Criticism

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Have you ever had to deal with (harsh or not-so-harsh) criticism? Did you deal with it well or not-so-well? In the end, what was the result?
 
i havent recieved any as of yet because i havent posted any pics but i see all criticism good criticism as long as they get there point across and dont have a go at you and arent nasty about it.

and besides there helping you to improve but on the other hand their not helping if there shouting and insulting your work
 
Constructive criticism, I feel anyway, can be taken two ways.

Firstly the “what the hell do you know, if I want your opinion I’ll beat it out of you” – this to my mind is the wrong way.

I take any and all criticism as a learning experience. Take for instance, you ask for a critique of a shot on this forum.
Someone says that you “could try and do something this way” it’s not a personal thing it’s just a valid opinion / advice.
You can learn a great deal by listening to constructive advice / criticism.

Out right criticism or rudeness can be taken two ways also – Ignore it and keep on learning or employ the liberal use of some size 12’s.
 
Great Question!!!

Good Crit:
This place is full of it, people offering tips and suggestions on how to improve on a shot. This is very helpful and never seems to be put across in a way which makes you feel like sh*t :thumbs:



Bad Crit:
OK, I have a friend who likes to spend a fair bit on his kit. I have spent a lot more, and have far less experience, and I think this bugs the hell out of him. He seems to critisise me for petty things non stop, things like the way my Camera sounds, or the fact that I haven't bought very expensive prime lenses. He always finishes with something akin to, "My Camera would not have that problem, its a nikon trait to have pics with those issues etc etc"...pics you guys have said here that are decent, he rips to shreads. I just ignore, and no longer share my work with the individual.:thumbsdown:
 
I'm curious if any of you have encountered 'professional' criticism. Say, for example, criticism from magazines, books, or professional photographers. Do you find that criticism on the internet is easier to deal with?
 
Me rarely and then as only good well meaning advice.
If I may I’ll recount something that happened to a young lady just starting out in photography.

She and her Mum were walking around a lake near where I live. They came across a “professional” tog taking some shots of the local bird life on the lake.
The young girl started taking a few shots of her own. The guy turned to her and told her she should leave as she had no place taking photographs with
such a crap camera and that she was making too much noise.

Mum defended her daughters right to shoot what she wanted and things got a little heated. At that point he stormed off with the passing shot
“I’m a professional photographer, I know what I’m talking about”

At the time she had a little 35mm point and shoot and the local kids were feeding the ducks.

A few days later I met them by the lake. We exchanged pleasantries like you do. Then she recounted the story of what happened and that
her daughters enthusiasm for photography had taken one almighty slump. This was the first time since it happened she’d been out with her camera.
I explained to her that not all togs are like that and invited her and Mum to tag along for awhile.
The young lady borrowed my back up D80 and we set about filling some memory cards.A very pleasant afternoon followed,
a million questions asked. She was taking shots like a good’un and her enthusiasm restored.

In this day and age it’s nice that a young person shows an interest in something constructive.
I didn’t do anything special, just passed on a little knowledge. As for that total and utter (insert own word(s) here)
his brand of criticism could have destroyed a kids enthusiasm and we could have lost a potentially great photographer.
I know who he is and if i meet him, he’ll need his “professional” gear surgically removed.

The upshot is the young lady has enrolled in a couple of photography courses at college and is
sporting a sparkly new D80. Her ambition to be a wildlife photographer – All the best to you kid.
 
My OH says I'm far to critical of my own work, he reckons I delete far too many pictures.
I don't post pictures very often but I do apreciate honest opinions, it's how you learn to take better pictures, unfortunately with birds and wildlife it's not always easy to get the perfect pose or background and that is one thing I do find annoying when people say "if you had moved a little to the right" yep it would have made a better picture but often the main subject would not be there :)
I often let people use my camera, specially if they are struggling with a point and shoot, it often is just the encouragement they need to move onto to something a bit better
 
Aiden said:
Me rarely and then as only good well meaning advice.
If I may I’ll recount something that happened to a young lady just starting out in photography.

She and her Mum were walking around a lake near where I live. They came across a “professional” tog taking some shots of the local bird life on the lake.
The young girl started taking a few shots of her own. The guy turned to her and told her she should leave as she had no place taking photographs with
such a crap camera and that she was making too much noise.

Mum defended her daughters right to shoot what she wanted and things got a little heated. At that point he stormed off with the passing shot
“I’m a professional photographer, I know what I’m talking about”

At the time she had a little 35mm point and shoot and the local kids were feeding the ducks.

