Norma Desmond

I've found this, and it can be bizarre, in a minority of cases, but it's too often exaggerated and blown out of proportion for cynical reasons. Art has always, and still does, have the right to be philosophical and politically relevant and more. Many feel that by its nature art is those things, whether obvious or not. On the other hand, the insistence on art's "relevance" can become arrogant and boorish, such as Cartier Bresson was when he said with a complete lack of self awareness: First, he fails to recognize that not every photographer and artist follows the same mission statement and the contemplation of beauty in Adams (whether successful or not) as well as the profound lovingness and intimacy portrayed in most of Weston's work are not qualities to be underestimated. Furthermore, their work with landscapes and the environment, coupled with Adams's activism around National Parks and the environmentalism he's associated with, probably did more in the service of social cause than did Bresson's work. In short, I don't think social, political, and sexual underpinnings of some art on the one hand and contemplative art for beauty's sake on the other need to be mutually exclusive. Also, the resistance to art which addresses social and political matters can be as misguided and bereft of sophistication as the insistence on political relevance and the overdoing of it. And, an insistence on allowing a work to stand on its own or only succeeding by the approbation of the ordinary viewer can be just as myopic as other demands made of art. It seems the case that much art throughout history, and a lot of the better art, was well beyond the approbation of the ordinary viewer. Art's role has often been to push the viewer. It's often resulted in disapproval in its time. It's often changed rather than satisfied existing tastes. And it's often been part of a call to action . . . or not.

Sanford, I suspect something is up . . . again . . . with the system. I’ve been experiencing the old timed error message where I’m locked out of posting to threads for anywhere between 192 seconds and 6 hours. Not to worry. I’m sure things will be temporarily fixed soon before they break down again.

Getting the error message that states “You must wait 192 second before posting again.” The amount of seconds given varies and the time I’m locked out from posting to threads (can use PMs and post to POTW but no regular threads) varies from 5 minutes to about 6 hours. This was happening regularly months ago, took quite some time to “fix”, has happened only occasionally since then, and has happened three times since last week, with a 6-hour lockout on one of those days.

It was a genuine question. I don't understand the purpose or context of the question, really what you're getting at. I asked earlier what you meant by complex and you were honest in saying you weren't sure. I thought providing some context for the question, some practical reason it might have been asked, would help us know what you're talking about, since you seem to be using "complex" in a way none of the rest of us are when it comes to lighting. My bad. _________________________________________________________________________ And . . . if you can pull of melodrama (see any number of Douglas Sirk movies) why not?

Norman, was your bed this morning lit with complex lighting, one side dark, moody, foreboding, and shadowy, the other side warm and sunny? I ask because it seems like you woke up on one particular side of it.

Sure, and hopefully neither is used as a defense against criticism. "Fine art" and "non-representational" may be a license to stray from the origins of an image, but it doesn't mean a viewer must accept the vision as interesting, well done, or even remotely artistic or creative. Could be that. Often it just looks to me like playing around with filters and slider bars willy-nilly in the search for art and the service of kitsch, or worse. That's not my criticism of Tenenbaum's work, which I simply find thoughtful but sterile.

Then why do you think adding the word not to a sentence adds complexity? It, too, changes things in a simple, understood way. More importantly, is this more than a semantical exercise? Is there something your viewpoint is meant to be saying about light and lighting. Are you suggesting that, for example, lighting design is an easier job than sound design and should be worth only half an Academy Award? Is working with light and shadow in a photo easier or automatically less complex than making compositional choices?

I was talking about the difference between shining lights on a subject with no background (just black) and lighting both a subject and a multi-dimensional background (say a nighttime city street) simultaneously. The latter is a more complex task. I don’t know what you mean by “the maths is known.” Are you now telling us that complex means something you don’t know in advance? If the math is known about how one light pointed at a subject is going to differ from five lights pointed at a subject at different angles and intensities (that’s a lot to magically know in advance), that would be a matter of experience, not complexity. The latter is more complex than the former.

BTW, to be clear, I’m not saying I think she should engage in a different kind of architectural photography. Photographers of all kinds specialize and find niches. I’m saying that if you write an article talking about what makes a great architectural photo, it would be more helpful to readers to broaden the discussion beyond just what you, yourself, do. Otherwise, call the article something along the lines of “My Favorite Kind of Architectural Photograph.”

Yes, I think her experience of those being the 3 key factors is limiting. What’s the problem? If someone says to me, “IN MY EXPERIENCE, portraits are simple and include no distracting background” and they said it in an article titled “What Makes A Great Portrait Photograph,” it wouldn’t matter whether or not she qualified it by saying “in my experience,” I’d still think it was skipping over all kinds of great environmental portrait photographs. Saying “in my experience” doesn’t preclude an author from being challenged if a reader thinks that experience seems to be a fairly limiting factor to the point of the article.

The words that stood out to me were: “ . . . there are a few key factors that are necessary . . .” I did translate “necessary” to must. She also says: “. . . need to use the language of geometric lines and shapes . . .” “Need to” also suggested “must.” Again, she starts by saying, “Every person you ask might have a different answer to that question.” [What makes an architectural fine art photo great?] She follows with “However, there are three key factors that are necessary . . .” I took her to be rejecting all the different answers of everyone you ask in favor of her necessary factors. To be fair, she does then go on to say, “Great architectural images often follow these three features,” which can be seen to change the tone a bit.

David, I appreciate your follow up. Since I had made the last post, I thought you were responding to my words and not Tenenbaum’s. That led to my misinterpreting you. Sorry.

Remember, David, it was Tenenbaum who set forth the three features architectural photography MUST adhere to. No one else. Tenenbaum. Consider some of our reactions in that light. I posted the Steichen not because I think it’s the be-all and end-all of how to photograph a building, but because I think it’s a good photo that doesn’t do what Tenenbaum says it should.

