'The Enigma'

Viewed closely, this woman Metro rider, especially her expression, is

an 'enigma' and probably will remain so. 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

This woman neither sees me, nor is she attempting to talk to me.

Camera fired from waist level; my head turned sideways awau from her, subject viewed from the corner of my eye from peripheral vision; she had no idea her image was being captured or she was even being seen by me.

She is NOT communicating with me (at least on a temporal level).

john

John (Crosley)

I see no enigma. Looks to me she is simply yawning. An other possiblity is that she sees the camera pointed at her and the expression is a spotaneous reaction of displeasure at being photographed. Caught her at an unflattering moment. Not nice.

Not a yawn (I could observe her peripherally) and not a sneeze.

She had no idea she was being photographed.

Good try, just wrong result.

You're far too quick based on your own faulty assumptions to jump in with a 'not nice' comment.   Shame on you.

Furthermore, 'flattering' or 'flattery' is not a goal of my photography.  Some of my photographs do flattery, but it is only one consideration among many.

Having viewed many of your earlier photographs of models, I would say that the same applied to many of your signature photos also, if memory serves me well.  I don't recall that any were particularly flattering or that flattery seemed a goal of yours at all.

john

John (Crosley)

John, maybe she's a blind person, she's singing in a subway begging for a daily bread? Happens in eastern Europe. But what would you like to improve - contrast, timing, framing, etc.?

Hi John,

I like the way the three figures have roughly the same form and I like juxtaposition between the woman face-on and the two broad male backs.

Like Meir, I don't really get the impression of "enigma" from the woman in the photo. Perhaps she is an enigma in real life but it doesn't come across to me from the photo. I see a woman wearing a long hijab (if the term's correct) and has her eyes half-closed and mouth open.  Her facial expression in the photo (caught in the moment) could mean anything but yawning or dozing are the immediate associations I get from the photo.

Best wishes,

Mike

PS. Somehow, it doesn't suprise me that she's doesn't communicate or make eye contact. People on public transport rarely do.

No, she's not blind.  She navigated (and obviously could see) without aids.

She is wearing religious garb from what appears to be Russian Orthodox church or perhaps Eastern Orthodox church.

As to what to improve?  I take 'em and ask for critiques, sometimes I have no specific requests other than asking for reactions of others; not every photo is a sure fire winner but this is a critique forum, not a best of the best every time forum.  I do not search every time for highest rates, but for the reaction of my cyberphotographer friends whose opinion means something to me.

And it really does.

I like to experiment and not keep all experiment results private.

Thanks for giving me your impression.

john

John (Crosley)

The spacing you noted and the facial expression are the two reasons this was thrown open for critique; without them it would be occupying space on my hard drives only.

But I like to experiment and sometimes to share my experiments and the 'weirder stuff' like this where it's more ambiguous rather than have all my photos 'tell stories' as I'm told so many do.  Not every photo tells a story; life sometimes is ambiguous and we are the story tellers with our stories to afix to more amorphous and ambiguous photos, provided there is some interest in the photo.

But she's not blind, and the expression is temporary only; it just struck me.

Thanks for your critique; I threw this up mostly without comment as I found it 'interesting' but didn't want to try to explain anything, just to see reactions, which I've found interesting in themselves.

john

John (Crosley)

Darkness comes early, it's cold out (after a warming December with rain and also early January, though I was in the USA for a while).

There's little respite for photography if one does not hit the light of day and one wants to keep photographing after 3:15 or so when the heavy clouds cut off the sun; it'll change soon enough and the sun'll be up to 9:00.

Ninety-five per cent of Kyiv residents take the trains or trains and jitney buses, so if I'm going to photograph them, I have to go where they go.

I photograph to please critices with good taste like you; thanks for the encouraging word.  Not everyone will like this photo; it wasn't meant to be, in its ambiguity, but it's deserving of being looked at.

Thanks for looking and giving me feedback of long experience and great, trusted dedication.

john

John (Crosley)

OK. John, I wouldn't publish that shot with a metal bar coming right from that woman's head, doesn't look attractive. I missed myself many shots with that kind of artifacts, but missed means missed :).

Good name John! That's some expression, but as you say I have no idea what she's thinking. She does kind of look like an apparition hanging from that metal bar. Not sure if that was your intention but it sure works with that expression.

All the best,
Neil

I didn't even see the metal bar, far distance, as you say, coming from her head, but it appears to be so.

Maybe she's a piece of meat hanging there?

Interesting thought?

If I hadn't stopped down, blurriness from shallow depth of field would probably have fixed that, but I was hip shooting and felt I needed a more open depth of field.  Oh well. 

Interesing point.  Also interesting you were the first to point it out - but once pointed out, viewers always remember such things.

Best.

john

John (Crosley)

I don't post every photo as candidate for 'Photo of the Week'.

Some just are worthy of discussion for the varied views; viz. the discussion above with its yeas and nays.

Just the discussion has made it worthwhile.

I also had mixed feelings, but erred in view of the discussion even at the expense of ratings,(and care less about them anyway, or half my portfolio would be missing.  If I wanted, I could have a much smaller portfolio, but still large, of photos scoring 6.0 or higher, but that to me means little.

Score me high or low, but come have a look  (make it an honest score, of course).

