ghost
Well-known
if it didn't meet your standards, which ones were they?
How Do You Look At Photos?: Reference Thread
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boarini2003
Guest
I look at the following:
-Composition/Shape, or otherwise visual appearence
-Meaning, or what the image makes me think about, if at all
Any of these things well accomplished makes a good image. The HCB photo of the man jumping over the puddle is iconic and beautiful, however it doesn't convey any obvious emotional meaning. On the other hand, a Garry Winogrand shot will have a composition that almost seems chaotic, but has much meaning hidden under the obvious.
-Composition/Shape, or otherwise visual appearence
-Meaning, or what the image makes me think about, if at all
Any of these things well accomplished makes a good image. The HCB photo of the man jumping over the puddle is iconic and beautiful, however it doesn't convey any obvious emotional meaning. On the other hand, a Garry Winogrand shot will have a composition that almost seems chaotic, but has much meaning hidden under the obvious.
nomade
Hobbyist
I'm not quite sure, but i think i've to find something interesting to keep looking at it, the subject matters a lot, how the techniques and light were used to aid the photo's cause. I think. I've never though about that before, when you read, you understand more, and hence the things that you used to like aren't satisfactory...The way i look differs automatically, i don't put standards for that, i just look at it, and let my thoughts flow...
fitzihardwurshd
Spiteful little devil
RayPA said:
This question looks simple, hard to answer simple.
Of course , as Frank said, there must be something which keeps me watching it for a while, but what is it that attracts my attention at the first sight ?
For me, there is a creative part and a technical part
As for the creative part there must be an emotion clearly visible , something the photog wants to tell me, the emotion which has mede him press the release button.
The concept must be original in some way, at least a personal interpretation ,not a boring copy of things we have seen a thousand times before.
Boredom comes from imitating and copying.
As for the technical part it must show the photog has learned his lessons and used his knowledge well to make his idea visible: Composition, the use of light and a perfect exposure for the adaequate tonality and contrast, correct use of DOF, right film and development, careful scanning and postprocessing for the monitor, it's all important.
An emotion presented with sloppy craft is like speaking wise words with a mouth full of hot mashed potatoes. You do not understand it all.
The other way round , a technical well done photo without any emotion, that's mostly a copy of anything we have seen somewhere very often, a cliche. Often to find at nude galeries.
More general I could not answer the question , not sure anyway if I covered all aspects well. Telling emotions, that's it for me.
Fitzi
gns
Well-known
Rules for looking at pictures are perhaps no better than rules for making them.
If something is new (original), it will likely challenge your ideas about what a good picture is.
One needs to be open. (At least to learn).
Cheers
If something is new (original), it will likely challenge your ideas about what a good picture is.
One needs to be open. (At least to learn).
Cheers
zuikologist
.........................
FrankS said:
I would agree wih FrankS. Emotional response to a photo comes first, and interestingly there is usually a technical reason that supports the initial response.
kbg32
neo-romanticist
An image has to hit me on a gut emotional level. If I can look at it again and again, and it still me moves, than I would consider that image successful - to me. When I was younger, I could appreciate Ansel Adams. As I've grown older, I find his work more successful for his technique, but not for showing me something about the man on an emotional level, or his relationship in the world. These days, when I look at work like Daido Moriyama for example, it blows me away on an emotional level. I find myself coming back to it again and again. I find that much more important then technique. I enjoy looking at work that tells me about a person's relationship and reaction to the world. Technical proficiency should be the means to the end, not the end itself.
kbg32
neo-romanticist
Second thought, to make a firm criteria or reference in looking at images, even judging them, sounds very wrong. Everyone here at RFF is so different in their aesthetic likes, social backgrounds, etc.. We are all going to bring something different to the table in viewing images. There really is no right or wrong. Why do images that supposedly fulfill all the objectives in composition, lighting, etc., fail, and those that break all the "rules", somehow stand out and remain everlasting? There really is no hard and fast standard.
