doug_johnson10

Good for you Sam...ignorance is bliss...enjoy your bliss!

I wouldn't. If you go back to my first post, I was posing a hypothetical. Some people can't help themselves, and feel the need to critique when none is asked for. I made my living as an advertising photographer...every shot had the art directors instant critique. Art directors have their vision of what the shot should look like, photographers have theirs, and the clients have theirs...who is right? (Trick question...the correct answer is the guy paying for it!) In the end, all are right, and all are wrong, and none of it really matters. When it comes down to it, if a photographer goes to the trouble of selecting an image that they have taken, that makes the image perfect...wonky horizon, blown out highlights, no detail in the shadows...just the fact that THAT image was chosen make it temporarily perfect. Tomorrow is another day, and it may not be perfect tomorrow...only the photographer that took it could say. I realize that this is an unpopular opinion on this forum, but occasionally, the emperor has no clothes. I'm glad you think all critique is good, all is worth indulging, and all of it makes you feel better about you and your work. In my 50 year career as a photographer, no critique has ever changed anything for determined photographers. The fact that others don't see it your way is just the way it is...that is life!

Oh Sam, projection is one of your finer schoolboy traits! Can't say I ever had any desire to photograph a penis...I have one, so I can look at it at any time.

Did you vote for Trump?

I think that is called "passive/aggressive" behavior...another thing you share with Sam!

Rhetorical questions...if you know what those are, don't really require a response. I think you and Sam are on a similar photographic level, philosophically, and technically...it doesn't surprise me that you enjoy each others work.

That's why I think the photo is weak...he has to explain what it is...that's a fail as far as I'm concerned. The photo should stand on it's own. If you have to explain what it is, and why that speaks to you, then in my opinion, you've failed.

Not trolling (are you?), and I doubt my response is new or unique.

How would I know what the creators vision was? Why would I even care what the creators vision was, even if I could figure that out? Photographs are visuals...if the visuals don't convey the message of the photographer, it's the photographers fault. You can read all kinds of things into photographs...that doesn't mean it's there.

Interesting indeed...did you get to the part where I said "it's a weak photo"? Sam, I have no idea what turns your crank, and don't really care. Other than very pedestrian gay porn, these photos are neither interesting, technically competent, nor indicative of anything other than "adolescent titillation" at best.

So as long as I agree with you, my opinion is valid? Perhaps it's time for you to give yourself a little less credit. I stand by my comment...it's a weak photo

I sense repressed, adolescent titillation...doesn't save the rather weak photo.

I think I am...I've written to the admins on how to delete my profile...seems difficult on this site.

Apparently dick is never very far from an #*%hole.

Mentor?

I posted my question in the "Philosophy" section...we are discussing the philosophy of critique. Sad and heartbreaking indeed....it must have been near fatal for you to switch from film to digital. The world is full of photographers who actually do photography...who take photos every day, and don't need the pat on the head, and the "attaboy" from the adoring spectators.

I need a mentor to tell me.

OR, you can pander in whimsical imaginings, based on make-believe credentials, and pump up your ego by either taking or giving meaningless platitudes to make you feel better/worse about your own work, or theirs. You wrote that...now you should read it.

Unless you are willing to do background checks on anyone that critiques your work, you will never know how valid it is...how much is about your work, and how much is about them.

Good luck with that...but tread carefully Sam When you take on the mantle of "mentor", you embark on a very slippery slope of unintentional misdirection. Don't let your ego get the best of you.

WHY IS IT A SHAME? To look around this world, with all the shit we have been through in the last year, and see no perfection is just heartbreaking. My grandson is perfection, my wife is perfection, my daughter is perfection...to NOT see perfection is a very sad state! A red herring?...there can be no other way but yours...doubly sad. Give me a reason that you would suggest darkening/lightening something in a photo? Who decides whether the reasons are sound? Acceptance doesn't validate the reasoning. So which is it Sam? Doesn't trusted mentor=outside support? If you want to be told how to get better, then "better" indicates a direction away from where you are going on your own...hence a "better" way. Once you go down that road, away from your own instincts, you are lost. Your critiques will help KMAC see more like you, but they won't help KMAC see more like her/himself.

Does that take into account that he/she got a ticket on the way to see your photo, or that they got the news that their father is dying, or that their spouse is having an affair? This is a classic standoff, the perfect example of what I am talking about...nobody is right, and nobody is wrong because nobody can point to which one is which!

It's all around you...what a shame you can't/won't see it.

Shouldn't the artist know it's inevitable success/failure more than anyone else?