Rate Your Skills

[dl4449]

Yea what astrostu said

 

[Josh66]

average.

 

[craig]

I voted above average. I have been in photography since Jesus was in High School. My journey has been long, but I am always learning.

Love & Bass

 

[Sarah23]

I said above average as I have a very busy, high end business I am running, and have started having pro's who I look up to, coming to me for advice or questions (business wise, or photography wise) I think that was one of most humbling things I have had happen.

 

[nickisonfire]

i gave my self above average, now i know my pictures aren't so good but i feel in the past 2 years i have really came far from not knowing what f-stops were to now being able to help others out in explaining all camera functions

 

[Battou]

Battou you are your own worst enemy - this might sound harsh but I do mean that.
You have to break this mental view that you have with yourself and your hobby otherwise you will only serve to make yourself miserable - belive me I have seen this too many times! You work with children do you not? Well don't you offer support and encouragment to them - help them to choose the right path and so on and keep them enthusiastic?
Well you are past that level of a child so things are harder - you have to find that for yourself now - others can help, but your your own boss now and you have to find that in yourself otherwise the words and thoughts of others won't be able to help you (As much as others might wish to do so).

I honestly don't want to see you destroy yourself - its painfull but I can't help you out of this - I can offer words of support and encouragement and I can give my advice on your photography (as others can) but in the end you have to sitdown - look at yourself in the mirror and give yourself that determination. Tell yourself that your not a waste of space - that you CAN and you WILL!

On the contrary, acknowledging ones own shortcummings is the first step to pushing the boundries and expanding. Sitting in a bubble of arrogents is not my way, there will always be someone more skilled and where there is one there is always another. I can accept that I am not the best there is or ever has been, also that nor will I ever be.

If I believe that I am better than the person in front of me, I will fail reguardless of any encouragement provided from the outside. If I believe that everyone around me is better than I, then I have no choice but to improve or die trying. Success can only be had by seeing the problem and fixing it. Right now the problem is that I carry my camera, take it to my face, focus and hit the button, nothing more, nothing less. It's like walking into a sword fight knowing nothing but a thrust, It might work but chances are that it won't. The Honjo Masamune won't help you if all you can do is poke with it, a 400mm lens won't help if I don't bother to get close enough to compose the for subject or think about the way I want to photograph it.

I know that I am not a waste of space, but if I believe that what I am doing is sufficient and don't bother looking for faults. I will continue to allow my self to slide backwards inevetably becomming that waste of space. One enjoys their hobbies most when they succeed, so why set your self up for failure by believing every shot is an award winner, when you can know every shot sucks only to find you got more than a handful of better than anticipated images hidden in the mist and know how you did it. When you can brush off major setbacks as standard, the shots that are remotely close to holding a candle to those around you will hold that much more value to you and be a small success in and of them self wile the ones that suck can merely be tossed in the garbage can. Many small successes can easily hold one over long enough to overcome any major fault resulting in repeted failure like the one I have discovered in my own shooting habits. A couple weeks ago I was telling you about an inccodent with a flight of hawks, nearly half a dozen of them no more than fifty feet over my head, remember? I was so excited, have you ever seen a man with a manual advance film body with a manual focus prime telephoto lens on a teleconverter burst shooting straight into the air at nearly five FPS? Well, I had fun trying but shit happens. I know what went wrong, toss'em in the can and move on to the next set. What is done is done and that part of the past is now complete, If I sit there and dwell on the fact I got so excited in the heat of the moment I forgot to change my aperture, I will have completely forsaken the fun I had pointing a huge peice of glass at the sky and running in circles like a child. However, continuing to make the same mistake over and over again will take all the fun out of it. In the end isn't that what a hobby is all about, Something one finds fun to do to occupy time. Determination is one thing I have in spades, my first post in this thread was merely a reflection of that determination. I refuse to truly suck at anything I do. I am Human, I will make mistakes so I don't look at careless mistakes as major failures and/or a waste of time, but ignoring the mistakes will only serve to take away any chance of improvement. I see a flaw in my habits, I can and will fix it, failure is not an option.





