Kiss of Love

I see some of the virtues of the image already pointed out, but at first glance, I thought the pose was awkward. However, on looking at it, it grows on me. Not least because it avoids some of the cliches of the "madonna and child" form.

Very good documentary image of maternal love of mother for child. Both mother and child appear well fed and enjoying their decisive moment together.

Louis, if you go for a tight cropping, do you not think that what you might lose is what is important for an environmental portrait, the relation of the subjects to their surroundings? For me it is not a studio type of tight portrait of the two, but rather a well seen composition of the mother or grandmother with child in the context of their life (which is quite likely in a Pakistan village), wherein the love for the child is part of her existence there. As JDM says, and which is true for many such simple but very well perceived and composed images, it is a photo that grows on the viewer upon repeated viewings.

Sure Arthur, it would shift the emphasis away from the surround which is why I suggested two potential crops. Really, it's a matter of preference here. For me the power of the image is in the expressions. The surround, to me, is not adding much to the theme - the kiss, maternal love. Not that it doesn't have some interesting textures and perhaps indications of the economic conditions. Simply tightening up the right side border would also improve the scenes strength to my eye a great deal.

The question I ask myself is "does the environment add anything significant to the idea expressed?" Do the door, steps, woman's feet, or baby bottle really say much about the center of interest. It might for some viewers. It might for a more overall documentary application. But the photographer has left us a clue, via the title, of the true point of interest. And I agree.

This crop works better for me better as an documentary, environmental style image. All the original elements are there but with better balance (I think)

This crop I think focuses more on the Kiss. Is one "better" than the other. Not really. Just an exercise.

For me, the image is complete as it is and would suffer from any sort of change. Although the mother and child are the nominal subject, the meaning is predicated on the whole--even the processing of the image works here. The awkward pose, the odd kiss, the surroundings that are worn, dirty and in disrepair--these all work to give us a sense of this place and this woman.

The image is well balanced and the more depressed tonality of the highlights works well as there are not major black holes to distract, just a few areas where we must strain a bit to see.

I didn't look in all of the various categories in Umair's portfolio here, but this one struck me as the odd one. Most of the images seem more staged or maybe more like grab shots if not so. This one seems almost like it was done by someone else, I just didn't see anything else that had the qualities I see here.

I think this image is very successful.

I also think that this photo attracts immediate the eye mainly due to the subject. Looking more carefully I presume this is a cropped image showing the point of interest for the photographer which is the lady and the child and not so much the environment around which in a way it's kind of predictable and probably had nothing serious to offer in the whole of the picture.
That's why I agree with Louis Meluso and his suggestion (crop #1), for a little tighter crop. Black & white works well here emphasizing the surrounding enviroment, not the best as you can imagine, rather than the sentimental feeling of the human figures. I like that contrast and the image in general. Congrats my friend for the P.O.W. Cheers!

It looks staged to me, John A, just like almost all shots in the same folder, although not as obviously staged as THIS ONE.

When one sees such a pattern of obviously staged photos, one has to be skeptical that this was not staged. There is no way to know for sure, of course, but, after viewing Umair's other photos in this folder, it is difficult for me, at least, to believe that this was not a staged photograph.

I have seen more than one reference above to the "decisive moment." There is no "decisive moment" to a staged photo. If it were an authentically spontaneous photo, then I could join the laudatory chorus above, but I have trouble seeing this as a spontaneous photo.

I get the sense that the Elves were probably suckered this week by a master showman, not a gifted street photographer.

--Lannie

<<<" There is no "decisive moment" to a staged photo.>>>

I disagree. Often, the difference between a good staged photo and a bad one is the decisive moment. I'm not one who necessarily emphasizes the decisive moment over many other factors that go into making a photo, but of course staged photos have decisive moments. You don't have complete control over your subject or the expression or that intangible sense of timing just because you're staging something. You still have to be on your toes, observing, participating, looking keenly to see when best to make the photo you want. Expressions change in an instant, and the photographer often has to anticipate when that moment will happen. Often, I have my own staged subjects moving in order to capture a sense of movement, gesture, or life, even when stilled. I have to choose the moment.

_______________________________________

I accept this photo as presented. There may be a bit of clumsiness to it but, in a certain sense, that is endearing here.

