loosing interest in photography forum

jpb1974

Ah.. got you now -

If you've been emotionally scarred don't leave, lurk. Time heals all things.

Splinters

This argument is beyond childish. The term photgrapher has a meaning and isnt open for interpretation. There really isnt any room for debate here, if you take photos you are, by definition, a photographer.

Collins English dictionary defines it as....

a person who takes photographs, either as a hobby or a profession

You might be an amateur photographer, a hobbyist photographer, a camera phone photographer, even a bad photographer. It really doesnt matter....the point is, you are a photographer.

Borderfox

Enough already about the word. Back ot please

dakar

I think the nature of things is that forums tend to attract people in the first flush of enthusiasm with a new hobby. It's certainly what drew me here back in the day. It's what drew me to the coffee forum over the last year or so. It follows that you get waves of people at the same sort of point in their journey.

When I landed, I kind of tagged onto the coat tails of a bunch who had seen it all and some of them were moving on (to twitter mostly). I'm lucky in that I can now call some of those people my friends. I would never have met them without boards, yet most of them never post here anymore. I understand why. Topics get recycled (there is a fairly predictable arc at this stage). The same arguments get tedious. When you disagree with someone you know, you're less likely to get pissed off and bite back than someone you've never met who comes across as a keyboard warrior.

So yeah, change things round, then in 18 months when everyone's bored again, change them back. I'll keep lurking anyway (but I won't be reading any copyright threads).

colblimp

dakar wrote: »

It's what drew me to the coffee forum

There's a coffee forum?!! :eek:

Where...?

zero19

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/forumdisplay.php?f=929

Reoil

This forum has definitely gone to the dogs. As a visitor for many a year (not under this profile mind you) I've gradually watched it going tits-up.
Intrusive mods and the making of unnecessary sub-forums being the main culprits.

Bring back fajitas!

MudSkipper

Reoil wrote: »

Bring back fajitas! Oriel

fyp :pac:

I too posted with an old account, but not so much anymore... not due to loss of interest, I still lurk a bit.. but simply not enough time for photography....... doing an MSc while working full time is killer, end is in sight tho :-)

superflyninja

ive found myself with less time to take photos much less process them and so my quality of shot has declined. but in the meantime the standard of photos being posted has shot so far up i feel there is no point in me posting any shots. Also since the general standard is so high i wouldnt feel right attempting to give feedback to others. i do feel that there isnt much actual in depth feedback given in cc threads either. i do follow a good few of togs from boards on twitter but its not very useful, there is no C&C on twitter....what would get me coming back is more of a spread of talents and loads more camera and PP techniques...

the_syco

superflyninja wrote: »

i feel there is no point in me posting any shots.

Me hoop.

Take photos and put them up here for C&C. You imply that your photos are becoming worse? Bah! Post them up, and you may find that improving them may just need a small tweak.

magicbastarder

i've been around discussion forums long enough to see plenty of these sort of threads; and my attitude is often one of 'if you don't like it, what are you going to do about it?'
a discussion forum is made by the people posting. it cannot be the case that everyone complaining is a stellar poster in the forum, so often they're complaining about low standards that they themselves are not helping raise.

obviously, before someone jumps down my throat, i am not referring to everyone.

Reoil

MudSkipper wrote: »

fyp :pac:

Oh I tried!

superflyninja

the_syco wrote: »

Me hoop.

Take photos and put them up here for C&C. You imply that your photos are becoming worse? Bah! Post them up, and you may find that improving them may just need a small tweak.

lol!! no no im not fishing for compliments. I know myself that i have nothing worth posting right now.My PP needs tweaking.My processing too. ;p It just seems like most of the newbies- mid range peeps are rare and its a load of heavy hitters left and its intimidating!!

K_user

I'm a bit late to the party, but I'd like to get my 2cents in...

I'm with a lot of people on this, PCPhoto has always been helpful and informative and this board would be a lot poorer without him.

Tallon

superflyninja wrote: »

the_syco wrote: »

Me hoop.

Take photos and put them up here for C&C. You imply that your photos are becoming worse? Bah! Post them up, and you may find that improving them may just need a small tweak.

lol!! no no im not fishing for compliments. I know myself that i have nothing worth posting right now.My PP needs tweaking.My processing too. ;p It just seems like most of the newbies- mid range peeps are rare and its a load of heavy hitters left and its intimidating!!

Wait till you see the amateur crap I'm about to post over the coming weeks

magicbastarder

i've not been taking good stuff for ages now (just fixed, i hope) due to moving house and planning a wedding. i did drop ten rolls into gunns yesterday, but with no way of scanning the results...