A little fact about me that you don't know, I was destroyed once. A false accusation and a lawyer who was afraid to fight a battle he felt I could not win began a chain of events that resulted in my lacking a highschool diploma, lacking a drivers licence, having been homeless and more. This all impacted my ability to accuire employment even to this day. I'm a child care provider making a measly $1.98 an hour with no insurance, or job security living in New York state, because it's all I could get without that little peice of paper that sais I attended school. I may have a GED now but it was of no use and I ended up retaking this position after filling out countless applications a couple years ago when their mother threw her husband out. It is that mental view that I have with myself, my life and my hobbies that has kept me alive, out of prison, got a roof over my head, food on my table and the ability to partake in a hobby as expencive photography is. That ideaology can not destroy me, it made me who I am and provides me with ample reason to live. Not everyone can live this way, but I know of no other way. If I am to stop believing that I am not as good as people think I am, you may as well cut me down where I stand. I would very quickly become complacent and worthless with nothing to achieve and no reason to achieve it, such a meaningless existance.

 

[Overread]

Battou - there is understandings ones limitations - certainly we all need to understand our own limits, but if you take it too far then you get into a rut. You can easily get to the point where you see yourself as not worth a damn and then you get into the slippery slope of going further down - you put in less effort and get worse results out and that reinforces the negative self view - then it snowballs!
You do sound like you have been through a lot of hard times and are still living through times which are not so easy - but determined to make an improvement - your view now looks more posetive then your initial post which seemed to me to be very negative.
I think I would be right in saying that your right on the boarderline - I would like to see you a little more self confident, it won't lead to what you fear because your not that sort of person and if you feel better about yourself and what you CAN do then that can help carry you through bad times - rather than just dwelling on the negative side. No matter how good it is to face ones problems if you only dwell upon them then they will drag you down.


Out of interest what goals have you set (just with photography)? Have you set any in stone or just in writing?

 

[Chiller]

I voted Below Average. I am way below my capibilities, and know I have a lot to learn.
If I was above average, I would not be sitting on forums wasting my time. :greenpbl:

 

[Slaphead]

I put below average because even though members here have had some nice things to say about the few photos that I've posted here, they don't even begin to compare to a lot of the work I see here. You also don't get to see the gigabytes of photos that I've got that haven't passed my quality control.

 

[Mike_E]

It's really a shame that 'average' doesn't equate to 'good'.

If it did then I'd feel a whole lot better about all of this.

 

[Overread]

You also don't get to see the gigabytes of photos that I've got that haven't passed my quality control.

pffft I bet even that Adams chap who took some rather pleasant landscapes would have had box after box of failed exposures and shots that didn't meet his standards. The key part is not to see those shots as failures, but as learning tools - see them as things that went wrong, but can tell you about what is wrong with your methodology -- and if there is a common theme in them then that is something that you either have to fix or something that is part in parcel with your shooting style that you have to accept if you want to keep that style of work
heck I have 120GB of photos on my computer - maybe 700-900 of those shots are worth keeping! (something like 20000 shots there)

It's really a shame that 'average' doesn't equate to 'good'.

If it did then I'd feel a whole lot better about all of this.

depends what context you put average in doesn't it. If your in a room of masters of photography then average is probably more than good - if your in a room of sports mums then average is going to be rather much lower.

 

[Sarah23]

I voted Below Average. I am way below my capibilities, and know I have a lot to learn.
If I was above average, I would not be sitting on forums wasting my time. :greenpbl:

I dont know about that! If it was not for another forum I am on, and my paid business-related account with them, I would not be in business or where I am now in my career. It is where I do a lot of my learning, and has been 10 times better then any collage course I could have ever taken. Its far from wasting time. :thumbup:

 

[Dao]

I think I am below and close to avg.

When I post photos here, it usually didn't draw much attention. In that case, nothing really wrong about them but they did not stand out either.

So I know I need to do better.

 

[Chris of Arabia]

 

[JerryPH]

Pssst... don't look now, but I think someone's watching us!

I plan to in the future, kinda back out of conversations that are not photography related. This includes the mental stability and self image/self esteem issues that one may or may not have.

I will discuss those in the Sigmund Freud forums with anyone, though... lol