Can you develop a photographer's eye?

T

Tim Murphy

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Dear Board,

Except for the occasional bird or deer, I simply cannot take a picture that is worth a crap.

When is it time to quit?

Regards,

Tim Murphy

Harrisburg, PA:)
 
Don't quit - assuming you enjoy photography.

I would also say start with researching and understanding the "rules" of good photography (rule of thirds, etc blah, blah, blah) understand them and and practice using them. If you think many of your photos are crap then try to work out why - is it due to poor technical skills, or is it a lack of knowledge about the laws which guide good composition. But use those rules as a guide not hard binding laws. And, experiment with them.

Study the work of any great photographers you like and work out how you can emulate them. Also look at photos you like generally and try to understand why it si you like them. This will give you hints about what to try with your own. Eventually you should feel confidence in going beyond what they have done allowing you to develop your own style.

Developing a style of your own that others like is a good end.

Incidentally most of my photos are crap too. Most of every bodies' photos are crap, lets face it - it is that kind of pursuit and so much can go wrong while pursuing it. Because the image has to be made in a fraction of an instant - e.g. I cannot tell you how many "perfect" images I have lost when making street photos because someone has walking in front of me as I pressed the shutter button.

Having said alal of the above some people can never seem to develop much of a photographers eye. But you seem interest and I happen to think that enthusiasm is part of the battle.

BTW one final thought. I find it is easier to envisage an image if you are actually viewing it through the viewfinder not by looking at the scene and then bringing the camera up to take the image. Especially in those kind of shots where the potential image is changing quickly. Here you need to see the image forming and you can really only do this through the finder. This is a question of specific technique - too big a topic for here but you may need to study some of those tricks of the trade too.
 
Dear Tim,

If you're having fun, why the angst?

Consider Van Gogh, or Vivian Maier - they probably felt the same. Perhaps you are creating a legacy that will be appreciated and valued by others!

Warmest,
Lynn
 
Once you know what it is you love (or hate) and why you want to record or show it, photography is real easy.

took me only 1.5 decade to figure that one out ;)


But really, the first bit is the photographers mind, the photographers eye is only exposure, color/B&W, composition etc. The eye can be learnt by looking at the work of others and reflecting on one's own, but the mind can only be acquired by living consciously I reckon...
 
There's a lot of people about who haven't got a photographer's eye but who do have a book about their kind of photography and have memorised the sort of picture they like so that they can do minor variations of it. A lot of "old masters" using oil paints had the same technique...

The books have titles like landscape/portrait/travel photography; with apologies to any author of them called exactly that.

Regards, David
 
Some ideas:

Maybe this will help; practice the FART in photography (I believe it was Ken Rockwell who came up with the acronym).
F - Feel the need to take a photograph;
A - Ask yourself why you want to take the picture;
R - Refine, to bring out the reason for taking the picture;
T - Take the picture.

Turn 'failure' on its head in terms of assessing photographic output. Use the photographic failures as a guide to understand where you went wrong. Try to fail less progressively.

I assessed my own failures and discovered I was including too much 'confusion' in the images I was making; less is more as it is often said and I try to practice this.

If shooting colour, reduce the number of colours present in the scene. Too much and it becomes visual overload. In fact colour photography is very difficult to pull off correctly, I find it easier to produce a nicer (for my taste) black and white image.
 
I generally find that putting an eye in Rodinal or D76 stings, and can cause permanent damage, so I don’t recommend developing eyes, even ones belonging to photographers.

Marty
 
For over 15 years I have had a chance to interact with people who are (at least somewhat) interested in photography... everyone shares their photos. People rotate in and out, but there has always been a certain percentage who don't change and don't "improve". Improve is a bit tricky, but set that aside for a minute.

I would like to say that there's a correlation between that 'percentage group' and their ability to accept criticism... it's part of the story but it's not that simple. The tipping point, the light-bulb moment seems to be when the individual starts to seriously review their own work... which requires some experience and knowledge of "good" photography.