As someone pointed out before, "we need to remain open".
As someone pointed out before, "we need to remain open".
Last edited:
edodo
Well-known
What I seek first is the composition. When there is one, I feel myself entering into an idea and or a concept. Thats what I seek when I look at a photo. On the web its a different story that photo IRL, but generally sharpness and the common rules on a "good" exposure are definately not the points that make a photo stands out. I would even say that those who are breaking the rules of photo shooting are those who make pictures that impress me.
Rafael
Mandlerian
There have been some very good ideas posted here already. I would like to raise a few questions to problematise the discussion a bit. As I understand it, the point of photo critique is really to distinguish images that we like from those that we judge to be good and to give reasons to support our judgments. Liking a photograph is a purely subjective opinion. Judging a photograph to be good (or bad) is thought to be more objective. At the very least, it is a judgment that others are meant to understand (even if they do not agree with it). It is because these judgments have a degree of objectivity to them that they are so often helpful to the photographer in his or her quest to improve their craft. The distinction between liking a photograph and judging it to be good is a very important one. I can think of many family snap-shots, for example, that I love because of the people in them but still recognise to be poor photographs by any standard of critical analysis. These photographs certainly hold my attention. But it is not because they are any good.
The case of family snap-shots really problematises the whole enterprise of critiquing photographs. It demonstrates that photographs with virtually no redeeming technical merit can still be captivating. What do we do with these? Think, for example, of Robert Capa's D-Day photographs. Technically, most of these images are terrible. The horizons are not level. Some images are well out of focus and poorly exposed. Many of the compositions are very messy. And yet, the images are absolutely captivating. Why is that? I believe that much of the appeal of these images lies in the fact that they allow us to look in on a particularly dramatic moment of history that we would never have experienced otherwise. Words can not convey the experience of this moment in the same way. So many of us judge Capa's images to be great because of where they were taken, because of their subject matter, but not really on account of any technical reasons.
The flipside of this example, of course, is the case of the technically perfect but utterly uninteresting image. I am sure we can all think of examples of perfectly composed and exposed images of apples, or flowers, or streets, or whatever, that hold absolutely no interest for us, seem to tell no story, and make virtually no impression at all.
These two cases present us with a problem (assuming that you accept my reasoning to this point 😀 ). The case of Capa's images suggests that photographs can be judged good or even great simply on account of their subject matter. But if this is so, what do we do with something like pornography? Many pornographic images are very captivating (i.e. we find the subject matter interesting :angel: ). How do we differentiate these images from Capa's? Can we assert that Capa's images are great purely because we find their subject matter interesting but that the same does not apply to pornographic images? (Of course, some do not find images of sex to be interesting, but that's not really the point here.) And in regards to the uninteresting but technically flawless images of fruit and the like, can we really generalise the judgment of poor to all images whose subject matter does not speak to us? What if the images are technically perfect? Food photography is, afterall, one of the most difficult areas of photography to master. (I do not in any way here mean to imply that ALL food photography is boring.)
It appears that these examples - the interesting but technically poor images and the technically perfect boring images - are collapsing the distinction that I believe to be central to photo critique, namely that between the photograph that I like subjectively and the photograph that I objectively judge to be good.
So where does this leave us? The argument that photo critique consists in looking for photographs with a strong story or message or subject and then evaluating the means employed by the photographer to communicate that story or message or subject is very appealing. And I certainly think that both are important parts of critiquing photographs. But I believe that there is also something less tangible at play in our judgment of great or even good photographs. Clearly, the importance of technique and of subject matter varies with different images. And the approach of judging the photographer's success at accomplishing his or her objective also fails to take account of images that captivate us for reasons that were not intended by the photographer. Some photographs that were taken with P+S cameras have a great deal of impact even though the photographer had no control over aperture and shutter speed. And I'm sure many of us have had the experience of finding a gem in a roll of film that we exposed incorrectly or developed incorrectly, or with which we made some other stupid mistake. We can't really ever know the photographer's intentions. So critiquing photographs on the basis of how well the photographer achieved his or her intentions would seem to me to be quite problematic.