Has someone asserted this? Is it OK with you if some people don’t like Tenenbaum’s photos?

I understand what you’re saying and agree that a photo of a building is different from the building and can be looked at differently from the way the building is looked at. Photos and art, however, which are based on real events, people, or things, will diverge in varying degrees from the originals on which they’re based. Some photos, even of the art variety, tend more toward documentary, others more toward fantasy, and lots of places in between. One can shoot a street scene in an attempt to capture the feel and atmosphere of the moment, the zeitgeist, as it were, or just as raw material to create something imaginative and relatively unrelated to whatever the reality was at the time. So, a lot of photography I don’t consider just on its own merits. There are a lot of photos that have important ties to real things where a photographer may want to give the viewer a sense of “what it’s really like” (to whatever extent possible and desired), so I wouldn’t want to divorce photographic art, representational or otherwise, too much from the original source in a lot of cases. Which is not to say it can’t be taken on its own merits in others. This may separate the two a little too much, for me, even though I get what you’re saying. A photo of a building is a photo that has SOME degree (sometimes very minimal if at all, sometimes great) of attachment to the building. I think there can be important overlaps between people and their portraits, buildings and their photos. I think we can want, in some cases, some architecture in our photos of buildings, just like some photos of musicians seem to capture the music. And . . . just as a photographer can shoot a building in innumerable ways, as can a portaitist shoot people, a viewer, especially one who is familiar with the building or person, is entitled to prefer certain renditions over others, and not just based on the merits of the photo but on its fidelity to, or at least its handling of, the subject itself.

Don’t let ‘im fool ya. PapaTango stays cuz o’ me! :):):):eek: [The four emojis are to be read in the rhythm and style of the opening chords to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony (conducted by Herbert von Karajan).]:rolleyes:

Got it. Sorry. Thanks. Here’s a link to her architecture photography portfolio: Architecture

Instead of buying a "real" camera, take real pictures. That's what you'll be looking at when the kids are grown.

If you click on your avatar in the upper right of this page, a drop down menu will appear. Choose "My Account." When you're on your account page, scroll down to email and make sure No Email is checked under Email Alerts. Not everything always works on PN across all platforms and devices, but that's how I got my email notifications of follow-up comments to stop. I believe it will also stop other email notifications you might want, such as when someone newly comments on one of your photos. But I believe, when new activity happens on your portfolio, you'll get a little red dot alert in the upper right of your portfolio or gallery pages with a number inside indicating the new alerts you've received. If you click on that, you'll see the new activity. Because of the clunkiness of the gallery side of the site, I don't use it that much, but this is what I've discovered with a little bit of playing around over the long months since the redesign. Good luck!

Thanks, Michael. Interesting but, to me, disappointing take on the subject. Frankly, "must adhere to the following 3 features:" is a veiled way of saying, "here are my rules." Feature (or rule) 2 talks about "simplifying," getting rid of "unnecessary" details. Well, first, I think that may be oversimplifying the matter, since all architecture is far from simple as is all photography. Lots of both are quite complex. "Keep it simple" may work for AA, but not always for photos or art. Just look at baroque architecture, for example, much of which is dramatic, theatrical, and rich with embellishments and not as simple as some other types of architecture. Can't a photo of a building, too, have high drama and complexity? Who determines what elements are unnecessary? Anyway, looking at her own example, I'd say more than simplifying the original, she sterilized it. Here's a link to a page of her photos: sharon tenenbaum images - Google Search: Talk about processing! Looks more like the sci-fi version of architecture to me, even with fairly simplified compositions. Look at her flatiron building compared, say, to Steichen's. Hers is simple enough, but Steichen's less simple rendering captures much more of its character (importantly, in part, because it captures some of its context which wouldn't always be necessary, of course) and is a more interesting and compelling, atmospheric and response-producing photo. STEICHEN FLATIRON LINK

Presumably, Eastwood meant it to apply to all of us, even the one saying it! But, more importantly, I doubt Ilkka is as thin-skinned as you seem to think he is in needing you to try to stifle my opinion of his photo, Nick. He probably has enough confidence in his own work to know, as I do, that when a photographer shares his work publicly, viewers are naturally going to have opinions about it. Frankly, I don't—and I have a feeling Ilkka might not—think as little of other people's opinions as you and Clint do, Nick. I actually enjoy hearing opinions of my work, especially if they're made in good faith. To each his own, I guess. Over and out.

Nick, you're projecting something onto me I didn't do or say and your sarcasm isn't really helping much since it's just plain silly. I didn't tell Ilkka how to shoot. I told him what his photo looked like to me. It's up to him to care about that or not. The fact that I know sports and many other photographers work under all kinds of restricted conditions doesn't change the fact that a photo looks this way or that to me. If a photo looks like an ad to me, it looks like an ad, even if I know the photographer had no other choice but to shoot it this way. Having shot on the fly enough in my life, I know that my choices can sometimes be rather restricted, but I also know there are things that can be done when cropping or even taking the shot under restrictions that can quite drastically change the character of the eventual photo. Sports photographers, landscape photographers, photojournalists, all balance choices and restrictions with certain decisions they make or intuitive steps they take when shooting.

Or Glenn Palm! :) Responses to questions here can be spotty as well as to direct contacts through email or the CONTACT LINK at the bottom of this page. Best of luck!

Yes! That was my point. The composition and the way the sign was dealt with compositionally, despite the depth of field, made the photo, to me, look like an ad for the product in the sign.

Right. Which doesn’t stop a viewer of the photo from seeing what they see. And, whether through cropping or framing, there’s an intentionality in the way that sign relates so presiely to the corner of the frame that doesn’t simply look like happenstance or accident, whether it was or not.