A Level Playing field - for Critique

Level Playing field for Critique - Yay or Nay

  • Yes please, I think it needs to be more fair

    Votes: 10 23.8%

  • No Thanks, it works fine as it is

    Votes: 32 76.2%
  • Total voters
    42
  • Poll closed .
Pookeyhead said:
. I think the only thing needs to be avoided is false praise where it's not deserved, and [PLEASE DON'T TRY TO BYPASS THE SWEAR FILTER], such as saying it's sharp when it's not. Avoid that, and you'll just be giving an honest opinion.
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holy crap - after all that , finally something about which David and I agree , praise be to any non specific diety
 
big soft moose said:
um no , it was you who was implying that when you said that any photograph not taken with a purely artistic motivation was crap
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But being paid to paint or take a portrait doesn't mean it wasn't created with artistic integrity. Where did I say that? Where did I ever say that art wasn't also a lucrative commercial enterprise if played correctly?

You place a great deal assumption into what I say.
 
big soft moose said:
okay you sauid " did you mean your model to look like a prostitute " ... the semantic difference between a street prostitute and a cheap whore escapes me i'm afraid
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One is a correct term of reference... the other is intended as a slur and an insult. The fact that you are now arguing over this confirms my suspicions about you.
 
Pookeyhead said:
One is a correct term of reference... the other is intended as a slur and an insult. The fact that you are now arguing over this confirms my suspicions about you.
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I have no intention of arguing the semantic difference between prostitute, and whore - especially as there isnt one. But if you are going to try and claim some sort of pathetic point scoring exercise by saying that i am "as usual paraphrasing you badly" you don't have any claim to the moral high ground when it comes to pursuing pointless arguments.
 
Pookeyhead said:
But being paid to paint or take a portrait doesn't mean it wasn't created with artistic integrity. Where did I say that? Where did I ever say that art wasn't also a lucrative commercial enterprise if played correctly?
.
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and you fail to read what ive actually said , rather than reading your own predjudices into what you think ive said.

My point was that if a potrait painter is motivated to paint , for example a portrait of King Henry 8th by monetary concerns (and possibly the likelyhood of execution if he doesnt please the king) then he isn't being motivated by artistic concerns or the need to make a statement... but this doesn't mean its not art.

whatever - i'm done with both you and this pointless debate
 
Phew.. I'd thought you'd never stop.
 
Ok guys, back on track, let not have " he said, she said". There's three of you going in circles and all of you think your right, when probably you're all a little right and all a little wrong ;)
...unless any of you are female when of course they can't be wrong :)
 
Byker28i said:
Ok guys, back on track, let not have " he said, she said". There's three of you going in circles and all of you think your right, when probably you're all a little right and all a little wrong ;)
...unless any of you are female when of course they can't be wrong :)
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I've got moobs does that count?
 
I appreciate the way crit has helped me develop through this site. On another forum someone posted some images taken with a film camera that were blurry, lacking any kind of meaningful composition and were generally badly exposed. Previously I would have simply told them that I'd have binned them and tried to do better next time, but instead I asked them what they had been trying to create*.

Thank you for giving me another tool in my diplomatic bag. ;)

*After several days there was no answer. :(
 
Well, I'm afraid that, having read this thread, I'm coming to the conclusion that posting anything for critique is pointless. On the one hand, we can't comment on intentions or meaning, because we either don't know what is the artist's (sorry, wrong word, because of the assumption it carries) photographer's intention or meaning, or it was intended to be left to us to interpret it (making it doubly pointless, since it's then a subjective interpretation based on an assumption of intent).

On the other hand - technical critique? We've just seen the impossibility here, with an image posted where you couldn't tell (from the size) what was ot wasn't sharp, or see a lighthouse (again too small). Add in the uncertainty about the colours, brightness and contrast (is your monitor showing the same colours as mine? Is it brighter or less bright, higher or lower contrast, same gamut etc. as mine?) and it becomes difficult to say if the exposure - or anything else - was correct.