I certainly don't mean this rapidly lengthening post to suggest that photo critique is a hopeless exercise. It is not. Certain images, for whatever reasons, speak to us as human beings, not merely as individuals. Not everyone will judge these images to be great. But many will. Understanding why these images speak to us in this way is not purely a matter of rational analysis, nor is it purely subjective. I guess what I am trying to say is that the key to becoming a good critic does not, in my opinion, lie in establishing an appropriate set of criteria on which to evaluate images. Rather, it lies in developing a technical and aesthetic vocabulary that allows you to communicate your judgments in a way that makes them comprehensible to others. I think that most everyone here would agree that there is a fundamental difference between Capa's D-Day images and those found in pornographic magazines. Articulating the difference is not, to my mind a matter of establishing criteria of analysis as much as it is a matter of developing communicative skills.
This is not really a satisfactory answer to the question posed. But I hope this post raises some worthwhile questions that will help us to think about it.
The case of family snap-shots really problematises the whole enterprise of critiquing photographs. It demonstrates that photographs with virtually no redeeming technical merit can still be captivating. What do we do with these? Think, for example, of Robert Capa's D-Day photographs. Technically, most of these images are terrible. The horizons are not level. Some images are well out of focus and poorly exposed. Many of the compositions are very messy. And yet, the images are absolutely captivating. Why is that? I believe that much of the appeal of these images lies in the fact that they allow us to look in on a particularly dramatic moment of history that we would never have experienced otherwise. Words can not convey the experience of this moment in the same way. So many of us judge Capa's images to be great because of where they were taken, because of their subject matter, but not really on account of any technical reasons.
The flipside of this example, of course, is the case of the technically perfect but utterly uninteresting image. I am sure we can all think of examples of perfectly composed and exposed images of apples, or flowers, or streets, or whatever, that hold absolutely no interest for us, seem to tell no story, and make virtually no impression at all.
These two cases present us with a problem (assuming that you accept my reasoning to this point 😀 ). The case of Capa's images suggests that photographs can be judged good or even great simply on account of their subject matter. But if this is so, what do we do with something like pornography? Many pornographic images are very captivating (i.e. we find the subject matter interesting :angel: ). How do we differentiate these images from Capa's? Can we assert that Capa's images are great purely because we find their subject matter interesting but that the same does not apply to pornographic images? (Of course, some do not find images of sex to be interesting, but that's not really the point here.) And in regards to the uninteresting but technically flawless images of fruit and the like, can we really generalise the judgment of poor to all images whose subject matter does not speak to us? What if the images are technically perfect? Food photography is, afterall, one of the most difficult areas of photography to master. (I do not in any way here mean to imply that ALL food photography is boring.)
It appears that these examples - the interesting but technically poor images and the technically perfect boring images - are collapsing the distinction that I believe to be central to photo critique, namely that between the photograph that I like subjectively and the photograph that I objectively judge to be good.
So where does this leave us? The argument that photo critique consists in looking for photographs with a strong story or message or subject and then evaluating the means employed by the photographer to communicate that story or message or subject is very appealing. And I certainly think that both are important parts of critiquing photographs. But I believe that there is also something less tangible at play in our judgment of great or even good photographs. Clearly, the importance of technique and of subject matter varies with different images. And the approach of judging the photographer's success at accomplishing his or her objective also fails to take account of images that captivate us for reasons that were not intended by the photographer. Some photographs that were taken with P+S cameras have a great deal of impact even though the photographer had no control over aperture and shutter speed. And I'm sure many of us have had the experience of finding a gem in a roll of film that we exposed incorrectly or developed incorrectly, or with which we made some other stupid mistake. We can't really ever know the photographer's intentions. So critiquing photographs on the basis of how well the photographer achieved his or her intentions would seem to me to be quite problematic.