A few days later I met them by the lake. We exchanged pleasantries like you do. Then she recounted the story of what happened and that
her daughters enthusiasm for photography had taken one almighty slump. This was the first time since it happened she’d been out with her camera.
I explained to her that not all togs are like that and invited her and Mum to tag along for awhile.
The young lady borrowed my back up D80 and we set about filling some memory cards.A very pleasant afternoon followed,
a million questions asked. She was taking shots like a good’un and her enthusiasm restored.

In this day and age it’s nice that a young person shows an interest in something constructive.
I didn’t do anything special, just passed on a little knowledge. As for that total and utter (insert own word(s) here)
his brand of criticism could have destroyed a kids enthusiasm and we could have lost a potentially great photographer.
I know who he is and if i meet him, he’ll need his “professional” gear surgically removed.

The upshot is the young lady has enrolled in a couple of photography courses at college and is
sporting a sparkly new D80. Her ambition to be a wildlife photographer – All the best to you kid.
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Nice one, should be proud of yourself :thumbs:
 
That's a great story Aiden, you should definitely be proud of yourself. :thumbs:

Personally, criticism is the whole point of posting images on forums as long as it's constructive. I had one recently on this very forum where an image was labelled "very standard". Apart from the fact that I don't see how something can be "very" standard :thinking:, I found this less than helpful and asked the poster for some clarification. To this day I have had none. I'm sure that person knows who they are and are welcome to respond here.
 
One problem with posting critisism online (ie here) is that it can be easily mis-understood.
I posted something here recently about some self portraits somebody had taken, and am sure it was taken badly, when it wasn't meant that way. Maybe just me being useless with words, but one does need to be careful to avoid unintentional upset.
 
critism to me is a learning curve ;with good critic i know i am and doing things right ;bad critic means i still have a lot to learn which in my eyes is good as there is something wrong and needs to be looked at .so i take bad critic as a need to improve and the areas needed to improve upon.so good or bad i know were im right or wrong.
 
Critisism is fine, if its constructive. Damning comments help no one, and just make the critisiser look and/or sound up their own ar5e.
A place like this is great for constructive critisism, i have only very rarely read anything that i thought was a little bit harsh without reason.
Another great place for critisism are camera club competitions, the judges can be qiute harsh. Sometimes you can be reeling inside, but you have to let it go,take it on the chin and move on. I always try to enter the same photo in another comp later on in the year, to see what a different judge would make of it.
Dean:)
 
I am all for constructive critisism, but I do find some people dont like me answering the critisism. A lot of my best photos (in my opinion) are shots that I have either been to some effort to take or put a lot of work into, and I have reasons for cetain things in the image etc, people may not like these and point them out as a constructive critisism which is fine, but I have noticed if I respond and explain the reasons for these then some people do seem to take that as "not taking critisism well" where as I see it as just explaining my reasoning. It doesnt bug me really, but does make me think sometimes before responding to any critisism of my shots as I dont want to come over badly.
 
~^^^ good call JL:thumbs:
 
Jimmy_Lemon said:
I am all for constructive critisism, but I do find some people dont like me answering the critisism. A lot of my best photos (in my opinion) are shots that I have either been to some effort to take or put a lot of work into, and I have reasons for cetain things in the image etc, people may not like these and point them out as a constructive critisism which is fine, but I have noticed if I respond and explain the reasons for these then some people do seem to take that as "not taking critisism well" where as I see it as just explaining my reasoning. It doesnt bug me really, but does make me think sometimes before responding to any critisism of my shots as I dont want to come over badly.
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That's a very good point. We should all be prepared to take constructive criticism, but that doesn't mean we have to agree with it. Photography is extremely subjective so criticism will vary wildly and we shouldn't get upset by it if it is negative in any way (but constructive of course), but those people, in turn, shouldn't get upset if we disagree with them.

Of course, being an online forum, we often need to be careful of how we word replies as it is too easy to be misinterpreted. It's amazing how much we rely on body language and facial expressions and, all too often, take them for granted.
 
Whilst I hope I havn't gained a reputation for getting a bit stressed about this sort of thing, I do see both "sides" as it were. Admitedly, I did explode about this kind of thing the other day, and for that I appologise, again :bonk:

I am all in favour of taking constructive criticism in the way that it is intended. Constructively. The act of building upon what you know by way of others is essential. I don't think I'll bother discussing the other way of taking criticism, because lets face it, what is the point? Not taking on board good advice is a waste of everyones time, therefore I render talking about it a waste of time also.

Jimmy has made a very good point imo, and whilst being given good advice is so important, if you spent time composing a shot in such a way that the outcome looks to others as laiden with "mistakes", then defending the shot after posting it can be tricky. As long as people have this in the back of their minds when posting critique, then it makes life alot easier for everyone in the subsequent posts.

