Kaizen

[chuasam]

Is it Normal or even Healthy to be totally chuffed with a photo one week, and the next week you look at it and go...pah! I could do much better than that.

Though once in maybe 50,000 photos, I see an image that I am so happy with that it stays permanently in my good books.

 

[Derrel]

I try to avoid evaluating a photo until I've forgotten almost everything from the actual shoot in which it was created. Seems much easier to really like an image if it is not within my most recent category; I think sometimes the spirit of the shoot, or the energy from the shoot, or the feeling of success during the shoot--something like that, tends to influence one's opinion of the image or images. So, yeah...it **is** common to be totally stoked about a particular image, and then after a short time think, "WTF was I thinking!?"

I think you've actually brought up something almost universal, and important to us.

 

[tirediron]

...So, yeah...it **is** common to be totally stoked about a particular image, and then after a short time think, "WTF was I thinking!?".

I think that might be a bit extreme.... I'll often be completely in love with an image, and then after the initial romance cools down, look at it and go, "Hmmm.. could have improved, this, that... etc", but rarely do I ever go off it entirely.

 

[limr]

And then there are the opposite moments when you dismiss a photo initially, then come across it again months later and wonder why you hadn't noticed it before.

The brain is a fickle beast.

 

[Derrel]

Three different variations of how time can affect our sense of a photo's degree of perfection.

And then there are the opposite moments when you dismiss a photo initially, then come across it again months later and wonder why you hadn't noticed it before.

The brain is a fickle beast.

Yes, this is common too, and for me, this belated recognition of a good image only after the passage of a substabtial amoiunt of time seems to relate to, again, the way I perceived the shoot, and what shots I thought **at the time of shooting** were the "good shots". I think it is always best to WAIT before doing an edit/culling process for a shoot, since at times there's some sense of urgency to find the good shots, which as I think I;ve mentioned, are often ones we just "know" will be the good shots. It's a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy...we encounter a subject or a scene, react favorably to it, and then photograph it, and are sure that the photos made of it are "good shots".

Digitial shooting makes the edit/culling process more difficult in some ways than film, since digital shoots can be fast-paced, freewheeling, and high in volume, whereas film shoots tend to be slower-paced and lower in volume: 36-shot 35mm roll versusu a 387 frame CF card, for example...one is a roll of film the other more than ten rolls' equivalent.

But yeah...it seems that the true appreciation level that we have for a photo is not always established immediately after the photo has been made, and that appreciation level is not fixed and unvarying.

I think this issue that chuasam brought up is a very significant one. Picking out the absolute winners is NOT always easy!

 

[smoke665]

The brain is a fickle beast.

Even worse as you age, find myself being able to remember something from 20 years ago, yet can't remember what I had for supper last night. The good side to that is, every time I open a photo, chances are I will be seeing it again for the 1st time.

 

[chuasam]

I try to avoid evaluating a photo until I've forgotten almost everything from the actual shoot in which it was created. Seems much easier to really like an image if it is not within my most recent category; I think sometimes the spirit of the shoot, or the energy from the shoot, or the feeling of success during the shoot--something like that, tends to influence one's opinion of the image or images. So, yeah...it **is** common to be totally stoked about a particular image, and then after a short time think, "WTF was I thinking!?"

I think you've actually brought up something almost universal, and important to us.

But quite often I work with a fast turn around and need to get the image picks to the client within 2 days. Gotta weed out the bad ones and highlight the best so that they can choose what they want.

Plus I live in the Instagram generation...need to get the images out there ASAP so that people can envy.

 

[table1349]

 

[vintagesnaps]

I guess the difference can be what/how you shoot. Doing sports I would often know I nailed a shot or missed it. Shooting film takes longer to see the results to be sure what I got, but it's not slower taking pictures I don't think. I used to be damn fast changing a roll at a hockey game!

I shoot slower with a rangefinder framing shots of scenery etc. and when I have time to play around with a camera.

I've looked at older stuff that I thought was good at the time and now not so much! Or have had something I wasn't completely satisfied with, leave it and come back later and see exactly what's wrong with it. Which may be fixable or may involve a certain amount of mumbling knowing I mucked it and live and learn.

 

[chuasam]

I'm waiting for more human technology integration. I'm a transhumanist.

 

[steveWFL]

this thread delivers

 

[Gary A.]

I always feel I can improve on an image, regardless of how good it may be.

This is sorta odd, but back in the film days, back when I was on my game ... sometimes I'd get a slight tinge, a slight dose of electrical impulse shooting through my creamcheese brain when I nailed a shot. Sometimes the shot I felt I nailed would be instantly visualized, even as I continued shooting. When I get back to the office, I would look for the shot that flashed a mental image, while the film was still wet.