There are surely photos where I would react differently depending on whether I thought the photo were staged or more spontaneous. This is not one of them. I don't look at it and wonder if it were posed or not. And if I found out one or the other, it wouldn't really affect me much. Like I say, with some photos it would affect me quite a bit.

(By the way, there is a lot of spontaneity going on in staged photos, just a different kind. I might say that staged photos may mostly not be candid but can certainly be spontaneous or at least have a high threshold of spontaneity.)

Fred, you should have been an attorney. You parse words better than Bill Clinton.

Is the photo about the "decisive moment," and is it "spontaneous"? That depends, I guess, on what the definition of "is" is, to quote old Billy Bob himself.

Henri Cartier Bresson is turning over in his grave if the "decisive moment" can be set up. "Spontaneity" indeed!

--Lannie

Lannie, sorry, I wasn't trying to parse words. I didn't know how much staged shooting you'd done and was trying to explain in what ways the decisive moment applied to staged shooting, at least for me. If you didn't get anything out of my post, so be it.

Umair's photograph is likely to attract attention because it deals with that universal theme of the relationship between mother and child, which presumably is being shown here. The crop suggested by Louis gets to the heart of this relationship and removes those elements that aren't directly associated with the relationship. That has some strengths.

However, the crop removes the open sandals, the clothing worn on the lower part of the woman's body, the concrete steps, and the wooden table-like structure that is obviously in a somewhat degraded condition. All of these are contextual clues that tell me something about this woman and this child. While they may be of secondary importance in the overall frame, they are very important in giving me hints about the culture or socioeconomic surroundings of the mother and child. Without these elements, I feel that the story of this woman and child is less complete.

I've looked through Umair's photographs, and they don't give me any clues as to whether this is a spontaneous photograph or if, instead, Umair stopped here and asked the mother to pick up the child. To me, it doesn't matter. Most of Umair's photographs seem to be of portraits in which the subject was asked to have his/her/their photograph taken. Others are obviously spontaneous, and the subject seems entirely unaware that a photograph is being made. In still others it's difficult to tell. Again, that doesn't matter much to me, and it gives me no clue to the spontaneity factor in this POW (but admittedly I'm not looking very hard).

Bottom line for me is that I think this is a very good photograph of a woman and the bond she has with this child, a bond that is being expressed in a culture very different from my own but which I can nevertheless understand.

Fred, I always enjoy the verbal sparring. Now we have at least opened up the thread to something besides the issue of how great the photo is.

Perhaps I am just getting overly cynical in my old age. You and Stephen are probably right: it really doesn't matter. I just have a little trouble with using HCB's famous phrase if the photo was indeed set up, and I admit that there is no way to know.

All that said, Umair truly is a gifted photographer, and this is indeed a very good photo apart from the issues which I have raised.

--Lannie

Lannie, I really, honestly, and truly didn't mean to verbally spar with you. I thought what you said was worth responding to a perhaps clarifying. Nothing nefarious or contentious. Just an alternate view.

If Umair had taken this photograph just a fraction of a second sooner or a second or so later, it would have been a very different photograph and probably a less effective photograph in showing this woman picking up the child to embrace it. In my mind, Umair caught the perfect moment, whether he saw the scene as he was walking along or even if he had stopped and asked the woman to do this.

Well, Fred, we both know enough about philosophy to know that there are worse things in life than a bit of friendly verbal sparring. What would philosophy be if it were not at times about snipping definitions, and what would criticism be it were not at times philosophy?

--Lannie

<<<Henri Cartier Bresson is turning over in his grave if the "decisive moment" can be set up. >>>

Just to be clear, no one claimed the decisive moment could be set up. The claim was there could be and often is a decisive moment in a staged shot. You set up the shot, not the decisive moment. The decisive moment is seized upon, staged or candid.

When Bresson talks about the decisive moment, he is often talking about it as something unique to photography and he talks about it in terms of the difference between photography and painting. He doesn't seem to me to exclude different genres of photography and doesn't seem to me to limit it to candid or street photography. I imagine he's resting in his grave quite comfortably.

A few quotes from Bresson for consideration:

"There is nothing in this world that does not have a decisive moment"

"To me, photography is the simultaneous recognition, in a fraction of a second, of the significance of an event as well as of a precise organization of forms which give that event its proper expression."