I certainly don't mean this rapidly lengthening post to suggest that photo critique is a hopeless exercise. It is not. Certain images, for whatever reasons, speak to us as human beings, not merely as individuals. Not everyone will judge these images to be great. But many will. Understanding why these images speak to us in this way is not purely a matter of rational analysis, nor is it purely subjective. I guess what I am trying to say is that the key to becoming a good critic does not, in my opinion, lie in establishing an appropriate set of criteria on which to evaluate images. Rather, it lies in developing a technical and aesthetic vocabulary that allows you to communicate your judgments in a way that makes them comprehensible to others. I think that most everyone here would agree that there is a fundamental difference between Capa's D-Day images and those found in pornographic magazines. Articulating the difference is not, to my mind a matter of establishing criteria of analysis as much as it is a matter of developing communicative skills.
This is not really a satisfactory answer to the question posed. But I hope this post raises some worthwhile questions that will help us to think about it.
ghost
Well-known
you forgot one huge thing: aesthetic quality.
fitzihardwurshd
Spiteful little devil
Rafael said:
IMHO that is not the point. I would never like a photo which I cannot find "good" in the sense I have described in my post.
Fitzi
ghost
Well-known
with no exceptions?
ErnestoJL
Well-known
The way we look at a picture be it either a paint or a photo is purely subjective.
Then there is not a certain and unique way "to look at", nor even less, to judge it.
I adhere to Frank S opinion " if it grabs my attention for more than two seconds..."
There is something belonging or related to our inner feelings what make´s it attractive (an eye catcher) or not.
After that two seconds, I would try to find what made it interesting to me.
Ernesto
Then there is not a certain and unique way "to look at", nor even less, to judge it.
I adhere to Frank S opinion " if it grabs my attention for more than two seconds..."
There is something belonging or related to our inner feelings what make´s it attractive (an eye catcher) or not.
After that two seconds, I would try to find what made it interesting to me.
Ernesto
edodo
Well-known
Maybe the way we look at photos is the same way as we look at painting. Some like Francis Bacon, and some like Michelangelo, different story... Still believe composition is the key.
fitzihardwurshd
Spiteful little devil
ghost said:
One should never say NO, but such an exception would not change my general approach .
fitzi
fitzihardwurshd
Spiteful little devil
kbg32 said:
Sounds a bit as if it would be all relative, and if any criteria for technical and aesthetical quality would not make sense ?
There ARE hard standards, as a framework at least. "Rules" IMO is a misleading word in this case .
The personal likes, styles , or messages do not have to do anything with brilliant or crappy. There are good photos and poor photos, we all know that.
Fitzi
raid
Dad Photographer
If a photo forces me to think about it, then this photo is in my eyes excellent and successful.
Raid
Raid
John Robertson
Well-known
I look for compostition, originality and whether it has "impact" or not. I am very reluctant to comment on sharpness, color balance, tone etc, why??
The reason is I looked at photos of my own on various galleries, but on other peoples computers, lap-tops, CRT monitors LCD monitors all differing types. I could not believe the variations in tone, sharpness etc between them. I have judged photo competitions at camera clubs for many years, where I have the actual prints to hand. After seeing the variation on differing monitors I do not feel I could possibly give a reliable judgement on these points. If others want to do this on my pictures , thats fine by me, but I won't do it to others!! I adjust my own pictures for printing, not display on a monitor. If they work on a monitor,fine, if they don't ,too bad!!🙄
The reason is I looked at photos of my own on various galleries, but on other peoples computers, lap-tops, CRT monitors LCD monitors all differing types. I could not believe the variations in tone, sharpness etc between them. I have judged photo competitions at camera clubs for many years, where I have the actual prints to hand. After seeing the variation on differing monitors I do not feel I could possibly give a reliable judgement on these points. If others want to do this on my pictures , thats fine by me, but I won't do it to others!! I adjust my own pictures for printing, not display on a monitor. If they work on a monitor,fine, if they don't ,too bad!!🙄
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