Artistic or a Piece of Crap?

[adversus]

I took this yesterday (09/18), and everyone (non-photgrapher and 1 other photographer) I showed it to has loved it.

I find that as a technical exercise, this picture fails miserably. But I'm curious what knowledgable folks who consider themselves creative think of this. Don't be gentle:


Oceanic Solaris by adversus.us, on Flickr

 

[Mustlovedragons]

Hmmm, it almost "works" for me. Too dark in the foreground, though. Of course, it would also be a convincing "mushroom cloud" shot, if you felt like having a wee bit of pp fun. While I wouldn't print it out and frame it, I probably wouldn't delete it, either. Kinda cool, aesthetically, "technical fail" aside.

 

[Abby Rose]

Know what? At first glance I was kinda like "ugh". But then I looked a little longer and it reminds me of a scene from the movie "the ninth gate". I started to like the image after I thought of that. So, in answer to your question... sort of.

 

[adversus]

It does sort of look like a scene from the Ninth Gate, doesn't it? Great movie, by the way, one of my favorites

 

[Abby Rose]

yeah its a weird one but I do like it. Sort of like your photo...

 

[BuS_RiDeR]

As per Dictionary.com....

ar·tis·tic (är tis′tik)
adjective
of art or artists
done skillfully and tastefully; aesthetically satisfying
keenly sensitive to aesthetic values
Origin: Fr artistique

Don't forget... Art is pretty subjective and has a bit to do with personal tastes as well...

Some say Tomato... Some say Tomahto... All that...

 

[Derrel]

The overexposure on the water and sky kind of hurts.

 

[adversus]

The overexposure on the water and sky kind of hurts.

That was actually done on purpose. The original lacked any sort of contrast what-so-ever, and was grainy, so worked with what I had to try something outside of my "normal" shots.

 

[Olympus E300]

The overexposure on the water and sky kind of hurts.

Listen to this man... I agree.

 

[Foxwolfe]

The overexposure on the water and sky kind of hurts.

Listen to this man... I agree.

Yeah, whether or not it was intended it detracts from the image for me, although without having the original I can't compare it to how the scene looked beforehand.

 

[Kofman13]

The overexposure on the water and sky kind of hurts.

etc etc...

 

[adversus]

Thanks all for the feedback.

I agree that it's way way way overexposed, which is why I stated at the start is was a technical failure. It's interesting to see how people who don't do photography react to a photo versus those that do, which is what I was aiming for

This was also shot and edited on my iPhone. Was raining too much for my DSLR

 

[Sachphotography]

sorry......crap...you asked

 

[white]

More interesting than another flower shot, or a snap of someone's fat kid.

Joking. Kind of, but not really.

I like it. It could almost pass for a Lomo shot. I'm sure a print would look better as the overexposed areas wouldn't be so bright as they are on the screen.

 

[dcmoody23]

It looks like there's a giant hole in the middle of the picture and then there's a ring of overexposed darkness and waves surrounding that big white hole. That's just IMO -- There can sometimes be a very thin line between utter garbage and pure excellence..

Now, having torn you apart, can I suggest taking this raw file (if you have it) back the old photo editor, and fixing the over exposed areas? that would work a lot better for me .

Also consider that who would be buying this if you were to sell it? If it's family and they said they like it then you hit your target audience in doing this .. So who cares what the photographers think?