[The above quote is really important and a lot of his writings get to the core that this quote does, which is that the decisive moment is not just about time but about an organization of forms toward an expression.]

"Photography is not like painting. There is a creative fraction of a second when you are taking a picture. Your eye must see a composition or an expression that life itself offers you, and you must know with intuition when to click the camera. That is the moment the photographer is creative."

[He seems concerned with finding something unique about photography as seen in relationship to painting, for example, than in finding something unique about one type of photography vs. another. IMO, one can spend all day staging a photo and still the shutter is clicked in that creative fraction of a second that the photographer has. Your staging still has to offer you that split second chance, that decisive moment.]

This isn't your typical studio portrait you must admit.

And I wouldn't crop anything. It is all necessary context.

Lannie, we don't know if this was the most "decisive moment" or not for this image, but it is simply a very good moment and reveals the subjects in a special if not dramatic way. As for the assumption that most of Umair's images are staged and that downrates the quality of this one, I heartily disagree. A good photographer seeks to capture something of his subject and their life. If you don't see that here, that is fine. But I think he has captured something significant and has composed the image extremely well.

Here is another that is very beautiful, as it displays not only a complicity between two children that is most natural, but also has a central point and interesting centre directed composition that we don't see very often done so well and powerfully so. In this age of staged and manufactured images (publicity, showmanship, commodification, public life) it is nice to see images of simple and honest human interest. Some of the finest so-called "street" photographers of the mid twentieth century knew (Edouard Boubat among others) how to capture that, and their images transcend the ordinary and the staged. This one is of the same approach.

http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=4173601

Sorry, I got a failed upload message on the first of these two posts....

Fred, if we take HCB at his word ("nothing"), then you are most certainly correct. Whether he meant it one way or another, I do not know. It does not matter, I suppose.

There does seem to be something even more wonderfully decisive (to me) about the shot that one captures in an instant on the street, though--which is not to say that I have ever caught any of them.

Arthur, I have never suggested that I do not like setup shots. I do think that my appreciation of a PJ shot would be affected by whether or not it was candid or not, especially if it were presented as candid when it was not. Umair has made no such claim, of course.

The picture is a good picture. My first contention, from the top of the thread, was with what I considered at that point somewhat hyperbolic praise by Alex. Even so, we like what we like, and it speaks to some more strongly than it speaks to me, candid or otherwise. It is sometimes very difficult even to know why a particular photo captures one's soul, such as in the case with Alex and this one. It is a very personal and subjective thing.

--Lannie

Fred, you might be right that this could apply to any type of photography, but I have tended to interpret "a precise organization of forms" as referring not just to any old composition, but to composition captured on the fly. Since I have never read the entire work, however, it really doesn't matter much how I have interpreted it.

In any case, although HBC probably started this conversation, he certainly has not ended it, and we are free to interpret or reinterpret the "decisive moment" as we please. I was using the phrase as I had heard it most used, in the context of candid street photography. I wasn't trying to pull anybody's chain. The internet's a fine and public place, but none I think do there embrace--too much room for miscommunication, too little opportunity to see and interpret body language and other non-verbal cues.

--Lannie

Lannie, I didn't read the entire exchange here between you and Fred, but I think the idea of decisive moment has been way over romanticized. Bresson often set up shots and then waited for something to happen. We don't know if he ever did any direction or not. I watched a video on Winogrand working, another known for his "decisive" moments. He had no issue yelling at his subjects to do this or that. He didn't "set it up" but he interacted with his subjects.

I tend to agree with Fred's first comment on the decisive moment, having spent years working commercially with set up shots and people. There are only a few from each session that really transcend the ordinary shot. The problem, often, is just not recognizing the difference between just another shot and one that moves beyond. I am sure that is what Ansel Adams referred to when he said 12 significant photos a year is a good crop.

I don't know if this image was set up or not. There are a lot of images that in Umair's photo stream that are obviously not set up but this one is the only one with the qualities we see here. None of the "set up" shots (obvious) come close to this one either(again, based on viewing only the thumbnail images). This stands way above all the others IMO.

Too busy. Ther are too many distractions to what the photographer calls "Kiss of Love". I'm drawn to her sandals and poverty. Then what's the piece of big furniture doing there? How does that add to the point? It all distracts from the main point of the photo which is hidden too small in the corner of the photo.