Flickr? Other online communities?

[Iron Flatline]

Hi all.

I've been a member of Flickr for a long time (Jan 2006) but have never really posted a lot there. I was wondering what people get from it. I don't want this to be a Flickr bash or FanBoy post, I'd like to understand how I might maximize my involvement in a community that large.

I occasionally add images to groups, but I don't get much feedback. Not sure if that is the nature of specific groups, or my lacking participation in the underlying Discussion threads of certain groups.

Are there other communities? I like 1x.com, and really miss Weekly Shot a lot, but what (other than TPF) is there, and how/why do you use them?

Looking forward to a sensible discussion,

me

 

[C-Towner]

Flickr is a social photo sharing site, the best way to get people to comment and critique on your photos is to do the same. You cant just post your photos in groups and hope someone sees them and makes comments. The best way to direct people to your photostream is to let yourself be seen: discussions, comments and favs of other peoples photos.

 

[Iron Flatline]

Good point, and thanks for adding that. To be clear, I don't just expect to sit back and let people "marvel" at my work. I like commenting.

On a related note, it seems like some images get dozens of those odd awards, etc... whereas some get no comment. Without sounding flip, what is the purpose of some of the awards? Is it just members of certain sub-genres and smaller communities finding images that fit their own style?

 

[rocdoc]

the awards on flickr are a way to get something shiny in the comments on your pics, which may induce a pleasant tickle of your visual cortex and on occasion of your ego. You get them by pimping your pics out in awards groups and by giving similar awards to others. I do it on occasion when I'm down and don't feel like doing anything productive, because it's more fun than solitaire.
That aside, I found many very good photographers on flickr and learned a lot from their work. If you build a circle of contacts with people who do good work you can have a nice set of posts to look at while you drink your coffee in the morning.

 

[Overread]

The majority of flickr groups are going to be award based - setup to show and share images (often with a theme) and most will also go on to have little awards that commenters can attach to your image. Originally the idea was that the little images and messages would show which group the person had seen your image in but its quickly developed into a more light competition and collection format.

Thus the great many of the groups will have a lot of awarding but far smaller amounds of discussion and interaction - so for the learner or the one wishing to share more than the image it can appear (at first) to be rather shallow and empty. However there are a good number of very good and key groups on flickr which are well worth joining and are far more "serious" in nature.

The camera groups - eg the canon/nikon etc... groups are normally pretty good and many of the gear based groups tend to be a bit more serious and less awardy. Certainly joining a few of these can open up some very interesting results and I often like to see what others are doing with the very same lens.

In addition I would recomend having a look at hte following groups:
Flickr: Life Thru A Lenz (Quality Comment Group) -- fantastic group and well worth taking part in if you want good quality feedback on your work. It's open to all so of course you get those who are both good and bad commenting, but all put in the effort that is often lacking in so many other places.

Flickr: Strobist.com - the strobist group and highly active in discussions - possibly the most active that I have in my list.

Flickr: Canon DSLR User Group - no idea if you're a canon shooter or not - but there is the canon group. Nikon has one and there are others for hte other makes of camera (ps be very carfully of Boldpuppy in that group - he has 135mm L addiction and its very easy to catch)

Flickr: Sigma Lenses - sigma goodness! A bit less active but a good place for sigma advice barring going to the lens groups themselves.

Flickr: Birds and Wildlife UK - only found this one recently but a must for any wildlife fans in the UK.


Also there are often many groups for key places - like zoos, parks, trusts etc.. Most of them however are not run nor even looked in on by the groups they represent (they are just fan made). However some are well involved in their flickr groups.