"The 'Connected' Age"

Netbooks, notebooks, I-Pads, smart phones, and the like all have

changed the way people in the world lead their lives. Here two

young women react to a chat from far away on wi-fi in a restaurant,

almost oblivious to those around them. Your ratings, critiques and

observations are invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly, very

critically, or wish to make a remark, please submit a helpful and

constructive comment; please share your photographic knowledge to

help improve my photography. Thanks! Enjoy! John

As unlikely as it may seem, this may be one of the defining photos of this generation - the 'connected' generation.

john

John (Crosley)

Excellent capture!

I see my daughter in this picture :-) Since she's got an iPad and an iPhone her life looks more and more like a Sci-Fi movie where connectivity becomes a way of life. Only if our society won't morph into the world described by Isaac Asimov in The Naked Sun. But I digress...

You really captured the quintessence of a generation and its technology!

Very well done!

While pondering my place in photography and how I have gone to a place where the photographer can 'step  back in time' where people live on the street as they once did in the USA and Europe, I also have considered current culture and its new-found dependence on interconnectivity.

That interest and the ubiquity of photos in which people are talking on, using or otherwise employing and/or absorbed in some or another sort of 'device' including cameras/phones and camera phones/computers, etc., engendered in me a decision consciously to try to make some good, emblematic captures of this cultural phenomenon, as it is sea change in developed culture.

I see people without much money for food sporting I-Pods and I-Phones, and also smart phones with apps that do God knows what . . . . and people who might engage in conversation or who might formerly have, now engaged always in conversation with friends on phones.

That has deprived me of much street communication among the better educated and more prosperous people - the poorer ones are not a problem of course.  Chance encounters are somewhat more rare with the higher educated and more social, since they're already 'in touch' with their friends, almost always.

It's a new paradigm.

We'll see if I develop this into a series or not; this is what you say it is, I think.

I'm happy with it.

Glad you are too.

john

John (Crosley)

Very emotional moment!

I know for a fact you have sat within one meter of where I sat to take this photo; it's easy for me to 'see' these things, so maybe I dismiss them.

I just 'see' a movement, then wait for a followup and subsequent times I have my camera/lens combination ready, and sooner or later, the first time is repeated and 'snap', I got it (usually).  It's like poker, people have 'tells' about their future behavior that you can 'bank on' in 'street' shooting.

;~))

Happy holidays.

john

John (Crosley)

This image has been enhanced by removing some blur on one face and uploaded 3-16-2014.

It may take some time to work through Photo.net's servers, and even then if it is in your browser cache, the cache may have to be cleared before it the revised version shows to you as a viewer.

This is one good example why it is best not to 'shoot and delete' when an image that is 'good' but not 'perfect' yet still interesting and a little defective (here the face on the girl, right, is somewhat blurred by her head movement), presents itself.

Adobe has a new feature on Photoshop CC that is called 'shake reduction' or similar, which is meant, I think, to reduce problems from 'camera shake' but works really on taking away blur from parts of any image that are blurred, such as the blur on the face of the girl, right.

If the 'fix' is not yet visible, wait until it works its way through PN's servers, and clear your cache and see the difference; it's remarkable.

Best to shoot, keep and when the software improvement has been made, work it up (or rework it) if it is a promising capture with some technical defect which has become capable of being eliminated -- I saw that at first when I was shooting NEFs (Nikon Electronic Format - raw) captures and there was no good non-proprietary software for working on them, but I shot NEF starting at some time, even though I could not even view them with my software, (along with JPEGs which I worked on), and at one time, Adobe came out with Adobe capture raw, and kept improving it until it works wonderfully, then Adobe keeps adding feature, tweaks, and then also works on Photoshop main program (and allows switching back now to Photoshop Adobe Capture raw for most tweaks in the middle of editing in case you need to use the 'raw' editing features while in the middle of an edit.

Things just keep getting better and better from the editing standpoint - so don't throw away your marginal or somewhat deficient but otherwise interesting or 'good' captures on the chance some day they may be 'saved' to ordinary, viewable or even outstanding stature.

'Shake reduction' is marginal on many captures, but in this case it worked wonderfully, and like 'quick select' tool, which worked marginally to good when introduced, quick select has been greatly refined so it can be used with minimal problems on almost any capture with ease, and I expect 'shake reduction' also will undergo the same refinement.

john

John (Crosley)