C&c

elven

I know I've posted about this before but I think it was almost a year ago so I thought it might be worth having another think about.

It seems that a lot of people rely on this place as a source of feedback to try and learn how to improve their photographs, and I've seen lots of comments saying just how much help they've had round here, which is great. I just wanted to suggest for people giving feedback, to maybe stop and have a think about how they can do it most effectively and helpfully.

I think there are different levels of critique for different levels of photographers.

Some people are looking for pretty basic technical pointers - depth of field, use of shutter speed, basic processing techniques, that sort of stuff. There's the artistic bread and butter - composition, colour, texture, and perspective - I've seen a few newbies happy to go away with the simple advice of trying not to centre everything in the frame, maybe learning about the rule of thirds (rules, pah!), or how to use leading lines to give the impression of depth, again it's easy enough to identify these things and point them out. But once you get past that level - what makes it worth going to the effort of posting your shots for C&C, and what's worth taking the time to actually say to the photographer?

I feel a bit like I've been rambling on about this for, well, forever - but I think it's a bit pointless posting anything for more than the above comments or a plain old chin tickling, unless you tell the viewers what you were actually trying to achieve. And if you're going to comment on an image where you're not sure of the photographer's objective, how can you provide anything truly constructive? You could point out, maybe, that it's not sharp - but that could have been intentional, to show movement, uncertainty, an impressionistic view. You could just give them your own opinion - but how does that relate when what you expect a picture to do for you, and what they were actually trying for could be a million miles apart?

At the end of the day, it's in your own best interests to tell us what kind of feedback you're looking for when you post something - and it's going to be far more helpful to take that into consideration when giving a critique. Pointing out what a photo is or isn't, or what it does or doesn't do for you isn't awfully useful. But if you can attempt to identify *why* it is/isn't, or does/doesn't do, that's going to give the photographer much more help to improve.

As always, i just want to stress that I'm looking to help everyone get the most out of this, rather than rhyming off rules and regulations. I think maybe 'etiquette' is the best way to describe what I'm getting at - it's not a law, but it's awfully nice if you play along...

Redisle

Great Post!
Maybe there should be a sticky on the topic?
And I agree.. I know I posted pics before and people just gave their opinions and pretty much told me they were crap.. when I would have much preferred some constructive advice on how to improve..

PoleStar

I second that, great post.

As a noobie, I guess people note that on the few photos I have put up and got relevant "noobie-level" advice.

I always wonder too, do people mind continuos submission of photos? I am sure I would love to put up loads to learn as I am not in a club, do people mind this?

Eirebear

Can i suggest that possibly part of the C&C problem lies within the post of the person looking for C&C? (and i include myself in this)

Maybe if we gave everyone else an idea of what we were trying to achieve...what we like and dislike about the shot, a little bit of backstory and detail as to why we took this particular image.
I dont just mean technical stuff, but also the ideas we were trying to get across with the picture.

This helps other users sum up their ideas on the picture rather than being faced with "a sunset" or "a swan" or a scene that they dont recognise and have no affiliation to so dont know what were trying to critique?

leinsterman

Good point ... I also think there is are a few people around who seem to think comments like "that picture does nothing for me" serves some purpose for the person looking for C&C ... personally (though I know I'm far less than perfect) I try my best to give constructive critique to the benefit of the photographer ... not demonstrate any mastery of big words or some elitest position.

... on the other hand, it does help the critic if the photographer takes a bit of extra time to explain what sort of critique is requested ...

Valentia

Very good post. I must say critiques are not something that I feel particularly comfortable about giving myself. OK with basic stuff like exposure, composition, lighting and say levels and contrast. But when it's an experienced photographer I'm more inclined to accept that they have a style of their own. Sometimes I might like that style others not. If I don't like it I usually refrain from commenting but can still accept the skill and creativity of their shot.

I dislike comments like " If I was you I would do....." I like the idea of people posting just because there is a particular shot that they like and want to share it with this little community. It doesn't necessarily have to be for critique.

