Please explain the 'no-edit' rationale when asking for help

[LaFoto]

Well, to be quite open and frank I often get the feeling, mostly so in The Critique Forum, that those who just go about changing someone else's photo and thus adapting it to their own tastes actually don't offer any help at all, they mess with someone else's work.

Just like that art teacher did to my daughter and her classmates when they were in Grade 5, who would take the students' pencils into her hand (wrapping her hand around the students' hands) and making the pencil strokes that she, the teacher, thought were "right" here, and "good", and "the thing to be done". My daughter was outraged, and so was I when she told me!

Right, The Critique Forum is for critiquing photos. Which can also mean you say "I feel you went wrong here". But especially in The Critique Forum I find you should TAKE the time to find the words for your critique, to put your thoughts into a sentence, not to give what is your gut feeling expression in a run-through of someone's work in Photoshop, but to school also yourself to find the WORDs, expressions, to understand also for yourself the reason why you personally would much rather have seen things differently in the photo in question.

When I post photos online, I don't show my trial versions. My unfinished products. My mere attempts --- usually I show what I feel is the end-result.

Thanks to this very forum, and thanks to many people who expressed what they did to achieve a photo, what they thought, planned, etc., and how they worked on it afterwards, I have learned heaps in the past three years, much more than in all the other over 40 years before, and I am very happy about it. Today you won't see a photo on here that I personally want any different in looks than the way I show it.

And the four photos I have so far presented in The Critique Forum (four in over three years, two of them of late) were not there in order to see them changed by others, but a) to ask straightforwardly if something is wrong and why there is no impact (and in the case of that particular photo I am just SURE no work in PS can bring about that impact which the photo does not have, for it simply does not have any) and b) to ask if the play of light and shadow works.

In the case of the pigeon on the road, when many posters say (in words) "How about a crop?", then I can go and either WANT to try out that suggested crop myself or I don't. I tried it. And like it. But I decided to do it myself.

Maybe I am conceited.
Who knows.
I would be the last person to know myself.
Maybe I consider my work to be finished much too soon.

Maybe, though, also my understanding of The Critique Forum is very different and I feel learning is easier if you need to THINK (in words) and express (in words) what your emotion tells you about a photo, and take decisions yourself afterwards, either with regard to a photo already taken, or with regards to future photos that still need to be planned and taken.

Since you PMed me, asking me specifically for my input into this thread, this is the reason why I say "NOTE". It is not out of fear someone might run away with an edit of my work. They could run with the work as such ... I run that risk. It is because I feel that words actually help more, and that edits often are "messing about with someone's work", which is why I even ask those who say OTE underneath their names if they want to see what I did when I feel like "playing" (!) with some other member's photo here. I much rather note what I did and offer that in words for the photo author to decide if they want to apply this or not.

I hope I expressed myself here ... I tried.

 

[clarinetJWD]

I wish there was a way to turn off that thing completely...Most of the time my work is a finished piece, and I don't want anyone to edit it, as they can claim copyright to the edited work as a "derivitive work" under US law...

However on the rare times I'm asking for help and what not, I am more than happy to let someone edit my work.

 

[rmh159]

Haha I'm curious to see how they respond.

I personally have "Not Ok to edit" but rarely post anything in the critiques (if I would I'd include the OTE tag).

You have a point though with people asking for advice and giving mixed signals. As someone being asked to provide assistance, it shouldn't be on you to figure out at what point you're being helpful and what point you're being offensive.

 

[rmh159]

Well, to be quite open and frank I often get the feeling, mostly so in The Critique Forum, that those who just go about changing someone else's photo and thus adapting it to their own tastes actually don't offer any help at all, they mess with someone else's work...

Yeah... what she said. I couldn't agree more. :thumbup:

 

[The_Traveler]

I post in critique as often as I have a question which, since we are being honest, doesn't happen a lot because I am pretty secure in my 'vision.' (not to say that I'm the best photographer on this board - or even on my street - but I fairly often can achieve what I can envision and when I miss I usually know why.)

However I don't ever mind reworks because I see photography as a continuous process to uncover beauty or interest within the mundane around us. So if someone sees a better image within what I have done, I want to see it, because that will train me to see better. But I don't have to accept them as 'better.

OTOH, being forced to find words to express the possibly unexpressible is like trying to tell a young driver how to parallel park. Some things are best demonstrated.

Lew

 

[gmarquez]

But especially in The Critique Forum I find you should TAKE the time to find the words for your critique, to put your thoughts into a sentence, not to give what is your gut feeling expression in a run-through of someone's work in Photoshop, but to school also yourself to find the WORDs, expressions, to understand also for yourself the reason why you personally would much rather have seen things differently in the photo in question.

