Normal environment or studio shot?

[pnodrog]

What would be helpful to participants is if we knew what the judging criteria were to be. What annoys me is when professional landscape photographers - whose work is commercially successful - who go to the trouble of lighting beautiful piece of work from the inside of a snow cave lose out to a point and shoot shot of a cute kid with "Yep" on his teashirt - and shots of badly lit trees - shot at night - in the rain - through a fence win awards (that particular shot - if I'd taken it - wouldn't have even made it off the camera).

The link below - where an artist won a $15,000 competition using the discarded packing materials of their competitor is a good case in point. To me, this isn't art - it's just rubbish, and the judges who give awards to this kind of rubbish are - frankly - out of touch, and clueless.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/ar...ectid=10596014

I hope the artist shared her prize with the kind people who arranged the rubbish for her.

Because of the risk to my blood pressure I will not get started on fine art judges or art gallery purchases.

[Colin Southern]

I hope the artist shared her prize with the kind people who arranged the rubbish for her.

Because of the risk to my blood pressure I will not get started on fine art judges or art gallery purchases.

In my opinionated opinion, the term "Fine ART" - as it applies to things like this - needs to be abbreviated somewhat ...

[John 2]

Some photographic judges (but thankfully not all) like theatre critics, are sometimes motivated more by their perception of themselves than by the artwork they are judging. I guess you just have to be philosophical about some of them however, it's difficult to forgive the judge who pans an image, not because of the quality of the work, but because he/she doesn't personally like the subject matter ("I just don't like steam trains") and the judge who pauses and then admits that the image as projected looks better than it did on his "...admittedly ageing" (and presumably uncalibrated) monitor. But there again, if they didn't exist, what would we have to moan about?

[pnodrog]

Some photographic judges (but thankfully not all) like theatre critics, are sometimes motivated more by their perception of themselves than by the artwork they are judging. I guess you just have to be philosophical about some of them however, it's difficult to forgive the judge who pans an image, not because of the quality of the work, but because he/she doesn't personally like the subject matter ("I just don't like steam trains") and the judge who pauses and then admits that the image as projected looks better than it did on his "...admittedly ageing" (and presumably uncalibrated) monitor. But there again, if they didn't exist, what would we have to moan about?

John, earlier this year I attended a two day judging workshop and one of the main points stressed was to not use personal preference as a criteria when evaluating a photograph. The main objective was to try to understand what the photographer was trying to achieve and how successful they had been in doing so. Throughout the workshop they stressed that we did not have to like a photograph but only determine how well it worked. It was interesting as we all had to get up and assess a photograph and one of the attendees after doing a reasonably good critique confessed that personally she loathed the photograph she was given as it reminded her of a very unpleasant personal experience.

The use of a reasonably calibrated monitor and correct ambient lighting for any assessment was also stressed.

Any suggestions were to be of the "have you considered", "how do you think it would look" rather than "what I would do" etc. Actually at one point it bordered on being a bit to PC for me but overall it was a very interesting workshop.

[Colin Southern]

But there again, if they didn't exist, what would we have to moan about?

Macs,

Nikons,

UV Filters "damaging" images,

ETTR,

JPEG instead of RAW,

Software subscriptions,

Sharpening,

Adobe,

Microsoft,

Me,

Primes,

High ISO shooting,

Camera firmware,

Camera manufacturers (inc warranty, features, firmware),

Price of accessories,

Colour spaces,

Storage formats

Backup strategies,

CP Filters,

and many many more I'm sure ...

[pnodrog]

Colin be like the rest of us - not only can we moan about them we can also use them as excuses when we muck something up.

[Colin Southern]

Colin be like the rest of us - not only can we moan about them we can also use them as excuses when we muck something up.

Ha - since I took up RC Helicopters I've learnt there is a entire new dimension of excuses required when I muck things up

(I'm still looking for one to excuse equivocating between a nose-in 180 deg forward flip and a 360 degree forward flip -- 1/2 way through the maneuver) (didn't end well!).

[John 2]

Macs,

....... and many more I'm sure...
Cheers

.....so when does a heavily manipulated image become graphic art??

[RustBeltRaw]

Reine II - most expensive photo ever sold - and it's both "meh" (in my opinion) and heavily photoshopped.

You lost for being too good, which is too bad.

...try to understand what the photographer was trying to achieve and how successful they had been in doing so.

Because of the risk to my blood pressure I will not get started on fine art judges or art gallery purchases.

.....so when does a heavily manipulated image become graphic art??

All very salient points when it comes to fine art judging. I submitted to a gallery a few months ago. The theme was "time," so I submitted shots with unusually fast or slow shutter speeds (2sec, 37sec, and 1/8000sec). All in the color-accurate, sharp, brightly-colored, energetic style I like. Then I looked up the judge's work.

They've apparently shot nothing but mildly sepia-toned 1:1 black and whites of remarkably dull land and waterscapes for the last 20 years. I pretty much knew I was screwed the moment I saw their stiff. 5 weeks later, I got the rejection e-mail.

I think the second quote is what photo judges should be aiming for, but fine art has different objectives. Which are somewhere between "make people think," "confuse the crap out of everyone," and "describe your work with ridiculously obscure, lengthy prose until people start nodding to make you shut up." Obviously, there's a lot about fine art work I do not understand. Photos can amaze. Why should they befuddle?

The art/photo line is really a wickedly wide, gray area. My rules are a lot stricter when I'm Photoshopping shots of people. That said, I rarely like conspicuously-processed shot. If no one's in it, or you avoid changing their shape or giving them anime eyes and android skin, then there's very little that'll make me dismiss a shot. But that's a whole 'nother (likely lengthy) thread.

[John 2]

John, earlier this year I attended a two day judging workshop and one of the main points stressed was to not use personal preference as a criteria when evaluating a photograph. The main objective was to try to understand what the photographer was trying to achieve and how successful they had been in doing so. Throughout the workshop they stressed that we did not have to like a photograph but only determine how well it worked. It was interesting as we all had to get up and assess a photograph and one of the attendees after doing a reasonably good critique confessed that personally she loathed the photograph she was given as it reminded her of a very unpleasant personal experience.

The use of a reasonably calibrated monitor and correct ambient lighting for any assessment was also stressed.

Any suggestions were to be of the "have you considered", "how do you think it would look" rather than "what I would do" etc. Actually at one point it bordered on being a bit to PC for me but overall it was a very interesting workshop.

LP, my local regional body does much the same but it has no effect on some judges and I suspect that the problem is that it's not everybody that is prepared to be a judge. There is a lot of work involved. We therefore tend to be philosophical and grateful for what we get.

[Colin Southern]

All very salient points when it comes to fine art judging. I submitted to a gallery a few months ago. The theme was "time," so I submitted shots with unusually fast or slow shutter speeds (2sec, 37sec, and 1/8000sec). All in the color-accurate, sharp, brightly-colored, energetic style I like. Then I looked up the judge's work.

They've apparently shot nothing but mildly sepia-toned 1:1 black and whites of remarkably dull land and waterscapes for the last 20 years. I pretty much knew I was screwed the moment I saw their stiff. 5 weeks later, I got the rejection e-mail.

Exactly. Thus the reason I prefer to let my work be judged by the public, who vote with their wallets. Bit like the old saying "those who can do, the others teach and judge".

Obviously, there's a lot about fine art work I do not understand.

There's a lot of "fine art" that I don't think ANYBODY understands.