I assume - and I admit that this is an assumption, because it's the way I work - that every single so called technical point has an artistic overtone and reason. Exposure - "under" and "over" can both be done deliberately for a reason; camera shake, subject movement, sharp or unsharp - all to me are artistic decisions before they are technical. Because I'm starting with the assumption that the photographer knew what they were doing. And if they don't say that they don't, how can we tell. Personally, I have found it helps me immensely to always assume that the photographer meant to do exactly what they did, and attempt to understand the image on that basis. Only when it becomes impossible to find a reason do I explore the possibility that they got it technically wrong. Yes, it makes things harder to critique if you do it this way - but I get far more out of the exercise.

Anyway - net result - avoid critique based on intentions, because it's going to be wrong. And, from my point of view, avoid critique on technique because on the one hand it depends on the intent (so I couldn't give it and be self consistent) and on the other you can't objectively measure it from a forum post anyway.
 
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I appear to have opened a thread on the advanced metaphysics of photography :)

I, and I suspect the majority (yup this is an assumption), of TP members see a photograph and post some observations on what they see.

Cheers.
 
big soft moose said:
... - but its unfortunate that you seem to have fallen into the common trap for highly qualified academics of thinking that mastery of your subject also indicates mastery of other areas, ...
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Did you just call pookeyhead a "highly qualified academic"? ... :confused: Let's keep things down to Earth a bit, eh?
 
StephenM said:
Well, I'm afraid that, having read this thread, I'm coming to the conclusion that posting anything for critique is pointless. On the one hand, we can't comment on intentions or meaning, because we either don't know what is the artist's (sorry, wrong word, because of the assumption it carries) photographer's intention or meaning, or it was intended to be left to us to interpret it
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It's all still valid. Saw a thread the other day (didn't post in it) for crit on a self portrait. It was black and white, a bloke staring intently at the camera with a really direct gaze and no smile. He was dressed in a black leather jacket, and was in some kind of tunnel or underpass, at night. Now.. was it a good self portrait? It depends on intent. IS the man as mean and intimidating as he looked in the photo? If not, was he trying to give that impression? If he isn't, and wasn't, then perhaps it's not a great self portrait, as the message (Intense stare, no smile, dressed leather, at night, in a slightly intimidating environment) has all the connotations of him being perhaps a bit street-wise... can handle himself.. someone who don't want to tangle with. Those assumptions about people may be wrong - stereotyping always is, but they are there, they exist, and they are usually the first thing to cross someone's mind.


Technically, it was really good. Couldn't fault it really.. but it doesn't mean it was a good self portrait. If the said person isn't a bit of a hard case, nor was he trying for that... then you could argue that it's giving the wrong message. Seeing as a portrait should give some insight into the person who is the subject, it could be said that it's not quite as successful as it could have been. If you only comment on the technical, none of that would ever be raised.


Ulfric M Douglas said:
Did you just call pookeyhead a "highly qualified academic"? ... :confused: Let's keep things down to Earth a bit, eh?
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...and I see no reason to make smug, personal remarks about people. That's just low, and uncalled for. You have no idea what my academic qualifications are, so what's your problem?
 
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Pookeyhead said:
...and I see no reason to make smug, personal remarks about people. That's just low, and uncalled for. You have no idea what my academic qualifications are, so what's your problem?
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I'm pretty sure that's called a joke, David.
 
The23rdman said:
I'm pretty sure that's called a joke, David.
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If it was, then I apologise unreservedly. I am however, attacked with monotonous regularity these threads. I enter them with shields up :)
 
Pookeyhead said:
If it was, then I apologise unreservedly. I am however, attacked with monotonous regularity these threads. I enter them with shields up :)
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David, you have to consider the posts you make in much the same way as photos posted for crit. :D
 
Which makes my point nicely actually... that photographs are texts. They have meaning, and sometimes how you formulate the words can give a meaning you never intended. It's no surprise the theories of sign and signification in photography are identical to those of language. In fact, Saussure who was a founding theorist in this area was a linguist, not a visual artist of any kind. Image/text.. totally interchangeable semiotically.

Edit..

Sorry... forgot the wry smiley... the sign that qualifies the signification of my text ;)
 
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And some people don't understand that the language they use, and the way they use it, says more about them than the point they are making. Some people really don't want to understand that.

