mikemorrellNL

Not sure whether this answer is what you're looking for,. But if you click on your 'profile photo' at the very top right of your screen, you''ll see (what I consider to be) your 'content page'. The page has 3 tabs: - Activity (i.e. activity by you or related to your content) - Albums (I assume Albums created by you, showing the images in those Albums) - Images posted by you (thumbnail + filname, upload date and nr. of comments)* * If you click on (= open) any image, one of the fields on the right shows the '.category'. I'm not sure, but my guess is that may correspond to the 'member album' to which it has been uploaded. For example 'street'. I could well be wrong about this. Mods please correct any errors in this reply 🙂

My Big Band MD and Jazz Workshop leader. Taken at a concert with his guitar students in July.

@DanJM: Both photos are great IMHO and it is indeed a difficult choice. But the fact that you've asked for feedback here implies that you're not totally convinced that the 2nd photo is the best one. Although the clouds are perhaps slightly more dramatic in the 2nd photo, I strongly suggest that you submit the first photo. IMHO a composition in which subjects are 'entering' a photo' (implying space to move into) are much more interesting than subjects 'exiting' a photo leaving a whole lot of empty space behind them. At least, that's what I've always been taught 😉. I'm not sure how much 'post-processing' leeway you have, but you could of course combine the best of both photos.

I like your 'abstract' composition with the strong diagonal divide between the black & grey bridge (?) and the 'empty' white space. With the cables bridging the two spaces. T.BH. I don't think your photo is displayed at its best in this thread. I was about to comment that there was IMHO too much white space on the right of the photo. Until I clicked on the photo. Then I saw that it was a square photo in which you have a great balance between 'the bridge' on the left and the empty white space on the right. IMHO, it's a well-taken, well-contructed photo. When taking the photo, you obviously gave a lot of thought into how the final photo would look. Congratulations on this! It's a great photo but T.BH. I'm not sure whether ''end of story' is the best title. Leaving aside the obvious 'technical' reasons why the cables extend beyond the bridge, to me the photo evokes associations with 'growth', 'reaching out', etc, It's as if the cables have not been simply truncated far beyond the bridge but that they are in some way 'organinically' reaching out. Anyway, congrats and I hope more people will click on the post to see the 'real photo'.

I don't actively go looking for street shots any more (as I once did). The few street shots I do take (if people catch my eye) I take with my (Samsung) phone. It has primary lens equivalent to 26 mm + a "telelens" equivalent to 29mm and a wide angle lens equivalent to 13mm. Digital zoom in and out from any lens is of course always an option. The software is clever anough to automatically combine ' digital zoom' images from multiple lenses. The main thing I like about using a phone in street photography is that it's much less 'intrusive' than my DSLR. And I always have it with me 🙂. If I have my DSLR with me, I'll sometimes use it for street photography. My 'walk-about' lens is a 24-55mm zoom lens. These days, I mainly shoot portraits and 'events' (both in a 'documentary' style). I.e. photos of people in their working environment and people interacting with each other at an event. I shoot most photos using my 24-55mm lens and add some close-ups shot with my 70-200mm lens.

Hi @kevinhoogers, I've never been to Nashville so (as a European) I like the 'atmosphere' in this photo: the stack of ad signs (center) and the 'Live Music' sign (right). I also really like the reflection of the US flag in the window 'left'. One thing puzzles me: as far as I can tell, the dimensions of this photo (or crop) don't seem to correspond to standard digital camera formats (3:2 or 4:5) or with any standard US photo print sizes that I've able to track down. In terms of composition, there is IMHO some room for cropping top and bottom but not left and right. Whether and where you want to crop depends IMHO on your intended print formar.

