I'm new here- please tell me what you think

[SGorman]

Of course there is potential. Don't try to learn everything at once. Get a book on composition. You have some great ideas here, but I don't think those ideas translated to your photo the way you'd like. There are "rules" (so to speak) for a reason. If you want to take a more powerful photograph, you'll need to learn how to frame things in such a way that there is a focal point, and that the focal point is enhanced by exposure and/or composition. I've been taking pictures for almost 20 years, was educated in fine art, and I still blow compositions in photos. Take your last photo of the staircase. While that staircase is a great subject, it seems closed off from its surroundings. I want to see more of the bush to the left, and the staircase 2/3 from the left in the frame, which means you'd need to back up. If the photo was less cramped, I'd really like it.

Think of your viewfinder as a grid. Verticals should be verticals, and horizontals should be horizontal for landscapes.

Don't give up, and don't try to learn it all at once. Get familiar with composition. Then get familiar with exposure.

You have a good starting point. Enjoy it, and keep shooting!

 

[FireKitten]

In terms of backgrounds, doesn't that have alot to do with the lens and choice of exposure? The camera and knowledge I had was obviously not adequate, I really look forward to learning how to apply all the advice. Thank you. I'm reading "Understanding Exposure" right now.

Horizon is centered in the middle of the frame. Background has nothing to do with exposure or lens. Its all about you. You can move around so that you don't have a distracting background or change you point of view - shoot at a different angle l rather than straight on. ----That confuses me, because the book has examples of focusing on certain things and the background being blurred/out of focus. That's what I meant. I literally walked all around that tree trying to find the best place to take a "snapshot" as you would say... I crouched down as well, it was very crowded with other trees and I was just trying to get a picture of that tree as the focus.

Also, it's not the camera that takes great pictures - its the person. You control composition not the camera. These images have sentimental value to you but they provoke no feelings in anyone else. Understanding Exposure is a good book but it's not going to teach you composition. ---- Okay, well I never said that book was going to teach me Compostition. I have one bookmarked to order next week, I just meant I'm reading one book at a time and starting with the Exposure one. I never, ever meant to imply the camera did all the work... I really can't believe you took that from what I said. I've been playing with my p&s since I started reading the one book and it just doesn't have the settings to manually choose the exposure, so I don't see anything wrong with saying that if I had a better camera and more knowledge that the photos would have turned out better.

Do you know the distinction between a snapshot and a photograph. A snapshot is when you just take a photo with no regards for composition. The tree in the park may have been beautiful but I see a car and some other distracting stuff. If you take a picture of your kid and there are people standing behind in the picture - its a snapshot. If you take a picture of your kid with a plain non-distracting background its a photograph. Most landscape photos are taken with a large depth of field (pretty much everything in focus) so you wouldn't want unnecessary things in the frame. I do understand that, but I didn't when I took any of these, but even though I had never known about compostition I did try to move around untill it felt right. Does that make sense? Wouldn't #4 be considered a photgraph then? Even though I didn't know any of this information, I still felt naturally inclined to attempt the things you are talking about.

 

[Derrel]

The photos you posted have a certain snapshot-like quality about them...it's very difficult to put into words, but they seem to be missing the signs that show they were made by a studied, experienced, polished photography enthusiast. One thing is that most of them are "long shots"...overviews of scenes, if you will. The majority of them do not feature a large, close-up foreground object. Most of the photo area is taken up by things in the distance. #4 is the photo that most strongly differs from the pack, and I suspect the little tyke is your son, or grandson, and while he's cute and everything, the subject's actions are not that compelling to "me". Most of the photos also appear to have been made with the same lens focal length, or at least with the same basic "mental concept" of how the "view" of the landscape is going to be shown, how it is actually going to be portrayed by the camera.

Your technical fundamentals are pretty decent. Exposures good, camera level, focus is good,etc. But these photos are lacking in what many call "immediacy". They are mostly rather sterile, long-range, "views" of places you have been. Your technical fundamentals are good, but these lack "artistry", as well as variety of viewpoint. Well, that's what I have to say. Keep shooting. You are ready to turn a corner with your photography.