I couldn't agree more that if someone is posting for a critique that they say what particularly the would like critiqued. Even give their own view on what they see in the photo and why they are not happy with it.It would certainly make it easier for people like myself feel more confident about offering an opinion in a more focused and, hopefully, useful way.

elven

Yup, I think it goes both ways and if you expect some thoughtful and considered advice, maybe it's worth taking the time to explain what you were trying to do with the shots, and maybe be more specific about what kind of comments you're looking for - ie, technical, composition, processing, mood/feeling, or story telling type stuff?

As far as the actual number of shots you might want to put up, I know it's tempting to fire everything up there but I think the more you post, the less effort people will tend to make with their comments. In one thread, i would maybe think up to 5 images is acceptable and not overbearing, and in terms of number of threads, I think it only decent to at least wait until your first has dropped off the front page until posting another. Less is more!

I tell ya, I have to work hard to resist the 'delete' button when i see that "it does nothing for me" phrase being banded about...

ThOnda

My C&C posts are simple - I just want to be praised how good my pictures are :-)
And yes, good idea. If you provide more information about your attemp, you will be given more precise comments and advice. Well, if WE ask for it, we should get it.
And don't worry, I like C&C whatever you write, if it is positive

sineadw

I'm also not one for commenting on other people's C&Cs as I wouldn't necessarily feel comfortable with others' genres or styles, or my own knowledge of the subject/technique for that matter. And consequently I tend to steer clear of posting my own. Maybe its silly but I always feel if I post them here its an exercise in ego, although I honestly mean that says a lot more about my own sense of worth as a photographer than anyone elses'! I feel silly saying "how do you rate these?" when I'm not sure how I'd rate them myself.

I agree C&C is much more helpful when it's phrased so that the reader and poster both know what they want out of it. Sometimes that's easier said than done - there's always the 'meh' factor.

My head is still too full of snot to be any more lucid on the subject. Apologies for TMI

Valentia

sineadw wrote:

Maybe its silly but I always feel if I post them here its an exercise in ego,

Well that would be one of the reasons I post too I think we all need acknowledgement, especially when we have a group of like minded people we can bounce stuff off. I usually only post stuff I'm happy with and if people don't like it well **** them. What do they know anyway!!!!!:eek::eek::D

5uspect

I rarely post anything here for C&C as I wouldn't consider my shots good enough. I do however enjoy the pictures others post tho and I think in general the process works well. Often I'm happy to just compliment the poster on the quality of their shots rather than offer any advice as their shots usually help me understand composition better. I'm also guilty of the "doesn't do anything for me" thing too so I'll keep that in check! Good idea on trying to focus the C&C on what areas the OP needs.

I'm usually happy to dish out the PS tips tho!

thebaz

Valentia wrote:

if people don't like it well **** them. What do they know anyway!!!!!:eek::eek::D

have you had negative feedback here , Danny ??

Personally i hate it at the time, but i think it makes you better in the long term .

Thirdfox

Lol, hopefully it was not due to my thread asking for C&C on my pictures that caused this thread!

I feel that C&C is still useful on a higher level of photography as it allows the photographer to see what others may have done with the shot...

On the one hand - giving people a back story makes giving critique easier but on the other it could simply be biasing them towards a direction the photographer was leaning towards. I personally would prefer another photographer looking at photos with a blank slate and no biases. His/her style may be totally different from mine but by getting comments like "Too much red" or "would have liked some motion blur" photographers may be able to break out of their own confines and look at their shots in a different light in the future. Or at least know that there was another way of doing it (whether it be for better or worse).

Just my opinion

Valentia

thebaz wrote:

have you had negative feedback here , Danny ??

Personally i hate it at the time, but i think it makes you better in the long term .