FWIW, I personally don't think that there's 'too much sky'. The sky is (for me) perhaps the most attractive element in the photo. I love the way the texture of the clouds gradually changes between (in the photo) the 'upper sky' and the 'lower sky'. I do agree that - even if photographically accurate - the transition between the brighter foreground (lower 30% of the photo) to the much darker mountain range just looks abrupt in the frame of this photo. There may well be mountain formations behind the camera that let through sunlight on the road and block it on the mountains ahead. I think that this is one of those photos where you have to decide between 'photographic accuracy' and (perceived) 'photographic credibility'. As already mentioned, a more gradual transition between the bright foreground and the darker mountain range ahead might not be accurate but might improve the 'perceived credibility'.. The difference between 'light and shadow' (as in this photo) also depends on your light metering and focus at the time. The sky looks fine to me but it could be that the mountain range in the distance came out darker than they appeared to the naked eye.

I think that the basic question is: 'how to make the lion (as a subject) stand out from the background'? - I agree with the 'isolate the lion sentiments'. Not complete isolation, just cropping (or blurring) the tower on the right. The tower (right) is a natural 'visual focal point' due to the perspective and 'leading lines' on the building (left) which draw the eye towards to tower (and away from the lion) - so how to make the lion more of a focal point? My suggestion is to (artificially) create 'depth' by slightly blurring (or reducing sharpness and contrast) the building (left). As if the photo was taken with a wide aperture (f/2.8-5.6) focused on the lion - you could go further and (slightly) increase the sharpness and contrast of the lion against the background Lightroom allows you to make 'virtual copies' of the photo. So you can experiment with the adjustments that make the lion stand out more against (a less sharp) background whil still looking 'natural' Please don't color the lion!

I found @movingfinger's original post (and the article) fascinating. The thread is interesting and I'm sorry I missed it in June when I was away from PN doing other things. I don't want to drag it out, just add a couple of 'contextual' points that I believe are important. The original post (and the thread) seem to me to be primarily about the future potential (stated in 1984) to manipulate digital images and videos within 10 years and the current opportunities for doing so. Particularly w.r.t. news images and videos. A couple of points made in the thread were about (declining) trust in news photos and the importance of editorial guidelines. I think @samstevens' comment about 'who made the photo and for what purpose?' is a good one. My 'contextual' point is that questions about the 'truth' of - and trust in - media is not limited to photos but also extends to print, on-line media, videos, etc. All visual media have been, are and can be (to some extent) manipulated. Usually not by advanced technical manipulation such as 'deep fakes' but simply through the selection of submitted media and 'old school' manipulation such as cropping/video-editing. Ansel Adams is well known for his extensive 'dodging and burning' process in up to 30+ steps to produce his final images of what he had envisioned. Yet his images were regarded as a 'reliable representation' of US landscapes (including Yosemite). Very few - if any - news media outlets can be considered as 'objective' (or 'true'). ome kind of selection/editing process is always at work. Often targeted towards the outlet's primary consumer groups (a subset of the general population). A few media outlets genuinely do their best to be 'neutral', i.e. 'objective'. Media outlets are therefore often classified as 'left-leaning', 'right-leaning' or 'somewhere in the middle' depending on the text, photos and videos that they publish. In this wider context, the question of whether a photo has been (lightly) edited is IMHO is less important than the 'transparency' of the media selection and editing process. Nowadays, 'Digital Awareness' courses emphasize the need to 'critical' of on-line media. For example, can people find reliable corroboration evidence? Can they find the same photos and/or videos via independent websites? Journalists are taught to check multiple (reliable on-line) references in their research. So the watchword is not completely 'distrust' (of everything) but 'criticality' in the sense of 'compare and verify through multiple sources'. We've all seen very different photos/videos of US presidents Biden and ex-president Trump on different media outlets. Some (depending on the outlet) depict an (ex-)president looking 'relaxed, vital and energetic'. Others depict an (ex)-president looking much less 'relaxed, vital or energetic'. Which 'spin' media outlets put on photos and videos, depends IMHO on their political affiliation and on the specific consumer groups they want to appeal to. In this wider context of wider 'media manipulation', the (light) editing of photos is IMHO less important. Coming back to my point about 'Digital Awareness' courses. it's perhaps a sad fact that we all need to be more 'critical' of images, videos and text published digitally or even in print. We have no option than to rely on the integrity and processes of (reliably) published media. That's why I think that @samstevens's comment is important. IMHO, these days, the 'credibility' of an image is not to be found in the 'image content' but in the reputation of the publisher and photo- or videographer.