 

[FireKitten]

The photos you posted have a certain snapshot-like quality about them...it's very difficult to put into words, but they seem to be missing the signs that show they were made by a studied, experienced, polished photography enthusiast. One thing is that most of them are "long shots"...overviews of scenes, if you will. The majority of them do not feature a large, close-up foreground object. Most of the photo area is taken up by things in the distance. #4 is the photo that most strongly differs from the pack, and I suspect the little tyke is your son, or grandson, and while he's cute and everything, the subject's actions are not that compelling to "me". Most of the photos also appear to have been made with the same lens focal length, or at least with the same basic "mental concept" of how the "view" of the landscape is going to be shown, how it is actually going to be portrayed by the camera.

Your technical fundamentals are pretty decent. Exposures good, camera level, focus is good,etc. But these photos are lacking in what many call "immediacy". They are mostly rather sterile, long-range, "views" of places you have been. Your technical fundamentals are good, but these lack "artistry", as well as variety of viewpoint. Well, that's what I have to say. Keep shooting. You are ready to turn a corner with your photography.

Hi there, I don't even know what to say to that... except maybe it would be good for you to read what my skill level really is. I don't feel worthy of half of the things you give me credit for. The little boy is my nephew, and he couldn't even walk on his own at that point, so I thought they were nice, candid shots of him. I really do appreciate how you worded things... but I'll be the first to admit that I had no idea what I was doing, had a p&S set on auto, and was just taking pictures.

 

[thereyougo!14 2]

I think there's one thing you have to know, from your pictures it looks like you have just started with photography, and you aren't going to be a great photographer over a night. You say that you had no idea what you were doing. Well, if you didn't had an idea what you were doing, then you shouldn't had posted all these images. It's a bad idea to post images for critique when there is nothing to critique? It's not awful photos, but so fare, it's just regular vaccation photos. Keep photographing for a year, find videos of photography on the internet, get to know your way around your camera, around photography, wait with posting photos untill you "know what you are doing".

Keep up with photography, learn the basics, learn from other photographers, from youtube, forums, read stuff. LEARN! You are going to be a great photographer if you just keep on doing it!

Wait a bit for the posting of critique. And a nother important thing to do, look at other photographers photos, see them, you are going to get your own style by looking at others styles. Mixing the styles you loke into one, one style for you.

Hope I've helped, keep on going!

Be sure to take a look at my blog, the link is in the section below!

Peace!

Am I wrong to think that there is a such thing as at least "having an eye" for certain things? I wish I could properly explain what kind of feedback I was looking for. I know a lot of people who buy a DSLR and overnight call themselves a photographer, but yet I look at their photos and there is nothing even remotely interesting about them. Without the knowledge, I guess I was just asking if there was any artistic potential in my regular pics. Because I see people in my area making money at photography and they really suck! So much so that I decided to take it up myself so I could do my newborns pics and not have to pay someone else for it.

I'm sorry but you're incredibly naive if you think people are just going to give you the feedback you're looking for. Photography is fairly subjective and people will have a different take on it. People so far have been pretty gentle and constructive, if you think otherwise take a look at some of the other comments on other threads. To be able to learn, you'll need thicker skin.

That said, I think there is some promise with some of the shots.


1. The horizon is far too central, and I'm not sure what your subject is. I suspect it is the tree, but the composition doesn't say this. I think you needed to get lower down so that the sand was roughly 2/3rds of the way up the shot and have the tree in the right third. The sky does have some interest, but it needed to be shot from lower. At the moment there is too much dead space in the foreground. There is also some seawead on the right and something else above it which is distracting. How can you rescue it now? You need to crop it to a pano crop in my view, so that the sand is roughly 2/3rds up. you also need to crop so the tree is 2/3rds across the photo. As it stands, the people in the shot aren't a feature as they are too small.

2, I quite like this one, it's fairly well proportioned, but the horizon doesn't look level to me. I'd probably crop a little, but only a little as you need to leave some space for the boat to sail into.

3. I'm sorry but I see little interest in this shot. Shooting from behind rarely works, and you're too far away and wide to make this interesting.

4. What did you do in PS? For anyone to help you, they need to know what adjustments you made.

The one with most potential is 7. Nice leading lines, but you need to lose that sky as there is nothing there, and it's taking the interest away from the lines.

As others have said, keep your photo submissions down to 2 or 3. You'll get more feedback, and it will be more useful feedback.

Please do be more receptive to feedback that is useful to you. Most of this will be negative things that you have to unlearn, and the good things that you need to learn as a result.

