Picasso's Coffee | Street-esque

[MichaelHenson]

So, basically what I'm hearing is that I need to practice more...

I can do that!

 

[Gary A.]

A could not agree more with Gary about the speeding and practicing. And could not agree more with Lev that what Gary said was soooo right.

It is so important to learn to separate the moment from the action and the frame from what our eyes are seeing.

I often compare myself to a pigeon with its selective colour vision. Pigeons have a rare mental ability to see the crumbles of bread and other food they are searching for in colour whereas the rest is b&w. So they are not distracted by stones and other useless things and can find even the tiniest crumbles of food very quickly.

In that respect we are all pigeons (not exactly as advanced, but still..) We see an interesting subject, and our eye, or rather brain adjusts to the picture, ignoring distractions, screwing the perspective, minimising light contrasts, changing colours etc.

We take a shot without, as Gary says, previsualizing, and the camera shows ruthlessly what there really is, not what our brain wants us to see.
And it really is ruthless as shown in the OP images - with all those highlights, clatter, compressed perspective, busy background with distracting lines etc etc, with the main object thrown into this mess instead of standing out as it was when the OP looked at it.

So we have a choice - either to see like pigeons or to practice and learn to see like cameras (and photographers) do.

How do we know pigeons see food in color and non-food in B&W?

 

[Gary A.]

Michael, thank you for not being defensive with our feedback.

 

[sashbar]

A could not agree more with Gary about the speeding and practicing. And could not agree more with Lev that what Gary said was soooo right.

It is so important to learn to separate the moment from the action and the frame from what our eyes are seeing.

I often compare myself to a pigeon with its selective colour vision. Pigeons have a rare mental ability to see the crumbles of bread and other food they are searching for in colour whereas the rest is b&w. So they are not distracted by stones and other useless things and can find even the tiniest crumbles of food very quickly.

In that respect we are all pigeons (not exactly as advanced, but still..) We see an interesting subject, and our eye, or rather brain adjusts to the picture, ignoring distractions, screwing the perspective, minimising light contrasts, changing colours etc.

We take a shot without, as Gary says, previsualizing, and the camera shows ruthlessly what there really is, not what our brain wants us to see.
And it really is ruthless as shown in the OP images - with all those highlights, clatter, compressed perspective, busy background with distracting lines etc etc, with the main object thrown into this mess instead of standing out as it was when the OP looked at it.

So we have a choice - either to see like pigeons or to practice and learn to see like cameras (and photographers) do.

How do we know pigeons see food in color and non-food in B&W?

Good question. I have read about it in a science magazine. I dot not remember all details, bit they experimented with foods of different colours on backgrounds of different colours and found that pigeons do not see grey coloured food even if on a highly contrasting background (where we can see it clearly), and clearly see food of any other colour on the background of the exactly same colour, where we are unable to see it. The only logical conclusion is the all backgrounds become grey for pigeons when they start looking for food. That is probably a product of evolution, an instrument that allows them to find food faster.

Tried to google this old research and could not find anything. Instead found out that pigeons vision is believed to be pentochromatic instead if trichromatic, as with humans. Pigeons have additional colour receptors in their eye., so they see much more colours than we do. Interesting. Pengo chromatic vision theoretically means 10 billion colours and much more hues than we can see and additional mixing of hues. I am already envious. They see the world completely differently.
Would be a nightmare for camera manufacturers These guys are lucky we are so primitive.

 

[MichaelHenson]

Michael, thank you for not being defensive with our feedback.

Thank you for your feedback! I'm definitely committed to learning and the critiques contained in this thread have been very informative and eye opening. Gotta say, without you guys/gals on TPF I wouldn't be anywhere close to where I am in regards to photography today and would have little hope of ever getting there on my own. So thanks!