let's talk about improvement...

alexsoch said:
It's a great idea to talk about improvement, about growing. Of course, it depends on your ambitions, why you want grow?... To make a better picture then somebody else, to 'beat' someone, or just to express yourself in the best way with rf camera, of course ;)? I think, the best tutorial is to start to know yourself.
Duane Michals, one of my favourite photographers talks about it very well:


'You must find your real thing,
you must find your passion, your must find your fear,
it's not outside, its not in Africa, its not in somebody else,
it's in you.'
Duane Michals
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thank you, that´s a wonderful quote. i wonder why so many people here seem to be so unhappy with their images.....
 
maddoc said:
If you want to change your photographs, you need to change cameras. Changing cameras means that your photographs will change. A really good camera has something I suppose you might describe as its own distinctive aura. – Nobuyoshi Araki

I like that concept.
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This is superb got lot of meaning and sense
 
Sometimes I find the emotional feeling that made me take images evaporates by the time I process them For instance recently i got to drive a steam train, I took pictures on the footplate none of them do more than record the moment.
The images are OK but just for me really, not art and doesn't have to be.

I think leaving a week or two between taking and developing helps me sort the wheat from the chaff, but sometimes a photo has something of you or your life in it, probably shouldn't be shared.

One such image is this one from my holiday where my children collected flowers that has fell from a shrub, the air was warm and the children put the flowers in a dish which I took with the last light of a lovely summer day, emotive to me but a so so image to the rest of humanity.

flowers by Photo Utopia, on Flickr

Probably shouldn't be shown...
 
A lot of folks need to forget what they think is cool, and what they think makes them look cool when they carry it, and forget the trends and "instant truths" of the moment. They need to look at good photography from the distant past to the present and decide for themselves what is good and why. When I was a noobie in the 1950s, I had all these hangups. Gear changes but people don't-- not much, anyway. I owned two Leicas but had them because they did the job for me at the time. I now own more than 50 film cameras and no Leicas. I am sort of looking around for a Nicca, however.
 
squareshooter said:
A lot of folks need to forget what they think is cool, and what they think makes them look cool when they carry it, and forget the trends and "instant truths" of the moment. They need to look at good photography from the distant past to the present and decide for themselves what is good and why. When I was a noobie in the 1950s, I had all these hangups. Gear changes but people don't-- not much, anyway. I owned two Leicas but had them because they did the job for me at the time. I now own more than 50 film cameras and no Leicas. I am sort of looking around for a Nicca, however.
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Teuthida said:
1: avoid the picturesque, always.
2: never try to emulate someone else
3: be selective in what you show others
4: develop a style YOU like and ignore others criticisms
5: never, ever, equate sharp with good.
6: forget your gear.
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The best, both.

And 6 is timeless these days and seems to be more difficult.
XA and R are all I need, but can't stop thinking about older M. :)
 
back alley said:
i propose we start talking more about how we can improve our skills.
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In my opinion, a big start for a lot of photographers seeking improvement would be honesty. Honesty about what is actually holding them back, as I suspect they already know, and honesty about whether they actually wish to improve and do what it takes. Photography should be no different than any other subject in which one wishes to improve at, however most people simply do not want to do what it takes to improve, in my opinion.
 
I shoot a lot of landscapes, scenics, and still ilfe shots and after a while they all started to look the same: technically sound but pretty much boring and meaningless. After a goodly long while of wandering around with a camera and framing a lot of photos without pressing the shutter release, I started asking myself "What is it about <subject> that makes me want to photograph it?" Now I try to make the photo answer that question. My photos are getting more abstract and it's definitely more difficult than taking a pretty postcard shot, but I like the direction I'm going and I'm having much more fun.
 
The name of the game is to be able to get the kind of image you are looking to get. If one can pick up a great tip on how to do so from another shooter, well that is great. One person's "high fashion" is overexposed nonsense to another. So be it. But are you getting the picture exactly as you want it or are you settling for auto-exposure, auto-focus, auto-decisivemement?
 
cat man said:
Sid. Have you been setting fire to zebras again?
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Oh oh. I started the Inquisition on RFF.

I have only sat a cat's tail on fire. That was years ago. Luckily, it wasn't hurt and I didn't get caught.

But I remembered the Richard Pryor skit after he was burned while freebasing cocaine. He said they should introduce fire into the Olympics because man do you run fast when you are on fire. I would imagine a zebra would too.

Morale of the story? If your photography is not improving, put more fire into it.
 
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It's Frederick H. Evans who set the standards for me. A google search is worth the time. Mr. Evans operated a small book store for years before retiring to photograph the Abbeys and Cathedrals. Each shot is close to perfect. In the Aperture book he was described as waiting for hours or days to get the light just perfect. Then there was the fight over the furniture that needed to be arranged or moved. So what we have is dedication to photography that wasn't, at that time, considered an art.

He's one of my heros.
 
I think the best way to improve your skill is to: A. Take more pictures. B. Show them, either in a contest or on a site that offers critiques. C. Compare your pix to those of others and be critical. I'm happy to hear any criticism that anyone will bring, so long as it's constructive.
 
I think one important thing is to accept your weaknesses and work with your strengths.
For example, I know I will never be a good 'people' or 'street' photographer. I'm extremely introvert and people make me nervous, I don't 'connect' with them. So rather than try and be the next Koudelka I should rather focus on things that I actually have a knack for.
 
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