I totally disagree. Some of us are not very good with words...we tend to think visually. Saying that we SHOULD take the time to find the right words is the same as telling your daughter "that's a nice picture, sweetie, but I'd rather you make a poem of your drawing".

I, as most of us, have a limited time on the computer. I don't want to waste it TRYING to formulate what I mean. I'd rather post a modified picture and ask "does this help...this is what I did" than spend a long time going back and forth trying to explain what I mean.

If anyone states "it is not OK to change", then I will be much less likely to help out.

OTOH, being forced to find words to express the possibly unexpressible is like trying to tell a young driver how to parallel park. Some things are best demonstrated.

Agreed!

Just my thoughts.

 

[abraxas]

--

 

[Peniole]

Sorry traveler just saw your PM. I have the not ok to edit as a general rule, the one time I did post in the critique section I wrote in my post "please feel free to edit this one". In my mind that was a reasonable compromise. Very interesting views expressed in this thread, legally in particular. I'd be closest to Corry on this one, unless I ask for critique help I'd rather my photos not be edited into a context I never intended and then my name tagged to it.

 

[LaFoto]

G, I have thought about this discussion all day long today and I feel it is absolutely all right to be of two totally different opinions on this.
And if my red NOTE means that some people begin to skip my posts, be it. I can't help that, anyway.

But there are those two examples given that don't leave me alone. I started the first example myself by talking about that arts teacher in my daughter's class some years ago and how she actively drew into their pictures "to help".

Well, to do this and thus actively interfere with the student's process of creating a picture, or to do this once the picture is considered finished by the student and to then change it, instead of finding the words on how future drawings/paintings can be better and how this one COULD have been better, cannot be compared to the teacher saying: "You better make your picture into a poem". It is up to the teacher to find the words, the creative process per part of the students is to create a picture, all right.

And even if the teacher should ask "What did you mean when you drew/painted it like this and not in another way?" and the student is supposed to express himself/herself, it still does not mean the student is supposed to actually delve into a completely different creative process, i.e. that of making a poem! The student is merely asked to reflect on his/her own work.

When you edit someone else's photo, you don't thus say "stay with a photo", but if you put your critisism and advice into words you thus say "Go change what here is a photo into a novel", either!

So this comparison/example doesn't work.

Neither does that of parellel parking.
If my driving instructor had ever even once said to me, "Hang on, just move over, let ME do the parking and you watch me", I'd never have learned it. Instead he instructed me on where to look, which angles to observe, which little helping elements in the backwindow to use to get the angle right etc, and then I had to try. And try again. And try again. I could ONLY learn this by doing. Not by being shown. I was NEVER shown, always instructed, explained, helped. But I did the very thing.

OK, this has become very general.
I think it should be ok and accepted that some don't want their photos edited. I am one of them. And if that means I get no more replies or comments because people cannot alter my photos to their gustos ... so be it.

 

[gmarquez]

G, I have thought about this discussion all day long today and I feel it is absolutely all right to be of two totally different opinions on this.

Agreed. :thumbup:

 

[MonteMama]

G, I have thought about this discussion all day long today and I feel it is absolutely all right to be of two totally different opinions on this.

I absolutely agree as well... I'm not the slightest bit offended or bothered by anyone's choice to allow or not allow editing (and I admit my choice was made fairly arbitrarily).

Maybe, though, also my understanding of The Critique Forum is very different and I feel learning is easier if you need to THINK (in words) and express (in words) what your emotion tells you about a photo, and take decisions yourself afterwards, either with regard to a photo already taken, or with regards to future photos that still need to be planned and taken.

I don't agree with this so much though... for me, it's so much easier to understand what someone's trying to say with a picture than in words. You know the old saying, a picture's worth a thousand words...

If someone is eloquent enough, I'm sure they could convey "I think you should crop closer to X but leave a little space next to Y" just fine, and I have no problem with that. But if they actually do it, you'll know for sure that you understand what they meant.

 

[Garbz]

Actually I have the tag set for anything else. When they introduced the OK / Not OK tag I had mine set to my pictures are OK to edit. But after posting something in one of the galleries someone posted a "it's nice but I think it looks better like this" reply which I didn't like very much. That is why I said mine are not OK to edit.

Since the change of tag I often add when in the critique forum it is OK to edit the picture in that thread, although admittedly so far I have only posted 3 images in there and I forgot in the thread where you offered critique for me The_Traveler

I also understand sometimes when people ask for critique they do not ask for help but just an opinion. I have also seen a few photographers take huge offence when editing a photo in the critique gallery which I find is also quite ... over the top.

 

[Sw1tchFX]

I've gotten to the point where I don't need people to edit my images. That's why i said it's not ok.