Tongue firmly in cheek Barry

Valentia

BTW, in all honesty some or the feedback I have got here has been extremely useful. I have a very short boredom threshold and I often rush my pictures. Both taking and processing. Many things have been pointed out to me that I have missed. Stuff that I should have seen. So I do find the feedback very very useful. If only I had the discipline to go back and correct the mistakes but I have usually moved on to my next cock-up at that stage and am too lazy.

Fionn

lazy sod!!!

Fionn

c&c is good if you specify what you want... peeps who put up "is this any good?" are going to be disappointed

but like crap thread...like! huh?

Fionn

kidding!!!


before i get banned!!

Muineach

elven wrote:

Less is more!

finally a woman who agrees with me

City-Exile

Sometimes I see a picture that I really like.
It may not be a great picture per se, but I just feel I should post a response, saying that I like it.

I know that doesn't really add any value, but I hope it would at least be appreciated by the poster.

City-Exile

By the way, I like it when people see faults in my pictures. You get a wide profile of posters on this forum & by combining opinions, I hope to improve my photography. I'm not sensitive about my work, because when I take a picture, I see it as a stepping stone to taking a great picture.

Muineach

City-Exile wrote:

By the way, I like it when people see faults in my pictures. You get a wide profile of posters on this forum & by combining opinions, I hope to improve my photography. I'm not sensitive about my work, because when I take a picture, I see it as a stepping stone to taking a great picture.

I'm kinda the same, when I'm processing a shot I tend to find that I get too involved in trying to "fix" things, like a bit of cloning etc. and miss the obvious "faults". The other thing is that some friends are getting a bit peed off with me for asking them for opinions on photo's :rolleyes:

For me C&C is about getting a third+ opinion, hoping that they may spot something wrong with the photo like "X is a bit over saturated/sharpened/blurred"

magicbastarder

leinsterman wrote:

I also think there is are a few people around who seem to think comments like "that picture does nothing for me" serves some purpose for the person looking for C&C

i've been guilty of that. again, it comes down to what the person who is seeking C&C is asking for. if it's purely aesthetic feedback, i think the above comment is justified.
getting purely technical feedback is fine, if requested, technical merit is only a part of taking a good photograph. and depending on your viewpoint, not even 100% necessary.

elven

magicbastarder wrote:

if it's purely aesthetic feedback, i think the above comment is justified.

Hmmm, I'm not convinced that anyone would get much from someone telling them the shot leaves them cold. The whole point I'm always trying to make about commenting is that if you think something about a photo then of course that's valid - but it's not really helpful unless you can identify *why*. That goes for when you like it as well as when you don't.

For example, I could post a picture of a forest. Someone says "Nah, it does nothing for me." Fine - I won't force them to look at it, but what has that done, how does it help? Do they just not like forests? Do they not like those particular kinds of trees? Do they think I haven't put across the forestyness of the place well enough in the picture? Do they prefer more colourful/lighter/darker/more detailed/simpler images in general and it's absolutely nothing to do with my actual foresty picture?

It's always nice to hear if someone likes something, of course. There's nothing wrong with looking for a bit of acknowledgement, or on the other side, letting someone know when their stuff has affected you one way or the other. But it's a million times better if they can point out just an inkling as to why that might be the case, because that is something you can decide if it's important, and take with you, when you're out shooting next time.

beans

^^ What she said.

A simple "That's great!" is just as useless in real terms as a simple "That's rubbish". The understanding of why a shot is one or the other is pretty valuable though.

elven

Thirdfox wrote:

I personally would prefer another photographer looking at photos with a blank slate and no biases. His/her style may be totally different from mine but by getting comments like "Too much red" or "would have liked some motion blur" photographers may be able to break out of their own confines and look at their shots in a different light in the future. Or at least know that there was another way of doing it (whether it be for better or worse).