Aiden, what a fantastic story. Should be proud of yourself, because I know for one that you have gained a hell of a lot of respect, even though the anonimity of the forum is still somewhat apparent :D

As fabs also points out, text is to a large extent, a contextless medium, and as such comments can be missunderstood easily. I have many a time had to edit my posts after as I missread what poster was saying.

And once again, I am a calm person really! :D
 
steveinspain said:
One problem with posting critisism online (ie here) is that it can be easily mis-understood.
I posted something here recently about some self portraits somebody had taken, and am sure it was taken badly, when it wasn't meant that way. Maybe just me being useless with words, but one does need to be careful to avoid unintentional upset.
Click to expand...

I think the biggest problem with criticism online is that a lot of people only post images that they have spent a lot of time on and obviously think they are good (or they wouldn't have posted them). Usually (perhaps subconsciously) they are looking for a wee ego boost and when some one comes along and criticises they can become a tad defensive. As you say it's not that easy to get across your actual point when typing.
 
i dont presume to know enough about the medium of photography to give overly technical opinions.
i tend to keep my criticism too
" maybe I would do such and such " .
"i PERSONALY find A,B,C MAYBE immproved if you did x"
or even " i like it"
ive seen shots that some people didnt like much, but i loved . and vice versa.
remember that criticism should be as constructive as possible, and they are just that. peoples OPINIONS.
and even if you think people are having a dig, or being overly critical. dont take it personaly.
it doesnt always mean theyre right.
 
I have found the constructive criticism useful so far. For example, someone told me to play with the levels to give more punch. I did that and it was like removing a grey haze from my photos and I have learnt an important skill.

I'd prefer for my posts to receive constructive criticism than indifference.

I'm also going to try leaving more comments on peoples posts, but my worry is that my complete inexperience may annoy people, like "what does he know about this?"
 
I love to deal with criticsm, the harsher the better. As long as it's constructive, or justified, then it shows that someone is actually spending a lot of time analysing your picture and giving you feedback. It's all good.

It's the ones who post 'I don't get it' or 'it's crap' that get up my nose. Especially when you check up their photography and its less than excellent....well, that actually makes me feel better in the end, especially if they're spent a lot of money on decent kit :D
 
When I first start posting images here I though some ( read most) were the canine testicles.
It was pointed out on more than one occasion that actually they were more like the canine by-product.
but that was OK because it was always ( read mostly) followed by "if you do had / done this / that etc.
If it wasn't for the critique I had received, no doubt I would still be posting crap ( OK OK don't say it :D )
and thinking it was the best thing ever.

I also like to reply to the person providing the critque with a "thanks yeah I see what you mean"
or maybe even "can you elborate as I can't see what you mean"

If I think I can add something constructive I will.
But Some of the posters do themselves no favours sometimes I have noticed that the "OO great"
comments get a reaction from the OP
But the if you had done "this" it might have helped, post get totally ignored
which is a shame its easy to post "Oo great" but takes time to post constructive criticism.
So I guess, like always there is always two sides to this

Finally if I didn't want or expect critque I wouldn't post here.
If its crap I would expect to be told :thumbs:
 
Personally I love constructive criticsim, it doesn't matter to me whether the person giving the critique is a competent photographer or not. Everyone can look at a photo and tell you what they do and don't like or how it makes them feel.

I give critique where I can but at times have been reluctant to do so. In a recent thread I commented on being unsure whether I liked the processing or not, everyone who commented after me then went on to mention the processing, I felt awful afterwards for having mentioned it. My website also received the most hits it's ever had from that one thread, I can only assume it was to check whether people felt I was qualified enough to make such a comment.
 
I am new to this and still getting to grips with my camera etc.I post photos here hoping to get helpful C&C which I have recieved every time.I posted a photo the other day of my Wifes friends which was probably below the average standards here,Some-one kindly tweaked it and explained what they had done.I showed it to the couple,they loved it and asked me to do an A3 print for them.So thanks to all for C&C
 
I recently posted some pics on here, i knew the processing wasn't very good and asked for help with that, most of the replies were helpful. One reply on the other hand seemed very aggresive in its tone and wasn't really helpful in what i was trying to achieve. I am still learning loads about photograpghy and i not have the skills that a lot of people on here do espically in post processing but its all about learning.

Helpful cirtisum is good, ie why not do this instead type stuff, or if you do this you can achieve this. Also there is nothing wrong with saying something is not to your taste which is what i feel leads to a lot of none constructive critisum.

Ian - i would agree your skill has no relavance on weather or not you can comment on a photo and make a valid coment. As you can say you can always say what you like/dislike about a pic.
 
