What is it, about ...

Most if not all Landscape Photographers will have been inspired by and driven to visit a place they have seen in a photograph, what exactly is wrong with that ? They then make their own original version of that shot. Whether you feel it is original or not is immaterial as someone else never having see the place or the shot will. Hence I have sold many different versions of my own shots to happy clients who now display them on their walls, no doubt they will inspire others to go to the same place.

Live and let Live I say
 
Andrew Davies Photography said:
Most if not all Landscape Photographers will have been inspired by and driven to visit a place they have seen in a photograph, what exactly is wrong with that ?
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Absolutely nothing. Visiting the same place to take the same shot seems a bit redundant though.

Andrew Davies Photography said:
They then make their own original version of that shot.
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Well... that's what we're debating isn't it. Do they?

Andrew Davies Photography said:
I have sold many different versions of my own shots to happy clients who now display them on their walls, no doubt they will inspire others to go to the same place.
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Maybe. Whether they do something original isn't guaranteed though.

Andrew Davies Photography said:
Live and let Live I say
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Stop taking everything as a personal attack. This is "Talk Photography" and we're talking about photography. You chose to volunteer your work as an example of originality, not me.


It's impossible to discuss this without people spitting their dummies out in here.

Andrew Davies Photography said:
No they are not the same shot
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Explain the differences to me please.
 
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If you could bottle how different people saw shots and work out why one person liked shot a over shot b you would be a multi-billionaire.

If you posted all of those shots to a site and asked people to vote for their favorite you would end up with different scores for each, thats life, thats people and thats what makes photography so great.
 
....so what are the differences?
 
Andrew Davies Photography said:
If you could bottle how different people saw shots and work out why one person liked shot a over shot b you would be a multi-billionaire.
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No you wouldn't.. because the answer is obvious. They'd like the one with the most visual impact, eye candy and "wow" factor. That's what Joe public want. You could have done all that without standing in the same bloody place and taking the same bloody shot though :)
 
If you are going to take a matter of fact scientific approach to Art then you are always going to struggle to understand it.

I have some lovely shots of a place called Roseberry Topping on my site for instance, some wow shots, colourful shots etc, yet the best seller of my images is a very plain and not wow shot at all of the hill from behind a gate. I could never had guessed that would sell more.
 
Andrew Davies Photography said:
If you are going to take a matter of fact scientific approach to Art then you are always going to struggle to understand it.
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There's nothing scientific in establishing what makes popularist images popular.

I understand art very well.


You've still not answered the question... what makes those images I posted so different from one another. Can you list the reasons they're different?
 
It doesn't matter if it has been done before as long as you are enjoying yourself
I just do my own thing
But I don't try to duplicate shot's
I just photograph what I'm into which happens to be wildlife
I do what I want to do not what someone else thinks I should be doing
There's not that many species of insects in the UK for example but I still go out and get different shots to what I did last year
 
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I went to Northumberland on holiday and took some low down photos of the castles with rocks and milky water. Nothing at all original or artistic about them, but they look 'nice' and are bit of eye candy.

My parents prefer this kind of photo as it is 'nice' and they dont need to think or try to understand what the photo is saying whereas they dislike most of my photos that I am most proud of where I feel I have produced an image that has something interesting to say or that is important to me.
 
Pookeyhead said:
The "There's nothing new under the sun" (I'm not pretentious enough to write it in Latin Rob) argument is staggeringly lame I'm afraid.
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Oh that cuts me deep...

;)
 
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Steve said:
I went to Northumberland on holiday and took some low down photos of the castles with rocks and milky water. Nothing at all original or artistic about them, but they look 'nice' and are bit of eye candy.
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Yep. Many in here seem to think I'm being elitist or something.. I'm not. Just be honest about what you've got. You'll never convince anyone that it's anything other than eye candy, so just tell it like it is. I admire that more than someone trying to explain why a slightly different light, or different processing makes it different or any more worthy than the tens of thousands of other shots of the same thing from the same place, because it doesn't.


If you enjoy that... then do it, and it's no one else's business. However... show it, and it will obviously divide opinion. The slightly irritating thing is that it seems perfectly acceptable to rip art to pieces with impunity, but if I come at this from the other direction and criticise eye candy, I'm being nasty and insulting.


Steve said:
My parents prefer this kind of photo as it is 'nice' and they dont need to think or try to understand what the photo is saying
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Which is why they are popular.. same with the Daily Mail, The Sun, Coronation Street, Hollywood action movies, pop music... nothing wrong with any of that (well... plenty wrong with The Sun and the Daily Mail actually), but let's not pretend any of it is what it's not.
 
What is it about?

I think it's about people doing whatever they damn well choose to do.

I'm going to buy a Leica M9 and the most expensive lenses for it I can find, just to take pictures of my cat.

And I'm definitely going to get a personalised number plate; D0SH 1 sounds good.

