critiquing in real life

[mmaria]

How do you give a critique to someone in real life?

Here is much more easier to give critique on someone's photo. You just wrote the truth and don't really know the person who posted the photo. We all assume that they want a sincere critique. Right?

What do you do in real life when someone asks for your opinion on their work? Are you more careful with the words you said then with words you wrote on forum? Do you care more for someone's feelings when you haven't much good to say about their work?

On a forum we just type exact thoughts for posted photo and that person deals with that, you don't actually see are they disappointed or happy or mad or else...

I live in a small town. Two so called pro photographers, but really so called, have business here and they're doing great. There is no one here who is interested in photography and people here haven't seen better.

My friend S got interested in photography but we started to talk about it just recently. He is capable to hear an honest opinion and he sucks, but in a way that he knows he sucks and want to get better, and he asks questions. So no problem there delivering my honest critique and no hard feeling when I shred his photo.

Recently I met a guy J , 20 years old. I was walking with my children when I saw him shooting. I approached him, said how glad I am because there is someone else here that's interested in photography and we started to talk about equipment first and then about some projects I thought he might be interested. The guy was so confident, told me that for his knowledge his kit lens is not enough anymore, he is currently shooting a catalog for clothes....
We exchanged e-mails, he told me to look at his photos on facebook because well, he is good. Later in an e-mail he asked me if I saw his photos and would I be interested to participate in a photography course he thought to organize with above mentioned friend of mine S....
So I saw his photos .... they're not good at all. He is learning and he is at the beginning of learning ( at least I hope)...Let's say for now that he has a good camera and he is there trying.
I've been avoiding to tell him what I think, because of his attitude. He's confident and know all type of person which is far away from what he really is in photography.
How to crash him in a polite way? It's not possible.

He said also that he perfectly knows english, should I invite him here, to get some truth slapping? just kidding

 

[Braineack]

forward the emails to cgipson.

 

[amolitor]

I only give critique if it's requested and in real life it's never really requested. It might sound like a request, but I don't think it really is, often. A casual 'hey, here's my pix, what do you think?' is usually just a cue to say something nice, not an honest request for critique.

Generally, I avoid hanging out with other photographers. Mostly talk turns to gear or processing or something else technical, immediately, and I think that's incredibly boring. But that's just me.

 

[mmaria]

forward the emails to cgipson.

:lmao:

 

[mmaria]

I only give critique if it's requested and in real life it's never really requested. It might sound like a request, but I don't think it really is, often. A casual 'hey, here's my pix, what do you think?' is usually just a cue to say something nice, not an honest request for critique.

Generally, I avoid hanging out with other photographers. Mostly talk turns to gear or processing or something else technical, immediately, and I think that's incredibly boring. But that's just me.

I see your point.

My problem is that I don't know how to soften my words. In every aspect of my life I'll tell naked truth if someone asks me for opinion, and I know that in real life people most often don't want to hear naked truth.

So that's way I'm in a trouble....

 

[amolitor]

You don't have to be soft or dishonest.

Just start and end with something positive. There's always something good in a picture, as well as something bad. If you're giving critique, your job is to find both and talk about them a little.

 

[rlemert]

Toastmasters has someone evaluate each speech at every meeting - part of our commitment to helping people grow as a speaker. A common (and 'suggested', if not recommended) approach for these evaluations is a 'sandwich' format. You start out by mentioning things that you think the speaker did well - giving specific examples where possible. You then offer one or two suggestions for how they could have improved that speech, and end with some sort of encouraging statement.

Notice that second part. You DON'T tell the speaker what he or she did wrong - there is no "wrong". You offer a couple of concrete suggestions for how they could do better. Limit the number of suggested improvements, too, because most people can only focus on improving one or two items at a time.

I don't see why this approach can't work for photography.

 

[ronlane]

Take a few examples of his work where there is obvious errors. Then ask him what was he thinking about and why did he choose to do that certain thing. If he is smart, he will ask you why you ask and then you can state your understanding of the thing that is "wrong". A couple of well thought out examples and then pointing to this site could only help, if he is serious about photography.

 

[runnah]

Generally, I avoid hanging out with other photographers. Mostly talk turns to gear or processing or something else technical, immediately, and I think that's incredibly boring. But that's just me.

I could not agree more.

 

[amolitor]

I see what you did there.

 

[mmaria]

You gave me nice pointers how to start and lead conversation and I actually looked at his photos and tried to critique with following what you wrote.

It's funny/weird that I actually write critique like that, or at least I try. When I don't have a time I just write simple sentences. That is when I'm not emotionally involved with a person.