 

[FireKitten]

I just ordered Amazon.com: The Photographer's Eye: Composition and Design for Better Digital Photos (9780240809342): Michael Freeman: Books

Are there some other book suggestions? I'm currently reading "Understanding Exposure", and I have one of David Busch's on order- about the camera I'm getting.

I like reading an actual book, I tire very easily from reading online so I like to have an actual book to hold in my hands. Amazon is my go to place, so any links from there would be much appreciated.

 

[kundalini]

So the photos you posted were from the past when you confessed to know nothing at all. Now you are on a journey to become "better" at conveying your visions. Enjoy those past shots as memories, but as of today, let's move forward with the information you are gathering and implementing.

 

[MTVision]

was just making a point when I said its the person not the camera. It had nothing to do with what you said. You can still take amazing photos with a point and shoot.

Yes with a DSLR you can blur backgrounds out but you will still see the cars and other distracting stuff. Even with a small DOF (blurred background) you still don't want to have unnecessary stuff in the background. Look at some professional photographers images - even with a blurred background they won't have cars and people back there unless they are meant to be there. The people and cars in your images are there just because they were there.

You may have been inclined to do the things I said but it didn't work. That's fine - move onto the next one. The image of your nephew is OK. He is still pretty close to centered.

You already admitted you didn't know what you were doing. Stop being defensive of your photos and just take what everyone said and apply it to your soon to be photos. Just do some research and take lots of pictures. You've gotten some great advice. You are off to a good start. Practice takes time. I mess up on my compositions too but I know when I do now. I didn't always.

Use the Internet - its your friend. You'll find a lot of information on the rule of thirds.

 

[fjrabon]

Do you care if I crop/edit some of your pictures, so I can show you what a lot of the people are talking about?

I think that might clear up some of the confusion you're having with regards to what people are saying, which is perhaps why you're coming off so defensively about pictures that you arleady admitted you had little idea what you were doing.

One thing I will say, with a couple of exceptions (5&10) you have a pretty good eye for interesting subjects. You just need to really work on your composition ot really make them as interesting as they could be.

 

[KmH]

You can take photos of things that have sentimental value to you, but online your sentimental involvement doesn't translate.

There are tons of web sites that discuss good, and bad, photographic compositional guidelines. Here are a few you may find useful.

Guidelines for Better Photographic Composition.

Advanced Composition -- Part I

10 Top Photography Composition Rules | Photography Mad

As far as other digital photography technical aspects i highlt recommend the following tutorials - Digital Photography Tutorials

 

[FireKitten]

Do you care if I crop/edit some of your pictures, so I can show you what a lot of the people are talking about?

I think that might clear up some of the confusion you're having with regards to what people are saying, which is perhaps why you're coming off so defensively about pictures that you arleady admitted you had little idea what you were doing.

One thing I will say, with a couple of exceptions (5&10) you have a pretty good eye for interesting subjects. You just need to really work on your composition ot really make them as interesting as they could be.

Feel free, as that would help my understand. Honestly, I'm not trying to be defensive, I think that people on these forums are just inheritantly overly-critical... and I don't learn anything from that, but if someone were to say "Okay, with #whatever, if you had known how to use your camera- that shot could have been really good, and here's how...." Now THAT I would understand.

 

[fjrabon]

Here is I think the easiest one to show you what people are talking about composition wise. It's your first picture


beachtreehelp by franklinrabon, on Flickr

The primary thing I did was cropped it such that the sky took up the top 2/3rds and the beach just the bottom 1/3rd. I also moved the tree over a little to the right in the crop as well. That should give you an idea what people were talking about with your horizons dead centered.

Another thing composition wise with that one is that you shot the shoreline at an angle. This means that the beach line and the horizon line aren't parallel. WHich means that no matter how you straighten the image, one or the other, or both, looks slightly off.

Another tip is that mid day shooting of beaches generally doesn't work. I know there's nothing you can do about that now, but for the future. The beach sand is so bright it loses all detail, no matter what you do with the camera. Early AM would probably be the best time to shoot this type of scene, as the beach would be abandoned (and not all the distracting people right along the beach line), you'd have great light and, if this was on the east coast, you may be able to get an awesome sunrise in the frame as well.

One last tip is try to get something in the foreground of the shot that's interesting. Here you just have blank sand. A dune just off to the left of the image in the foreground would be awesome, or maybe you could find a big interesting piece of driftwood and actually, physically drag it there if you can't find anything else to put into the scene.