:rolleyes:

Why do people care so much what other people do when it has no impact on them whatsoever?

If yet more images of the same landmarks are posted here for critique, I have no problem with a comment such as, "could you perhaps have considered trying an alternative viewpoint?"
But to be bothered if that person wants to take the same shot as a million others is, frankly, odd.
 
simon ess said:
I'm going to buy a Leica M9 and the most expensive lenses for it I can find, just to take pictures of my cat.
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The red dot brigade will hunt you down and burn you as a witch :)
 
PMN said:
Considering this is the second thread started by the same person in the last few days that's basically ended up the same way (a bit of a slanging match), I'm kinda wondering if that was the intention...
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Feel the same here,maybe we got a bit of a :troll: :rolleyes:
 
PMN said:
Considering this is the second thread started by the same person in the last few days that's basically ended up the same way (a bit of a slanging match), I'm kinda wondering if that was the intention...
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The intention was to promote sensible debate about aspects of what we all do - photography. I think that's worthy of enquiry, and is what we're here for. Isn't it? Or would you have us all being like sheep?
 
droj said:
The intention was to promote sensible debate about aspects of what we all do - photography. I think that's worthy of enquiry, and is what we're here for. Isn't it? Or would you have us all being like sheep?
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Don't turn this round on me, you're the one whinging about how boring other people's photos can be.

Personally I wouldn't have anyone else do anything, it's none of my damned business what they do. I have my inspirations and they're what I pay attention to, I pay little attention to the stuff I'm not a fan of. A simple and easy choice we all have.
 
I used to say that no one has had an original idea in 40 years! While that is a bit flippant I (in part) stand by it.

What odds does it make though?

I have only glanced through the thread but it all seems a bit cyclical (is that a word? Could be).
 
jonbeeza said:
Yes of course that's why I still get out and take photos, because they are mine and I took them. Reminds me of the London Red bus copyright issues, nobody else could take a photo of a Red London bus, on a bridge or something I think it was. Can't remember if it was on here or someplace else, will have to try and look for it now..
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there was background to that one though iirc , hadn't the infringer previously breached copyright by nicking a picture , and when ruled against then went out and replicated it instead - thus getting it ruled that this was also copyright infringement. The judgement wasn't that no one could take a picture of a bus on a bridge under any circumstances without breaching the litigants copyright, just that the particular respondent couldn't due to their past history
 
big soft moose said:
there was background to that one though iirc , hadn't the infringer previously breached copyright by nicking a picture , and when ruled against then went out and replicated it instead - thus getting it ruled that this was also copyright infringement. The judgement wasn't that no one could take a picture of a bus on a bridge under any circumstances without breaching the litigants copyright, just that the particular respondent couldn't due to their past history
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Thanks for that Pete, I had an idea there might have been a little more to it ;)
 
PMN said:
Don't turn this round on me, you're the one whinging about how boring other people's photos can be ....
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If I'm whingeing, then you're being petulant. Slapsticks at dawn?
 
droj said:
If I'm whingeing, then you're being petulant. Slapsticks at dawn?
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Rubbish. Just get on with your own photography rather than whinging about other people's, which part of that is so difficult for you to understand? You've started two threads recently whinging about things you can very easily ignore, what's your problem?
 
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Stevie- said:
I used to say that no one has had an original idea in 40 years!
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The world is full of examples of people having original ideas every single day.
 
I thought you said that standing in the same place doesn't result in similar photos? :)
 
droj said:
What is it, about piers, jetties, castles, waterfalls and many other things, that draws many a photographer to more or less replicate a shot that's been taken many times before?

It can get boring. Even worse perhaps are birds caught or made stationary with every feather visible in detail, as if you could immobilise nature - this is surely a form of objectification? Should photography be about cliché, or something deeper?

Street photography is a minefield - a hundred photos are random pointings of the camera, and maybe another ten have meaning. What are we all aiming for?
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Pretentious?.....Moi???? I have never read such self-righteous clap-trap in my life.

People take photographs of nice looking things/scenes - it just so happens that more or less everyone perceives the same things to look nice. If you can put your own stamp on it then that's all well and good but is it not enough just to take a nice photograph any more??

Ps this seems to be a follow on from some critique given to some of my images here. I believe one of my my images of the Lake District was referred to as "hackneyed".
 
Andrew Davies Photography said:
Every single moment captured is unique , that is unless your a wedding tog - then you will find Uncle Bob has the amazing ability to follow you round and duplicate every shot :)
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... from a slightly different angle and ensuring that at least one guest isn't looking at the main camera :lol:
 
A lot of people on here (although not all) do like to simply recreate shots that have been taken a thousand times before. The hard part for me was accepting that lack of originality. I have, I can now move on:)

If thats what they want to do then so be it. Its not for me to tell them how or what to shoot.

For those who say there is nothing left to shoot 'that hasn't been overdone' are imo very shortsighted as I don't think we've even scratched the surface yet.
 
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