Madman in Istanbul

I had caught a surreal shot of a madman cheering and applausing while i was

headed to my place...He was so interesting that I had stopped by to take a

photo...What do you think about the composition ? Comments,critiques,ratings

!!! :)))

I won't rate this photo, but I'll pass on some thoughts.

Sometimes we see something or experience something that's so interesting that we think "Oh, if I just had a photograph . . . it would be so wonderful" because what we experienced was so interesting or fascinating.

But a still photogrqaph is just that. It's still and it's hard with a still photograph to capture things that are dynamic.

Surely tilting your camera and making the horizon a diagonal may help, but overexposing your image so it is barely recognizable as a photo surely does not.

And what about this photo tells us this man is a 'madman'. Literally, nothing.

It's a hard lesson to learn, but there's a major difference between cinematography, where sights, sounds and all experience except physical feelings including smell and taste come into play versus the world of the still photograph where you only have the four corners of the photograph (plus caption) to guide you.

I'd say that based on the four corners of this photograph, and even with the caption, you were so overwhelmed by your 'experience' and the thought of photographing it, that you hoped it would translate through the still photograph medium, but regrettably it didn't at all, despite the interesting touch of bisecting the photo with a strong diagonal.

I hope you'll take this as constructive -- I'm just one man and this is just my opinion, but a properly exposed image that tells its own story probably will be much more successful, even if you didn't experience the powerful emotions and feelings I am sure you felt here.

With respect.

John