 

[FireKitten]

Here is I think the easiest one to show you what people are talking about composition wise. It's your first picture


beachtreehelp by franklinrabon, on Flickr

The primary thing I did was cropped it such that the sky took up the top 2/3rds and the beach just the bottom 1/3rd. I also moved the tree over a little to the right in the crop as well. That should give you an idea what people were talking about with your horizons dead centered.

Another thing composition wise with that one is that you shot the shoreline at an angle. This means that the beach line and the horizon line aren't parallel. WHich means that no matter how you straighten the image, one or the other, or both, looks slightly off.

Another tip is that mid day shooting of beaches generally doesn't work. I know there's nothing you can do about that now, but for the future. The beach sand is so bright it loses all detail, no matter what you do with the camera. Early AM would probably be the best time to shoot this type of scene, as the beach would be abandoned (and not all the distracting people right along the beach line), you'd have great light and, if this was on the east coast, you may be able to get an awesome sunrise in the frame as well.

One last tip is try to get something in the foreground of the shot that's interesting. Here you just have blank sand. A dune just off to the left of the image in the foreground would be awesome, or maybe you could find a big interesting piece of driftwood and actually, physically drag it there if you can't find anything else to put into the scene.

Okay, I can understand that! I did not realize I shot the shoreline at an angle, it wasn't my intention. I had a copy of this cropped just like you did it, but I can't find it so I posted the original. Thank you very much.

 

[fjrabon]

Okay, I can understand that! I did not realize I shot the shoreline at an angle, it wasn't my intention. I had a copy of this cropped just like you did it, but I can't find it so I posted the original. Thank you very much.

Yeah, it's mild, which is more problematic than if it was at a severe angle. It took me a minute to figure out why I couldn't get it to feel straight no matter how I rotated it. Then I realized that you shot towards the beach at like a 12 degree angle. If you're shooting beach lines, make sure you either shoot at a severe angle (like 45 degrees) or you shoot it dead perpendicular. When it's very slightly off, it just feels 'off'. The biggest thing you can do to help your photos has nothing to do with your camera, it has to do with moving your feet to get the right frame for the shot. I think that's the thing people don't get at first. To get photographs, as opposed to snapshots, you have to really move around a lot to get the right frames, lines and angles.

 

[MTVision]

Feel free, as that would help my understand. Honestly, I'm not trying to be defensive, I think that people on these forums are just inheritantly overly-critical... and I don't learn anything from that, but if someone were to say "Okay, with #whatever, if you had known how to use your camera- that shot could have been really good, and here's how...." Now THAT I would understand.

Nobody is over critical. You asked about composition and you received a lot of feedback. Trust me - people can be really critical and rude - you didn't get any of that.

There isn't really anything we could tell you to do with your camera to better compose your photos besides move around and look at all angles. It's something you kind of have to learn by practice. I posted my first assignment in photography class down below. It's all about composition.

A while back a few people expressed interest in an assignment thread for beginners. I'm currently taking a Digital Photography class and have decided to post the assignments that I get in class. I hope people participate!

Viewpoint - look up at subject to imply respect, look down to diminish subject: "worms eye view", "birds eye view", skewed angle

Rule of Thirds - keep subject out of the center of the picture, strongest point of interest is 1/3 of the way into the pictures, don't divide the picture in half with the horizon line

Rule of Odds - frame subject with even number of elements on each side

Simplification - eliminate distracting information, keep focus on subject, have a clear center of interest, use narrow depth of field isolates subject, get close to subjext

Symmetry - balance arrangement, equal visual weight on each side of image

Repetition - use an element over and over again within the picture to create movement, pattern or texture

Color - create an emotional impact, warm colors suggest aggressive and advance, cool colors suggest calm and recede, monochromatic

Framing - look for the picture within the picture

Leading Lines - create a visual path into the picture with lines, mover the viewers eye around the photograph, imply action with direction of line, imply emotion with type of line

Lighting - use light to your advantage, time of day produces different color of light, use flat light, dynamic light, high key light, low key light

ASSIGNMENT
Create 1 image that illustrates each of the principles (there are 10)
Pick a minimum of 5 strategies to explore in-depth and take an additional 5 pictures using that principle

This assignment will result in at least 35 images. Out of the 10 pictures, that illustrate each of the principles, post your 3 best/favorite.