Here, with J, I met him and I didn't like his attitude. Because his confident isn't based on a real knowledge and he is too confident even for a someone who knows much more then he does. So instantly with disliking his attitude and seeing his photos I became less objective because I want to kind of shake him and tell him "wake up dude! Grow up!" that's my emotional reaction on his behavior. And it seems to me that I can't get pass it...

S, a friend I mentioned has completely different attitude and he is more then welcome to ask me everything and I will pass him everything I know. With him I use nice way of critiquing because he wants to know more and don't act like an ass, so I have none of emotional barriers towards him.

A couple of well thought out examples and then pointing to this site could only help, if he is serious about photography.

well, if he knows english as he knows about photography, I doubt he could manage here

 

[robbins.photo]

How do you give a critique to someone in real life?

Here is much more easier to give critique on someone's photo. You just wrote the truth and don't really know the person who posted the photo. We all assume that they want a sincere critique. Right?

What do you do in real life when someone asks for your opinion on their work? Are you more careful with the words you said then with words you wrote on forum? Do you care more for someone's feelings when you haven't much good to say about their work?

On a forum we just type exact thoughts for posted photo and that person deals with that, you don't actually see are they disappointed or happy or mad or else...

I live in a small town. Two so called pro photographers, but really so called, have business here and they're doing great. There is no one here who is interested in photography and people here haven't seen better.

My friend S got interested in photography but we started to talk about it just recently. He is capable to hear an honest opinion and he sucks, but in a way that he knows he sucks and want to get better, and he asks questions. So no problem there delivering my honest critique and no hard feeling when I shred his photo.

Recently I met a guy J , 20 years old. I was walking with my children when I saw him shooting. I approached him, said how glad I am because there is someone else here that's interested in photography and we started to talk about equipment first and then about some projects I thought he might be interested. The guy was so confident, told me that for his knowledge his kit lens is not enough anymore, he is currently shooting a catalog for clothes....
We exchanged e-mails, he told me to look at his photos on facebook because well, he is good. Later in an e-mail he asked me if I saw his photos and would I be interested to participate in a photography course he thought to organize with above mentioned friend of mine S....
So I saw his photos .... they're not good at all. He is learning and he is at the beginning of learning ( at least I hope)...Let's say for now that he has a good camera and he is there trying.
I've been avoiding to tell him what I think, because of his attitude. He's confident and know all type of person which is far away from what he really is in photography.
How to crash him in a polite way? It's not possible.

He said also that he perfectly knows english, should I invite him here, to get some truth slapping? just kidding

Well I'm sort of reminded of the words of Bruce Lee, who said "Master the art of fighting, without fighting."

I think in this case the best bet is for you to master the art of being honest, without being honest. At the very least not 100% completely brutally honest all at once. Best method I've found to help people improve in any endeavor is to go with a 95/5 approach. When you look at one of his photo's make 95% of your commentary positive, and only 5% should be in the "You know, I just noticed something that might make this shot even better" category. After a few of these, go to 90/10 - still a lot of positive reinforcment but just a bit more actual critique. Keep adjusting this down till you sense that you've reached the "too much critique level" and if you do adjust it back up again to a comfortable zone. The more praise and the less critique of course the longer it will take for them to begin correcting everything that needs correcting, but this is still preferable to giving it all to them at once and having them reject what your saying because the can't accept it all at once like that.

 

[pixmedic]

unless you are willing to put in the time and effort to teach him how to shoot better, i would leave this one alone.
some casual pointers might be ok, some general critiques maybe....
but if you start REALLY going into details, there could be the expectation that you will be mentoring him.
if that's what you want to do its fine. if not, i wouldn't do much critiquing of his stuff. unless he wants to pay for lessons.

 

[ronlane]

unless you are willing to put in the time and effort to teach him how to shoot better, i would leave this one alone.
some casual pointers might be ok, some general critiques maybe....
but if you start REALLY going into details, there could be the expectation that you will be mentoring him.
if that's what you want to do its fine. if not, i wouldn't do much critiquing of his stuff. unless he wants to pay for lessons.

Hadn't thought of that but I guess that could happen. Or he'll be offended and won't ever want to talk or see you again.

 

[robbins.photo]

if you start REALLY going into details, there could be the expectation that you will be mentoring him.

I think I saw this on TV once - really terrible movie. Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. It was like fingernails on a chalkboard really.. lol

Pixmedic does have a very valid point here though, you don't want to get yourself into a situation where you end up adopting one or both.