I've browsed through this thread and TBH, anyone still using Windows 7 (THE support or which ended in 2020) or Windows 8 (THE support for which ended in January 2023) really should (IMHO) upgrade their Windows to at least Windows 10 (and preferably Windows 11). For most users of 'old and no longer supported Windows versions' this will almost certainly involve upgrading or replacing the PC/Laptop 'hardware'. The 'business value' of PC's and Laptops is written off after about 3 years. Maybe, you want to extend the life of your PC/Laptop to 5 years or even longer. Whatever photo-organizing and -editing program(s) you choose mu only tip is that you something that is kept up-to-date.

My very first photos at 'Canon Thursday', please be kind! 1st photo (30 june) a 'Coffee and Music" morning at a local community center. It's not the sharpest photo, but I still like it. Taken with a Canon 6D with a Tamron 24mm - 70mm lens. 2nd photo (9 july) a 'Guitar concert', taken with a Canon 6D and 70mm - 200mm lens.

Thanks for your reply, @paddler4! Good to hear your endorsement of the quality of the mk iv too! Yes, I am looking forward to exploring the 'extra' capabilities and features of the mk iv compared to my trusty 6D. I (voluntarily) publish almost all of my photo's digitally so I'll be interested to see what (if any) difference is visible on-screen. Even if there's no or little visible difference, my impression is that the mk iv is a much better camera then the 6D to use when shooting. FWIW, with the 6D, I've only applied noise reduction if my small final selection of photo's had obvious high ISO noise. Especially on faces and flat surfaces. I don't 'enhance' much in Lightroom. Only slight boosts to 'clarity' and 'vibrance' when I think they add anything to the photo which I always take in a 'neutral' picture style. I have no regrets in buying a second hand 'good as new' mk iv. But - just out of interest - I'll also compare the mk iv with the current 'R' range, some of which I noticed (to my surprise) are also selling second-hand. But I'd already decided that - at my age (67) - I'd pass on getting into new (and for me unknown) technology.. Mike

Hi @Mark Keefer, thanks for your feedback! Good to hear that the mark iv is still your 'go to' camera! I have a Lightroom/Photoshop subscription too though I haven't tried out the AI Noise reduction and enhance features yet. Good tip! I'll contribute to the Canon Photo Thursday when I can 🙂 Mike

I'm not sure whether this is the right sub-forum to post and I'm not sure whether members are interested. If not, please delete! I'm just an amateur/volunteer photographer so I don't need the latest professional camera. I do have a couple of good quality Canon (or Canon-compatible) lenses. I'm definitely not a 'gearhead''. If the gear I have does the (amateur/volunteer) work that I want, then it's fine. I've used a (2nd hand) Canon 6D for many years and it's been absolutely fine. At that time, this was my 'dream' FF upgrade from my previous Canon 40D. A couple of years ago (through my own fault) the main dial on my 6D fell off. The metal bit of the dial still worked and because I almost always use the camera in AP priority, it hasn't been too much of a problem. Whenever I needed to switch to Shutter priority, or manual, I could work out in the viewfinder (using the dials) which shooting mode I was in. But for the last couple of years, I've been thinking about another 'upgrade'. 'Upgrading' to the Canon 6D mk ii didn't - at that time -make much sense to me. So I've now bitten the bullet and bought a 2nd hand Canon 5D mk iv. I must say that the camera and the whole package look as good as new! So I'm delighted with my on-line delivery from a reputable camera shop. I was surprised to discover that the 5D mk iv was released in 2016 - just 4 years after my trusty 6D. It's still advertised as a 'current DSLR' on the Canon websites. No doubt that Canon has since then has shifted its investments and development towards mirrorless. DSLR's are a dying breed. But (as an oldie,) I like DSLRs and I have no motivation to buy a Canon Mirrorless and figure out what adapters I need to use my lenses. Moving from a 6D to a 5D mk iv is pretty much 'plug and play'. I'm sure may of you use a 5D mk iv. Any thoughts? Mike