K_user

melekalikimaka wrote: »

not at all, I started posting here in 2005 and didnt know my arse from my elbow photographically, and the forum helped me so much I couldn't even begin to explain, the people who posted here were all extremely helpful, shared gear, took me on trips, went through my work with a fine tooth comb and argued with me til the cows came home over the smallest details, and i thank every one of them for it.

Just because you're learning would never be a reason to ridicule, quite the opposite, its great to have new people here looking for advice and sharing work for tips.

Its only through a huge amount of self criticism that we learn anything.

When I first started going to forums like this, or scanning the internet, I used to get depressed looking at some of the work that others where producing.

But it was that same work, those same posters, that have pushed me to improve. I now know how to look for imperfections, I know how to set goals, how to visualise what I'm looking for and how to plan to get things right the next time. And there is always a next time...

C&C is one of the best things in a forum like this. Sometimes you get people who scoff, sometimes your picture is ignored, the rest of the time you get feedback and that is where you learn.

melekalikimaka wrote: »

But I have found these days, people rarely accept any critisim, I would be told ' yeah mele, they are useless (lists off in bullet form the reasons), I would sometimes ask for clarification on why, take on board and come back til it was to the standard of my peers, and thats how it would be. now its a huge arguement of 'elitism' and 'your stuck in film age' rubbish.

Unfortunately some people don't really want "C&C", they want to be patted on the back and told that they are great...

melekalikimaka

maybe if we got together and focused on a few projects, discuss plans for some personal projects sitting on the back burner, and all together get pushing each other to get the finger out, could liven up things, everyone get active encouraging and badgering for updates?

I run the photo club in work and found that was the only way to motivate everyone, the fear of letting down, its a wondferful thing, and its rewarding and something great to show at the end of it, alot of us here have been down the personal project route, some of us have completed it, and I think everyone who has can vouch for them, great way to learn and progress, which at the end of the day is what (well i think) is exactly what this forum is about

superflyninja

Tallon wrote: »

Wait till you see the amateur crap I'm about to post over the coming weeks

race you to the bottom!

ThOnda

The reasons why I am not here that often anymore are:

• too many personal attacks on people I respect
• too many attacks on people with questions
• too much moderation - disturbing flow of threads and subsequent self-censoring before posting
• too much emphasizing on a certain technique without aesthetical merits (yes, the bloody HDR is only technique, like BW conversion, so LEARN how to use it correctly)
• not enough activity by people who made me like this forum (as results from the points above?)
• and personal reasons not related by any way to this forum or members (sad, but true)

One example for all is Pete. He still does great photography, he still tries to make it here a bit more fun, he has opinions and is willing to share them and explain/defense them. But he is being attacked almost in every possible way, on everything he says. He has plenty of experience, talking about gear, photography, processing, engaging people, however I can predict attack on his work or opinions on the very first page of any thread he comments. (And yes, I would give thumbs up to almost every of his posts too, independently from whether I spent some quality time with him or not, but I don't want to be accused of being obsessed by him.)
If members here could be a less anal, a less self-centered, could be a bit more open-minded and funny, it might be fun to get back here more often. So far, I don't post due to self-censoring. I think I know what (same) reactions I would spark and how soon such thread would be moderated.
Change needed? Yes, but that change would hardly come from the top, which is ironically the opposite what this country needs right now.

CabanSail

Thanks for taking the time to put your thoughts together, much appreciated. My responses in Red.

ThOnda wrote: »

The reasons why I am not here that often anymore are:

• too many personal attacks on people I respect Either Report this or politely rebuff the attacks.
• too many attacks on people with questions Report these please
• too much moderation - disturbing flow of threads and subsequent self-censoring before posting The Moderation is probably the most lenient since I have been here. Can you give me some examples, maybe by PM?
• too much emphasizing on a certain technique without aesthetical merits (yes, the bloody HDR is only technique, like BW conversion, so LEARN how to use it correctly) Comes down to personal taste (but I am also not a fan) but your C&C of these images may assist. You have the experience & respect of many here.
• not enough activity by people who made me like this forum (as results from the points above?)Like any Group/Forum/Club people come and go.
• and personal reasons not related by any way to this forum or members (sad, but true) What? Don't tell me you have a LIFE????