NatGeo photographer Sam Abell (1945-present), said "Greatness is not the goal, goodness is"... work with it, make the best picture you can. A good place to start is Abell's video "The Life of a Photograph: What makes a lasting photograph?".

Sharing selected photographs with like minded photographers also seems to help... not so much the feedback (although that can be helpful), more the internal process of selecting which photographs to share and why.

Just some random thoughts...
 
I think it is possible. In my case I started shooting a lot of events for churches and other organizations. Since the subjects were generally active, expressions and groupings were constantly changing. I had to shoot quickly and came home with lots of shots with too many backs of heads, weird expressions, etc. In curating those shots I developed a better sense of what made a good, or at least interesting, photograph. As my curating standards increased I found I was getting a higher percentage of "keepers" in my shots. The curating skills were now helping me identify good shots before I took them.
 
It sounds silly, but the fact that you see that your pictures are ‘crap’ means your on the way. I find it more troubling when people who take crap pictures think their pictures are great. Also, go back and look at stuff you have shot in the past and what was once ‘crap’ may look better that you would think.

Joe
 
Study the work of good photographers. You don't need to buy books - online searches have reproductions of many great names in photography. And there are many great photographers on Flickr, where you can follow their work.

For any genre there are great moderated (curated) groups on Flickr. You can learn a ton from browsing those. For learning, stick with moderated groups.

Once you have mentally absorbed tens of thousands of good pictures, you at least start to develop a taste to recognize what is good.

Even then, don't expect more than 1 in a 100 of your pictures to be a really good picture worth sharing. This happens to the best of photographers and is totally normal. Many of the best photographers on Flickr will post maybe one picture a week, or one a month.
 
Well, for myself I learned finally that I simply was no artist. But have always loved ‘tinkering’ with photography. So, since at 70, having been at this hobby for about 50 years, I just look at it as a bit of fun that I personally enjoy, and don’t sweat the lack of artistic skills. Other than a few basic rules, you know the type, ‘don’t have light poles growing out of a portrait subject’s head’, etc. I’m still having fun.
 
When I first go involved with photography, I started researching the photographers whose work inspired me. I have a passion for black&white that was fostered by Ansel Adams. For subject matter, it has always been [mostly] about people. I was fortunate late in life (I was 51) to be able to make my dream of being a newspaper shooter for 10 years. As far as my eye, I found once I was shooting daily (10-12 hours/day) for work that my number of keepers skyrocketed. Like the old adage says: "PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT!" Now that I am retired from daily shooting, my keepers have fallen.


You want to get better? Shoot more! It is an easy thing to do today with the digital cameras.
 
Find a person who sees the world as you do and can make beautiful photographs. Ask this person, if by chance, s(he) would help you with your photography, serve as your coach and mentor.

If you don’t, some person will tell you this is the way to make photographs. Then some one else will tell you something different. And on and on.

All this advice taking from different people will lead you down a path of confusion.

I was fortunate to find some one who really helped me. I found out about him from articles he wrote for a magazine called Shutterbug. He died sbout 10 years ago. But there are some of his videos on you tube. Just type in search, “Monte Zucker.” You could also do a google search on him.

So that’s my two cents!

Hope it helps you.
 
zuiko85 said:
... ‘don’t have light poles growing out of a portrait subject’s head’....
Click to expand...

I was so bad about that, I finally just took the bull by the horns and did it on purpose. The intention was "Do it on purpose to learn it why I always do it on accident." Got both my kids, one at a time, to stand where a huge tree in the distance was growing out of their heads - I even moved around to get the tree lined up perfectly. That helped me learn NOT to do it.
 
Deer and bird? BIF and wildlife is tough enough photography.

It is hard to learn the talent. But if you take pictures of somethings you are really interested in and if you applying same rules from somethings you know good...

For example, I like to look at people and I know fishing. I apply it in street photography.

Trying to get good, right picture is often way to bad results.
Trying to take something you like is the opposite.

AA was crappy portraits photographer, but we all know where he was good at.
Keep on searching. Maybe you are king of Macro.
 
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