black and white: then to now Dunkin' Donuts (of a sort)

Despite the caption, this man of course is engaged in tire repair

business. This is a study in light and darkness as well as geometric

shapes, as I see it; you may differ. Your ratings and critiques are

invited and most welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically, please

submit a helpful and constructive comment; please share your superior

photographic knowledge to help improve my photography. Thanks!

Enjoy! John

This one is a favorite of mine, though it seems not with raters.

That's the fun of exposing a photo to the ratings system -- one can take a photo that one holds in high esteem, like this one, and raters can try to deflate one's ego, as the five or so raters have shown a strong dislike or at the most judged this photo mediocre.

But I judge it differently.

I judge it by its geometry - the roundness of the cylindrical 'testing tub' with the more complex rectangle-like figure of the man on two long legs and two short arms, holding himself at right angles in two places -- hips and shoulders..

I judge it by its tonalities, which are very good in my opinion.

.

I judge it by its proportions -- its ratios of lights to dark and their relative placement within the photo

I judge it by its surrealness (exactly how and why is that guy seeming to punch that water, anyhow?) Some Western viewers may have little problem in seeing through the mystery of this photo, but others may see some mystery in it; in another time it would have been very mysterious to most viewers.

In any case, for me, it is high art.

It will stay in my portfolio, no matter what the rates, and no matter how popular or unpopular it is with viewers.

I like it and I'm proud of it.

John (Crosley)

Do you have any comments about the photo, constructive or otherwise, Ton?

If members refuse or just don't comment, then they also seem to be 'saying' something, don't you think?

But if you have something to say about the photo, that would be interesting to me, even if it is negative and hopefully 'constructive'.

John (Crosley)

no snideness John, just an observation. I don't think this is the best way to get people to react. I mean, what would be the use anyway. If it's positive they just would confirm what you already think. If it's negative why write at all because at the very least it suggests that you know best which has the nasty habit of scaring most people off and while that may be not intentionally it's at the least the way I read it in this instance. Your choice of course.

As far as ratings go, you know what I think of them. I'm just surprised that you put any meaning to them at all.

About this photo then. I can sure see the humour here, what you call surreal. As such I think it's a good one. But you also stated that you judge it's tonality as good. On that score I don't agree, in my opinion it's too flat and you could get a lot more out of this. You should, it's worth it.

But in reading many of your comments both on my photos and on others, there often is a touch of acidity to them that you may not recognize, for the written word and modes of expression that may seem 'familiar' and 'friendly' sometimes have the unfortunate ability in a neutral environment of being stripped of the friendly smile or the twinkle in the eye that accompanies oral communication, so others cannot always 'feel' the 'true meaning' behind what may be intended as a very good natured remark and mistake it.

As to the issue of my remarking here, there were hardly any rates and no comments, so I felt free to make my own comment; after all, nobody else exercised their right of expression, so I exercised mine. It is not as though I exercised it right away -- I waited several days.

And as to the 'tonalities' I was thinking of the tones from white through black and the full use of the gray scale. Although this photo may need some 'polishing up' in that regard, it is still an example of the use of tones that I'd like to see in more of my photos -- something I've been wrestling with lately, with so many of my photos taken during the early evening after my day's tasks have a break, then back to those self-same tasks until the wee hours and even daybreak once again.

Complicating matters, I suffered a 'head crash' on not one but three drives recently including two of the self-same design by different manufacturers (purportedly) -- those designs just don't stand up to any use. One just fell over sideways and had a head crash -- something that has never happened before in my career, and the original file of this photo is on that drive. I do have this file 'worked up' and saved elsewhere and the next day was going to back up tons of download files (saved on another hard drive which crashed a few days before), and so I'm going to see if my expert can save the data when it gets out of his dust-free chamber, and he gets to rescuing my files.

(At least it's in Ukraine where such services are much cheaper than in Western Europe/USA).

I have a hard time deciding whether during these summer doldrum days when I'm not getting much of my usual viewership on this service, to post good stuff on another service which caters to the more accomplished photographer which has a more specialty and smaller audience (but is growing).

Such a photo would be well appreciated there.

And thanks for the kind word and taking the time to critique the photo (as well as the poster). It's always appreciated.

John (Crosley)

on the tonality, fair enough. Sorry about your drives, anything but fun.

John, I'm not in the habit of putting feathers up people's behind, there is enough of that going around. What you call acidity I prefer to call honesty. I indeed do not mince words, why should I. If people put up their work for critique I tell them what I think whether they like it or not and I tend to do that with respect. Especcialy on the work of accomplished photographers I don't see any reason to hold back. I've told you on different occasions that you where sloppy in your postprocessing. You acknowledged that and explained why that was so what's wrong in that? I only make allowances for those that are just starting out. I invite people to do the same on my work as well. I don't mind a hard critique. But you know as well as I do that a lot of people are just seeking praise.

You told me some time ago that you dealt with professional reviewers. Then you know as well as I do that critiques on a forum like this are just childplay. Besides, most people, by their own admission, seem to like the way I provide critiques..

The worst insult is telling people they've done a good job when in fact they haven't