One example for all is Pete. He still does great photography, he still tries to make it here a bit more fun, he has opinions and is willing to share them and explain/defense them. But he is being attacked almost in every possible way, on everything he says. He has plenty of experience, talking about gear, photography, processing, engaging people, however I can predict attack on his work or opinions on the very first page of any thread he comments. (And yes, I would give thumbs up to almost every of his posts too, independently from whether I spent some quality time with him or not, but I don't want to be accused of being obsessed by him.) I too appreciate a lot of what Pete contributes. If you think he's misunderstood here then you should have a look at some of the other places I see Pete. They may as well be on another planet rather than a different country!
If members here could be a less anal, a less self-centered, could be a bit more open-minded and funny, it might be fun to get back here more often. So far, I don't post due to self-censoring. I think I know what (same) reactions I would spark and how soon such thread would be moderated.
Change needed? Yes, but that change would hardly come from the top, which is ironically the opposite what this country needs right now. This sort of behaviour seemed to start when we had a particular member who would argue about everything. I was hoping that would die out by now. My feeling is that this would reduce if we were more involved with each other in the real world.

Tallon

I'd like to add to this if I may, there was a thread started today about voting in a competition which was already closed for submissions.

You can see my reply, and then the OP replied with this site:
http://www.photographycompetitions.net/

After clicking it, and thinking about it... I think I was too harsh!

I mean, if every time there was a new competition, and people started a thread, there would be tonnes of them!

I never even thought about a site like that where you can just enter loads of competitions!

If the OP was lucky enough to make it to the final selection, then we (Mostly I) should be supporting them?

Opinions?

magicbastarder

i think your original responses were proportionate and justified. if you go pimping for votes from people you don't know, don't expect them to fall over to do it for you.

scr33n

Err - that was me

If on the off chance that you visit the the thread linked above, don't feel the need to lambaste me - they got me already:D

scr33n

magicbastarder wrote: »

i think your original responses were proportionate and justified. if you go pimping for votes from people you don't know, don't expect them to fall over to do it for you.

Honestly I wasn't expecting anyone to fall over themselves in rush to vote or even read the topic, I'm surprised at the instant negativity that came back though, some really ridiculous stuff too :rolleyes: In fairness I was polite, I opened by asking if it was ok to post the request, and I didn't try to hide the fact that I was looking for vote by using a vague or misleading post title but I obviously got off to a bad start!

Tallon

scr33n wrote: »

Honestly I wasn't expecting anyone to fall over themselves in rush to vote or even read the topic, I'm surprised at the instant negativity that came back though, some really ridiculous stuff too :rolleyes: In fairness I was polite, I opened by asking if it was ok to post the request, and I didn't try to hide the fact that I was looking for vote by using a vague or misleading post title but I obviously got off to a bad start!

What was the 'ridiculous stuff'?

You never answered my questions

Tallon wrote:

How long has the competition been running? How long have you known about it? And why didn't you post it before?

magicbastarder

scr33n wrote: »

In fairness I was polite

you were polite, but you were cheeky. did you post the same to (m)any other forums?

scr33n

Tallon wrote: »

What was the 'ridiculous stuff'?

You never answered my questions

Ok, the competition was opened in mid may sometime, I entered it when I read about it on the Steve Huff website, so I've known there was a competition on since then, I didn't really feel the need to join up with the boards.ie photography forum to tell people that there's an online competition where you could actually win a 'bag' for lots of reasons, mainly because it would seem like pointless spamming of this forum - which I sometimes read, and there's enough fluff here already without posting links to every competition that's being run from Phoenix Arizona or wherever, because I assume that anyone with access to the internet and a passion for photography usually follows a number of different websites and blogs and could enter whatever competitions they felt like.

I try not to respond with negativity to the dumber comments because it doesn't help anybody, or any forum, but seeing as someone thought it was sneaky to post a link to competition I was shortlisted for and then you wanted to know why you hadn't been notified of it before - well I thought the only positive thing I could do was to provide a link to a site where you can keep up to date with photo competitions etc.

I see you have 19,000+ posts here (can that be right???) so you obviously shoot a lot with the comments, I have less than 30 posts but I shoot a lot with cameras :P and seeing that this is a photography forum it seemed a relevant place to put the post.

scr33n

magicbastarder wrote: »

you were polite, but you were cheeky. did you post the same to (m)any other forums?

Just to www.photographyireland.net and the ubiquitous social networks, facebook etc.

Tallon

scr33n wrote: »

I see you have 19,000+ posts here (can that be right???) so you obviously shoot a lot with the comments, I have less than 30 posts but I shoot a lot with cameras :P and seeing that this is a photography forum it seemed a relevant place to put the post.

I don't see what relevance that is.

I shoot a lot with the camera too, I've just been here at lot longer, and am very active in the community, hence the posts...