My 2 cts (again): I suspect that for many 'standardized' product photos for online catalogs, etc. AI will do just fine. Also for 'creating new photos based on existing photos. Or even projecting from them. AI seems pretty good at transposing existing 'photographic styles' to new images. We don't really know - as yet - what kind of images AI is capable of producing. Given that there is a high convergence between many city/landscape/street photo's, we can IMHO expect Ai to come up with similar or enhanced photos based on the vast number of images on the internet. Perhaps the same applies to portraits of famous people. I certainly think that AI is highly capable of 'tweaking' images, either created or based on historical images. My guess is that AI is - or will become - much more powerful than for example, Photoshop. And yet, there has always been some artistic 'rebellion' against technological change. A very small example consists of young photographers and artists who still prefer 'to use analog' and 'instant' cameras rather than the most advanced digital cameras. An artist I personally know recently decided to take a 'bike tour' with a mobile darkroom attached to her bike. She took photos of those she met and developed and printed them in her 'mobile darkroom'. I very much doubt whether AI can get anywhere close to this kind of personal subjectivity in content and style.

I read/watched this article om my BBC News app. The examples are IMHO pretty cruddy but I can see the potential applications to artistic/historical/scientific images where 'how it is now' might be contrasted with AI images of 'how it was then'' or 'how it might be'. Photography - by definition - captures a moment (or moments) in time. As I understand it, AI generated images are capable of recovering 'what has been' from archived images. And also projecting images of 'what might be'. Is this interesting? As far as the past is concerned, many interesting historical images have been digitized, are available on internet tand are probably accessible to any AI program. On the other hand, many interesting photo's have not (yet?) been digitized and are not (yet) accessible via internet and any AI programs. For me, the most interesting thing about AI programs is that they suck in enormous amounts of data and can give us a 'projection' of the future

Hi, I've posted some photos for the 'post-processing challenges' (together with @Glenn McCreery and @tom_r) for more than a year. I've had a 'forced beak' from posting due to first Covid-19 and then a 2-week holiday. TBH, I've gotten out the habit of posting, I've pretty much much exhausted my 'archive' anyway and I have less time these days for post-processing. This is the first time I've visited PN in about 2 months. So I won't be (weekly) posting PP-challenges for the foreseeable future. Perhaps occasionally if there's still enough interest. I'll keep an eye on the forum and if others post - and I have the time - I'll join in. I just want to delete PP challenge (as an obligation) from my weekly agenda. Best wishes, Mike

Haha, I love your sense of humor, Sam! I'm not sure whether the AI vs. non-AI discussion might replace the film vs. digital discussions on PN anytime soon, but I hope - going forward - that it may be a more relevant discussion. I saw - but didn't read/watch - a recent BBC article entitled 'are we living a Matrix-like life?' Unfortunately, I've not (yet) been able to track it down. But given all the current (social and tradtional) media biases and - especially - the continual media ads, I can well imagine that many heavy media consumers are living a 'matrix-like' life. In the sense that their media consumption has big influence on their ambitions: what kind of life they want to lead, what they want to buy, etc

See my response on the thread 'Images created by AI: 2 questions/ My 4 cts. -each to his own (habits, preferences, aversions, opinions) with the emphasis - regarding PN - on opinions - it's always good (and interesting!) to express personal opinions on PN - whether PN-members support opinions (or not), it's worth bearing in mind that PN-membership represents a minuscule percentage of artists and photographers around the world. - As we quitely debate these kinds of questions on PN, the world moves on. Including the advance of AI into pretty much all aspects of our lives. And including the advance of AI into pretty much all aspects of (at least digital) photography.