I have heard people say before that they would rather not bias the viewer, and that's why they don't want to write anything. I think it's important, though, to make that point when you do post it and specifically say that, and also if you're open to different approaches - I'd be a bit offended, if I'm totally honest, if someone came along and told me to ramp up the contrast on a picture that I was attempting to show as delicate and soft - but it would be my fault if I didn't say "I'm going for a delicate, soft look here, does it work?"... I suppose it comes back to that thing where we have to consider the level of the photographer and whether the things they have done have been creative decisions, or they didn't actually think about it and maybe need to have the effect pointed out to them. Usually I would approach that by saying "I noticed that 'x' has given it a 'y' look", to try and find out if it was a conscious decision on their part.

magicbastarder

it hardly needs to be said that good shots, or shots with obvious flaws will get far more comments than plain old boring shots. when i say "it doesn't do anything for me", i generally mean i find the shot boring.

sometimes boring is just boring; there's no 'why' to it, the shot just has nothing of interest in it, and no flaws you can point at. it's an aesthetic reaction, not a rational one.

Calina

I've been thinking about this since the post went up and having read some of the responses, I've thought about it a little more and although I dare say it would surprise some of you here, the net effect it would have on me is to

a) dissuade me from providing any feedback at all
b) dissuade me from posting work for C&C.

In part, that's because I get the impression, there is some level of judging what constitutes useful feedback when only the poster of the work can judge that. As the feedback I have gotten back regarding my feedback is generally positive, I sort of feel I have some scope for believing that people regard what I say as useful. But - by the same token - it falls foul of a lot of what people criticise in this thread as being unhelpful. So what do I do then?

Ultimately, when I say a photograph doesn't do anything for me - and I do - it is usually one of a group of photographs, many of which I will comment on, but if I choose not to, it is precisely because it leaves me cold, for example. That is a reason - and what's more - it's feedback whether you want to see it as such or not. In the same way, if someone posts a photograph that touches you in a particular way, that you think is great, it is as useful to tell them that. So I disagree with those who suggest that just saying a picture is great is not useful feedback. For an unconfident photographer - of which I am one - it may be extremely useful feedback provided you trust the community. At the same time, this is not Leaving Certificate English and you do not have to justify every single emotion you have either.

Based on this thread, I am no longer sure that I really do trust the community in general, albeit there will always be individual exceptions to that.

I would have said that fundamentally, C&C worked in this forum to date. I've made a particular effort of late to provide more feedback in those threads, particularly to new posters who are coming into the community because they will be the stalwarts of the place in a year's time. For that reason, I question this thread - it seems to be trying to fix something that isn't particularly broken, but which, with excess tinkering, may become broken, particularly if the net effect on others is the same as on me as stated above - I don't want to do it because there's this impression I have that there is some sort of required form for feedback - and I don't want to submit for feedback because I think people may be constrained by that form, or I don't, essentially trust the community feedback any more because they have become in some way sort of hung up on it.

Mostly when I submit photographs for comment, I'll cite a particular issue I have with them, and ask how other people see it. In other words, I make an effort to tell you why I want feedback. I haven't got such an ego - and I think if you submit work for C&C you have to leave your ego behind - that I believe everything I do or post to Flickr/pix.ie is perfect. When I stop believing I can learn stuff, then that's the day I start disimproving as a photographer.

In truth, I'd also add that it is entirely possible for feedback providers to learn from the C&C process as well - but that concept doesn't appear to have been picked up on during this thread.

In short, where feedback is concerned, the sole arbiter of usefulness is the OP of the photographs concerned. I think it is perhaps less helpful to assume there is some sort of quality control that we could apply to the process, some sort of one size fits all. Effectively, if you don't like the feedback such as "I'd crop slightly to the right", then you are still at liberty to ignore it, or you can argue the point. I think it would stymie the process however if we had any preconceived notions about how it *should* work. It tends to work differently in every case anyway - something which should be obvious by watching any of the most recent C&C threads.

Regards, Calina.

sineadw

Hey Calina. I agree with a lot of what you're saying. I think if there were requirements to posting or replying to C&C then this would obviously be ridiculous in the extreme as well as pointless. Each post is unique. I honestly don't think that was the point of this thread though. Or at least thats not the way I read any of it. My thoughts would be that if you're posting or replying then it can be more beneficial to be explicit. What you want from the C&C - why you feel the way you do about the shot when replying. This isn't gonna be the case in all instances.

