just the info that you got a kid. Produce pics that make the viewer feel what you feel. That's damn hard, but it's worth it.

 

For my take on kids pics see: http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=214974 and http://www.photo.net/photodb/folder?folder_id=229356

 

For basic information about my commenting behaviour see: http://www.photo.net/shared/community-member?user_id=287864

[Karim Ghantous]

Stephen wrote: "the 3rd shot. It was mainly bright window illumination behind my back shining right on the baby."

 

No wonder you like it the best. Not because it was a Leica shot but because of the nice lighting. Scott is correct: on-camera flash is truly woeful (press photographers excepted; they sometimes just have to use it to just get *something*).

 

This is why I pray that Khiem Nguyen and folks like him would just ditch the flash and work with ambient light. If this is done, wonders can be accomplished and their children will look fantastic.

 

Craig, trust you to bring up sepia! :-P

[Robin Smith]

I like the last the best, but I don't think its anything to do with being taken with a Leica - here the baby is engaged with the viewer.