tomtomtom

<p>You have a full-frame digital camera. If you had another camera, one <em>could</em> argue that the focal length multiplier changes your relationship to your lenses.<br>

But the 5D is fully frame, is awesome, and really, any modern digital camera 6mp or above is completely sufficient for 99% of modern use.<br>

If you want a camera (not an HD movie maker or anything else), the 5D is wonderful and you won't need anything for a long time to come.</p>

The whole problem is the repressed founders of the country, fearful of the human body and rebelling against the excesses of the aristocracy, leaving England and setting up a culture that is STILL suffering from shame about the body, and the very repression of it has set up a culture of titillation and denial, such that even classic figures, sculptures showing a stone breast, for pete's sake, are being censored and covered up! That's just, well, silly and tragic at the same time. Imagine how shocking to them an aesthetic, simple nude photograph. Because the body is dirty, dirty, dirty -- right?

Think of the difference between topless beaches in Europe, and Americans going and leering at those same beaches. The human body just is, and documenting our humanity, what's beautiful, what's truthful, is the job of the artist. See John Coplans' A Body.

We are human. Humans find the aesthetics of humans fascinating. Perhaps if people saw the human body all the time, and weren't told it was wrong, yes, they could actually get past their animal brain, and see it as form and wonder and beauty.

I'm with you there, Zoe. Some people are wound up so tight about the silliest of things. I'm agnostic too, but no need to get into that discussion here. :)

The point of the question is that the human form is obviously going to be the most aesthetic thing to our eyes, because every part of our brain is wired to seek healthy, attractive humans -- whether for survival or procreation.

The perfect human form has resonated since the dawn of humankind, perhaps never so worshipped as in Greek and Roman times, made lovely and romantically real by Renaissance painters, and revisited in the Body Culture of the early twentieth century. A sunset is lovely, but the human form speaks to something deeper in us, on many levels: aesthetic, sexual, geometric, dark-light sensing, tactile, survival-of-the-pack, existentially....

And we shouldn't feel bad about any of them in the least.

The reason for cell phone cameras is quick pix when you don't happen to have a camera with you.

My Treo 600 one sucks, but getting one with 1.3mp or up will at least get you some res.

There are ones with up to 5mp res....

I think denying that Gordin is valid or claiming he is boring for finding a voice is silly.

In music, once an artist finds a "sound", they explore and refine that sound because they are trying to get to a higher place, and spraying buckshot all over the range of possible paths just dilutes their creative power.

That's not to say artists should stagnate. But the moment of finding a voice, even when it is minor, is powerful. And many people will envy or deride others who are trying, with every image, to get into digestible form what is in their mind, their heart, their soul.

Gordin's work reminds me of Robert ParkeHarrison. It allows both contemplation of the image, AND the contemplation of the force of work behind it. The admiration of both the art and the craft of it.

Have you ever seen a painting from a master? I started to tear up when I saw my first Renoir, because it was so astounding that a little jiggle of a paintbrush -- and I could see the stroke right in front of me -- conveyed a flower perfectly. I wasn't prepared for how powerful that was.

So, yes, for critique and appreciation of the image, the process does not matter. But for the full emotional or cerebral impact, the process does matter. We are not robots. We live in the same world, and can take up the same materials. But for true artists, they elevate what they take into their hands and create things we can only stand back and wonder at.

Admire Gordin for really trying to GET at something, and for doing what he does very, very well. You may not like it, but damn if he isn't knocking what he's trying to do out of the park.

Exactly. Points schmoints, it's all about the critiques. People are here trying to help each other hone their self-expression, their art -- and instead of going to where they are plenty of prurient images, they skulk around here, looking like they are serious, but typing with one hand. Grow up, boys.

Anyway, back to the point of the thread, it would be great if there was a Self Portraits category. It is a very different type of photography, different enough to warrant a new category, because the challenges of it, physically and philosophically, are different than any other type of photography. And they'll get lost in the sea of portraiture otherwise.

Other folks can throw out some Speedlite specific setups... Lighting for Portrait, Lighting for Glamour, and Lighting for Still Life have photos with lighting diagrams right next to them. So I assume you could just move them closer a bit to adjust for their size. But those books are invaluable for lighting setups... love 'em!

Really, since that's an unconventional, impromptu setup, I'd just experiment and enjoy.

Well, of course that is possible, but the point being that people taking self-portraits are involved in a different kind of activity, running into different problems, and in a different philosophical space that people taking portraits.

People who have a similar set of problems that are different from other folks, and that all want to talk about them together is the definition of a forum. :)

Well, I just wanted a forum for people to share images and comments about self-portraits, because taking them is a different mindset and a different set of challenges.

Ratings, really, who cares -- it's about improving yourself as a photography and sharing comments with other folks in the community.

I would love to have a Self-Portraits category in the Critique

requests. I'm just starting to try them, and I'd love a nice forum

for all the folks venture to the odd realm where they are IN their

art.