That often applies to a photograph, or a painting, or a sculpture, or anything else as well.
 
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I refer everyone to my signature.
 
The23rdman said:
I refer everyone to my signature.
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Which only shows in the first comment you post in a thread. As this is page five (on an iPad at least), can you tell me where it is? ;)
 
Bythesea said:
Which only shows in the first comment you post in a thread. As this is page five (on an iPad at least), can you tell me where it is? ;)
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I can tell you what it says... "If you think you know what's going on you're probably full of s***." - Robert Anton Wilson.
 
As most people are partially full of s*** ( in a literal sense), does this mean that everyone partially knows what's going on?

Between us we must know everything so that would explain why everyone can be both right and wrong at the same time.
 
I'm not certain, but I think R. A. Wilson was more of a everyone's wrong all of the time type of guy.

He was wrong of course. ;)
 
More of a truth is always relative kinda guy.
 
simon ess said:
That's fair enough.

I was made aware of him a few years back and have him on my to read list. Haven't got to him yet.
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Then you have a feast of delights in store.
 
Excellent!

Actually, thinking about it, the people who made me aware of him may very well have mis-read him.

I'll bump him up the list.
 
simon ess said:
Excellent!

Actually, thinking about it, the people who made me aware of him may very well have mis-read him.

I'll bump him up the list.
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His work covers a vast number of fields. My favourite is Quantum Psychology.
 
I'll admit to Mr Wilson passing me by too. Thanks to a 3G Kindle, you just cost me £5.99 :)
 
He splits opinions so it'll be interesting to hear how you get on.
 
big soft moose said:
If we take another example, If I post this for crit

skyesunset1.jpg


And you tell me that it's clear that i was intending to evoke the tranquility of the scottish wildernes, and that the juxtaposition of the light house is clear symbolism of mans isolation in the wilderness, or some such

Then that helps me not at all (especially as the principal motivation was "oh thats a pretty view, may be i'll be able to sell it as a print")

If you tell me that ive over cooked the processing, blocked the blacks, should have used a grad filter to retain detail in the foreground , that there's cack on the sensor , and the sillohouttes arent quite sharp due to the tripod not being as steady as it should have been - and that generally its not very good , and it could have been done better by doing x,y, z - then thats actually helpful and worthwhile.... and accurate

(btw before anyone starts with 'if thats the best you can do' type comments, this was shot in 2007 with my first DSLR - I'm only using it as an example because it was the first suitable shot that came to hand.)
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And perhaps this isn't the primary purpose of crit, but that second sort of analysis and review helps every one of us beginners because we can then analyse the image and start to understand the critique. Which is the real "network effect" of forums such as this...
 
The23rdman said:
His work covers a vast number of fields. My favourite is Quantum Psychology.
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Or "b*****ks" as it is referred to by people who work with real quantum science.

What is it about quantum physics that attracts so much glib pseudoscientific garbage?

Deepak Chopra is the best at this. He's a right hoot.
 
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ghoti said:
Or "b*****ks" as it is referred to by people who work with real quantum science.

What is it about quantum physics that attracts so much glib pseudoscientific garbage?
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Read it have you?
 
The23rdman said:
Read it have you?
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No, but every single attempt to mesh quantum physics with psychology (and - groan - consciousness) is riddled with pseudoscientific babble. Fundamentally so, since real quantum science says nothing about the subject.
It ranges in credibility from the highly speculative to outright new-age ramblings.

Although I see the book has been criticised for being speculative and lacking empirical support, which figures. And the author is not a physicist of any kind.
These texts are usually impressive, hand-wavy language with little going on beneath the surface, written by and for people with no real understanding of quantum science.

You should read "Intellectual Impostures" by Alan Sokal and Jean Briqmont (two proper physicists). It does a thorough and amusing job of dismantling this kind of hijacking & abuse of real science by hand-wavy philosophers and sociologists.
 
It also sounds like your man might be an epistemological relativist, which usually means someone is either a troll or a loon.
 
I suggest you move on then. It's not for you.
 
For what it's worth, I read RAW for entertainment. Anyone who reads a book and takes it as science is daft.
 
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