;~))

Thanks for weighing in, Neil.

john

John (Crosley)

When you rebuke my comment then you just know you will get some kind of backlash such as the following:

You say, "good try wrong result". I say "don't shoot your photo in the foot". Art (if this is art) is about interpretation -where perception is reality and absolutes go out the window. You see "enigma", I see "yawn" and someone sees, "sneeze" or whatever. There is no "wrong result". You should only be concerned if no one sees 'nutting'.

I'm still betting yawn or sneeze.

I said "not nice" because that is what my mother taught me.

You wrote: "if my memory serves me well". Your memory may serve you well but the way you sometimes see and describe people does not serve you well.

I do not see your way. In what you refer to as my "signature photos", you see a whore and I see a girl who happens to be a prostitute and thinks that modeling is "more fun" (unquote) than fucking a stranger in the back of a truck.

It is not a hijab and with that garb she should be subjected to a strip search at airport security checks.

Anyway, we are having fun with this and that is what counts. Yes?

If nothing else, I've learned one thing . . . . .

You got your model(s) (or kept them) from the backs of trucks, at least sometimes.

I just go out on the street and for nude models I used Internet or newspaper 'help wanted' ads under the 'classified section'.

Maybe that colors your view of women who disrobe for photos; it certainly does mine, as mine generally happened not to come from the backs of trucks or to make their livings off their backs, though I think you have suggested that some of mine do, contrary to my assertions.

My modeling fees have purchased many full semester university tuitions (I don't pay much, but full semester tuition has been very low, and there have been very few competing employers without asking for pornography, which is not what I seek or offer here.)

And I don't contribute to any site other than one serious photographic site which I think you know well -- no sub rosa work. 

What you see displayed here (and occasionally there) is a cross section of my output aside from my telephoto bird and wildlife work, a major part of which was stolen several years ago but NOT backed up as opposed to everything else. 

It was never to be placed on Photo.net; I just hauled around those mammoth teles for my own pleasure because at the time I happened to live near one of the world's top birding and wildlife sites -- less than half an hour's drive away, and kept a trunk full of mammoth Nikkor tele lenses for capturing them (and was a very familiar sight to those who observed the brown pelicans, snowy egrets, sea otters, seals, sea lions, and numerous shorebirds and wading birds that populated that estuary, named by Arthur Frommer one of the ten 'must see' places in California, even though almost no one in California can name it, and which I didn't know had significance until I took up photography again.

You cannot judge where I live by where I photograph, either; please don't forget that.  I just travel for long periods, usually, do a lot of photographing, and keep my legal residence to myself.

And of course, this woman pictured is 'an enigma', not yawning, not sneezing, to which I can attest from personal view (and hearing).

And, I think, it does not really matter what she's doing -- that's really the interesting part of it all -- she's interesting, which is my lead criterion for whether a photo is show worthy. 

Here, the photo speaks for itself, so to 'speak'.  One can speculate, but that's all, and one cannot judge more than express one's personal likes and dislikes.

(I do not always follow the criterion of 'interesting first', of course.)

Interesting comment of yours, it brings back to me a ribald rhyme I remember from the University of Oregon I heard when I was a young student at public school nearby, about members of one sorority doing it in Cadillacs, another in Buicks and Pi Phis doing it in Fords.

Apparently your sorority did it in trucks.  Any particular brand?

Daimler/Mercedes, DAF, or others, or just any old truck, large or small?

Did you regard yourself as the 'rescuer' of your models? 

It's not without possibility I think.

john

John (Crosley)

I like this shot because I know it's hard to take such shots in a place like the subway. And it's hard to take a portrait of people like this woman. This is representative of non-traditional religions. They go to the subway trains to propagate their religion. Recently I was talking on the subway with one of these women, but did not take photos.

Svetlana,

You're a native Ukrainian and a Kyiv resident, and you say you talked to one such woman, and it's a non-traditional religion.

My Russian/Ukrainian is limited at best, and I had assumed she was either Eastern Orthodox or Russian Orthodox, but perhaps I'm wrong.

If so, what sect or religion does she represent.

Please write more and tell us something more of what church she belongs to and how she proselytizes.

Her garb obviously is analogous to that of Roman Catholic 'nuns' - 'sisters' in English or 'schwesters' in German who are 'wedded to Jesus or even to God.

Is she wedded to God or Jesus or something less Christian or even something more nontraditional.

I see Hare Krishna in downtown Kyiv, a sect which drives Vladimir Putin of neighboring Russia absolutely crazy, and in Russia Hare Krishna are criminalized I think but not in Ukraine (yet). 

What does she represent, how does she 'spread the word', 'what word does she spread' or does she collect funds?   

(I didn't see her collecting any funds this ride or talking to people, about religion or anything else).

Inquiring minds want to know Svetlana, and obviously you know more than the rest of us, and some of us are curious. 

Right now she's a 'mystery woman' that I thought I knew something about, but now after what you wrote I feel much less secure about my assumed knowledge of her.

Please enlighten me and us.

Thanks.

john

John (Crosley)

No John, I did not resecue any models. I might try to resecue you but such a chore. I'd not know where to start. 

I spoke very little with this woman. Woman had printed religious sheets. The only thing that I learned about her religion is just what they are baptized with two fingers, not three, as usual Eastern Christians.

I have an eye toward spotting the unusual, it seems, and so, apparently do you.

However, a session reading Wikipedia on Baptism in Eastern Orthodoxy yields no mention of the number of fingers used, nor, for that matter, whta is done with them, in the ceremony.

In Western Christianity baptism, I think the fingers have no use at all.

Thanks for trying to elaborate; however limited your knowledge is.

john

John (Crosley)