Argh - my brain is dead. I have a few trains of thought but my vocabulary/general linguistic skills seem to have disappeared somewhere the last few days. All I can say is I've learned a whole lot from your responses to C&C posts and I hope you don't stop!

Fenster

It's blown out and you need to learn how to focus.

Fenster

...

I guess it would help if for once I actually read a C&C thread before I gave feedback.

elven

Your feedback is appreciated fenster

Calina, I really hope you don't think that the intention of this whole thing was to start throwing about rules and regulations, or suggest that your own comments in the past haven't been helpful. Off the top of my head, anything I've ever seen you write about someone else's stuff has been thoughtful, considered and generally pretty helpful. And when I've seen you post for c&c you do generally say "I'm having a problem with x" or "I'm trying to figure out how to do y" so you tend to get relevant responses. In that case, well for sure if it ain't broke don't fix it - but there are too many occasions I've read and cringed as people spout thoughtless, careless and pretty much useless drivel under the banner of c&c, and wonder why the OP either responds defensively, or stops posting altogether.

We're all here voluntarily, at the end of the day, and I just thought it might be nice to have a bit of a think about hwo we can all get the most out of it. And you're right - and I'm kicking myself for not including it earlier - that looking at other people's stuff and wondering why certain things work and why they don't is an incredibly useful tool for improving your own photography. Sometimes I make an effort to look harder at an image when it's been posted for comment, and I'll find something in it to appreciate that I might not have noticed at a glance, so that helps too.

After having thought about it some more, I just can't convince myself that it's useful to anyone to point out that you don't find a particular shot interesting to the extent that you can't find anything constructive to say about it. You make a fair point, when you're taking a group of pictures into consideration sometimes you don't really have any response to one or two of them - it's a tricky situation and I'm not going to preach about 'how one should handle it', I suppose i just have a bit of a particular aversion to it after seeing it used as an excuse for actual input. I can't think of one photo I've seen that left me 'meh' where I couldn't put it down to subject, composition, technique or processing at the very least.

I remember being incredibly frustrated, years ago, when I was told that very thing about a picture of mine. Looking back now, the bloke who dispensed that particular pearl of wisdom was a glamour photographer, and it was a photo of a plane... the use of the phrase "doesn't do anything for me" never seemed so apt in fact... but anyway, I kept on asking him why, why, what was wrong, was it the light, was it the composition, the subject, the angle? But he couldn't tell me, and I had to decide whether I thought it was because my shot was awful, or maybe my subject just didn't have erogenous zones :rolleyes:

ThOnda

Don't worry, Elven, your cherries do something to me ;-)

It's very hard to explain what emotions are being created by some pictures. It's all based on everybody's personal experience. The only experience I have is to see all pictures in a set, have a break and come back to the pictures after some time. And if I have reason to remember some picture or to spend more time looking at that picture, the reason is that the picture does something to me. At least it makes me stay awake even if I should be sleeping.

RoryW

so in short then having read the VERY long postings above by a few people , the conclusion is

1. post your photos for CC (as a new person around these pages I promise to do this soon and expose myself to the hopeful onslaught of comments for which I will learn)

2. post and be damned (Or not).

3. That you must recognise that not everything will be appreciated by everyone (how boring that would be)

4. that as in life you can learn from everyone else by admiring what they have done well, learning from their mistakes (so you dont make them as well)

5. I do not know the age group of people here but get the feeling that it is mixed and skewed to the younger generation. In any event every age has a viewpoint and perspective that can be beneficial to others

6. different levels can learn from each other.

and

7. the main think is to ENJOY THE JOURNEY (as a friend says we are here for a good time not a long time ! ) as you never know where it may lead you to (interesting diversions here and there) and it all sure as hell beats thinking about work !

waffling rant over