Great question! In short: a) yes, but with a broader scope b) No, so can't advise; many reviews available on the web though I think that, these days, there definitely should be a (sub-)forum to discuss - and post photos/images that have been created and/or edited with the help of AI. IHMO the scope of the (sub-) forum should be broader than just 'images created by AI-apps' and should also include 'photos/images' . There's probably a fine line between the two categories. As far as I know some 'image creation' AI-apps can take an uploaded photo/image as a starting point. The user can then - using keywords, references, etc. manipulate the image to get the desired result. These apps can also 'generate' images based on keywords, references etc. for further manipulation. So, as far as I know, strictly speaking, only images generated without an uploaded photo/image as input could be considered to be an 'AI- generated image'. The use of AI-apps to manipulatie uploaded photos/images falls IMHO in the category (advanced) 'postprocessing'. I personally believe that there's a more important reason to discuss and post examples of photos/images created with the help of AI-apps. The two main reasons for this are: - AI-based functions are increasingly becoming available in (broadly) post-processing apps. Just taking one (Photoshop, which I use) as an example, AI-based functions and plug-ins are regularly added to the range of options with which users can manipulate images. And yet Photoshop is still regarded as a 'traditional post-processing' app. - new - supposedly AI-based apps and plugins - are springing up that, according to the blurb, drastically reduce the time spent on manual 'post-processing' of photos So IMHO, the application of rapidly developing AI to photography/imaging is not only relevant to (autonomously) creating images but also to the way we post-process photos/images. There's a common Dutch expression that roughly translates as "why should I care, I’m happy with what I have". This expression probably applies to many PN members. Still, for those of us interested in what the future of photography/imaging might hold, An AI-based (sub-forum) would be a great place to exchange views, experience, tips, etc. In any case (IMHO) a better alternative to the current situation in which seemingly unrelated threads are posted.

Let's have fun while we learn (and show) how we use our imagination, creativity and skills in post-processing. There are no rules or guidelines: your post-processed images can be 'adjustments' that you think improve the image or 'wildly creative' interpretations. Entirely up to you. Please summarize your PP so we can all learn from each other. This is my own (legal) photo taken in 2013 of a work by the artist Andrei Filippov entitled "The Last Supper" (1989). It was exhibited at the Dutch 'Museum by the Sea' in 2013.

@michael_kucinich, Hi, I'm sorry but I'm very late to this party. I missed your request the first time around and I saw your recent response to @dcstep. I like your idea for- and your composition of - the photo. In general, I think it's turned out fine! The only improvement I can suggest is that I would have liked to see a bit more 'crispness' (= sharpness) in the first 2 or 3 milkweeds in the foreground, In the critique forum, I'm occasionally curious about the shooting settings. In this case, I wondered about the sharpness in the foreground. So I hope you don't mind, but I downloaded a copy of the photo to look at the Exif data. As always, I immediately delete any downloaded copies! From the Exif data, I see that photo was taken in 2013, so I assume that your skills and technique have developed a lot since then! For this specific photo, what struck me (if I interpret the Exif data correctly) was that you took it with: - a very small aperture (f/29) - a low ISO setting (100) - a long exposure time (2 seconds) If this Exif data is correct, then with a small aperture, I assume you wanted to create a large DOF. The downside - with a 2 sec exposure time - is that any slight breeze would compromise the sharpness. All in all, with these settings, you did a great job! However, in general (and with hindsight!), you might have used a wider aperture (f/4 f/8 ?), a higher ISO and focused more sharply on the foreground. I just imagine the first 2 or 3 'milkweeds' being sharply in focus and the focus gradually becoming less sharp as it fades away to the background mist. Again, this is largely true in your photo. With the only exception of a 'crisp' (sharp) focus on the first 2-3 milkweeds. Hope this helps. PS. If my interpretation of the Exif data for this photo is completely wrong, please let me know!

Let's have fun while we learn (and show) how we use our imagination, creativity and skills in post-processing. There are no rules or guidelines: your post-processed images can be 'adjustments' that you think improve the image or 'wildly creative' interpretations. Entirely up to you. Please summarize your PP so we can all learn from each other.