I`m so lacking in confidence of my own ability that a)I wouldn`t dare criticise any of the pics I`ve viewed,as all seem to be exceedingly good in comparison to my best efforts b) when I do eventually summon up the courage I`m expecting to be ripped apart but I`m big and ugly enough to take it on the chin.Everyone can`t be pro`s from the word go. (Can they?)
 
There are alot of hypocrits on here though numorus times ive seen people commenting on someones pic as ****ed because its at a bad angle or the horizon isnt straight. Yet some people have posted say a beach shot with it completely at an angle and people reply its a great shot.
 
What a cool discussion, it's a very complicated area but looks like fun to ramble with a little. :D

There are some very different reasons for posting up images and each probably require a totally different approach.

lets start with the "here's a shot I'm really happy with. How does it make you feel, what do you think?" post. This a question that absolutely everyone is qualified to answer. Doesn't matter if you've never held a camera or even seen a photograph before. If you have a feeling about it, share it. There are no wrong answers, you don't have to agree with anyone and some 30 year pro's opinion has not a gram more weight than a totally fresh face.

When someone shares a shot that has matched their vision, or even just been a pleasant surprise and they like it as it is. Then we have a duty to be mindful of what we say. It's possible that we might have liked to try a slightly different angle or tweak some part of the shot. It is NOT our right however to say it it would be BETTER if..........

Then there are the shots that people post with the question "I've tried to do x,y or z and where do I go from here". This is totally different and here there is slightly more grey area of who is qualified to reply. Of course anyone can still have a feeling about the shots, even if you don't personally have a grasp of the techy stuff involved. There seems to always be a good group on here that are happy to share knowledge that newer folk turn into experience and then in turn pass on again.

I know for myself when I post shots I'm really not in the least bit fussed what people say about them. I post them mostly to reciprocate to the people that show me their work and I just like the idea that someone has looked and had an opinion. I've already pulled it all to pieces, chances are it matches my vision and therefor has already ticked all my boxes.

I do worry sometimes that there are people out there that match the shots they see to the text books they have read and run a check list to see if they are good. This "interpretation" is then passed on as fact. Art just doesn't work that way. Sometimes the rules do help and there are shots, where for example the rule of 1/3rds or not putting the horizon halfway up the frame make sense but you cant actually make art that way. Good art comes from passion and creativity and these attributes simply cannot be found in books.

I do sometimes still like to spend to time with seasoned snappers that can teach me things about science and craft. I always LOVE to spend time with snappers that have no techy knowledge whatsoever but that fabulous passion for making images.

Ramble off......... :lol:
 
There isn't such thing as positive constructive criticism, theres just positive comments.
Everyone loves positive comments, obviously, and if someone tells me my shot is fantastic, it puts a massive grin on my face and increases my desire to shoot!

Now, negative comments i.e. "This shot is crap" or "This shot doesn't work".
No one likes them. But not because they aren't constructive, thats not the sole reason. No one likes negative comments about their work.
I'm a culprit for giving these sorts of comments. I never say them deliberately. Never with the intent of trying to hurt the individual.
When I get negative comments like this, it does knock my confidence, and it does feel upsetting, but you've just got to try and brush them off and carry on doing what you love.

Negative, constructive comments.
Now, as I said, no one likes negative comments, but constructive ones are easier to take.
If you say why you don't like a shot, and how to improve it, its a lot nicer.
If someone makes a constructive comment that I agree with i.e. 'This isn't very sharp, try AI servo and a faster shutter speed', then I wholeheartedly accept it with a smile.
If someone makes a constructive comment that I don't agree with i.e. 'The processing you've done makes the atmosphere feel false, try this', then usually I will defend myself, because I chose the processing for a reason.

The way to give criticism is very simple, and can be followed in steps:

"The general overview of how you feel about the photo"
"What you like about the photo and why"
"What you don't like about the photo and why"
"How they can improve the photo"

Its very important to include something you like about the photo. It neutralises the negativity and makes the person feel a lot better about the criticism rather than knocking their confidence, yet still gives them the insight to improve.
 
:agree: completely foodpoison!

Negative or not so positive comments are ok I think, AS LONG as they are not downright rude and are followed by a piece of advice or some sort of constructive comment that explains why it is they feel that the image is lacking or does not work in whatever way. I have sometimes seen comments which honestly are not helpful at all and could definitely be interpreted in an extremely negative way.

at the same time, you dont have to like every image that you comment on! its ok to be negative, just be mindful that the OP posted the image most likely for some help and advice, not to be told that they should never have bothered in the first place.

:)
 
I honestly wouldn't mind if someone came on and said that a photo I posted was completey s***, as long as they said why they felt it was. I'm a perfectionist and far harder on myself than anyone could ever be :)
 
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