Would you please check out my website and compare and contrast these reviews i got on answers.yahoo.com. If I am half as bad as they want me to believe I am I am going to throw my camera away and take up rally car driving. I speak to you with a wounded spirit but a spirit that longs for the truth...
Without looking at your site, I can tell you that grief from them is a compliment to you. They've got nothing better to do that preserve their own imaginary hierarchy. Of course they're going to diss you. You're actually doing something!
Posted by Basil Greber on June 12, 2010 at 4:33 AM
If you post on the web asking for critique, you need to be prepared to receive some critical comments (I mean in the sense of renduh's comment, not KK's over on yahoo), and you need to be able to handle that. I too have posted shots that I considered excellent, or even my best ever, only to receive lukewarm comments. It's not all that nice, but in the end, accepting that your shots are not perfect is the only way that will make you improve.
What I think (all that follows below is just an amateur's opinion, mind you!) is that you're showing too many photographs, meaning that you should be more selective. Your body of work doesn't seem to be large enough to support the number of photographs you're showing, which means that some of the photographs are not up to the standard of your best ones - and the best ones are those you should show, exclusively. Since you want to sell your images, you may also want to give each of your images a hard look and ask yourself whether you'd actually buy it, particularly when compared to other people's work (I've asked this question about my own work, and my answer was no... which, given my track record of zero sold images, seems to be the truth ).
I'm sure some of the more experienced people frequenting this board will jump in with more helpful suggestions...
You need to be your own worst critic. Take a look around the web and see what kinds of images (and quality) are out there and do an honest comparison or your work versus the competition. Yes there are millions of images out there. Some incredible work, and some on the other end of the spectrum. Be ruthless in your editing process. I agree with the comment above that you have too many images up trying to support your body of work.
Well, for critiques sake....you have some wonderful images. Things to ponder....remove distracting minor elements (either PS them out or crop the image), sometimes putting the horizon in the middle of the image works (usually not), an image with a body of water (especially an ocean horizon) should have that waterline straight horizontal unless it is obvious why you didn't and it better be a good reason (straighten the water in those images). Keep shooting! You have talent! Edit edit edit.
My website has over 10,000 images. I do not expect sales from it. These are bodies of work that include alot of documentary images taken for that purpose with only the time I was there to get the images...so, I don't expect them to be perfect art or even art of all. I do the best I can with the time of day and light. There are many golden nuggets in the 10,000. I think people understand what I shoot and why. They know I can go after a perfect image when that is what I am after. They also know that when I'm documenting something, the job is complete for the purpose intended. Many of my images are for my own sake of getting out there and shooting something.
If I was doing an art-for-sale website, my site would be terrible! Know what your WEBSITE is all about. If it is images as art for sale, then focus on that and purge the website of anything that is not PERFECT. There may be some great but not perfect shots---they gotta go.
I would be very careful of posting other people's images on your website. One, people may buy their images instead of yours (!) and you have no control on their expertise (such as the comment on the ferris wheel which I have to agree with that poster). On the other hand, you may be trying to build a multi-photographer site. If so, then you need to have the final say on what they post (and I think that should be acceptable since it is your site).
One person gave you advice on all the images in the slideshow, you should probably give that a thinking. Sometimes you have to be careful what you ask for!!
Hope this is a useful critique!
Troup Nightingale
Posted by David Rogers on June 12, 2010 at 4:54 PM
I think Basil's answer was very good and appropriate. Overall, I thought your images were nice, but not particularly special. I think a good bit of that "not special" remark may be due to post processing skills being lacking somewhat. You had some nice compositions and beautiful color in some of them, but most seem to lack sharpness and crispness, at least on my work monitor. I will check again when I get home on my calibrated monitor. I certainly wouldn't worry too much about what the people at yahoo thought as they're anonymous comments. Opinions from cowards who won't print their full name are wothless IMO.
Discussion
6 replieshttp://www.dajdesignsphotography.com
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=ApjcDN_Oo1TGgWTXEYiqXZnsy6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20100611160323AAfx1sz
What I think (all that follows below is just an amateur's opinion, mind you!) is that you're showing too many photographs, meaning that you should be more selective. Your body of work doesn't seem to be large enough to support the number of photographs you're showing, which means that some of the photographs are not up to the standard of your best ones - and the best ones are those you should show, exclusively. Since you want to sell your images, you may also want to give each of your images a hard look and ask yourself whether you'd actually buy it, particularly when compared to other people's work (I've asked this question about my own work, and my answer was no... which, given my track record of zero sold images, seems to be the truth
I'm sure some of the more experienced people frequenting this board will jump in with more helpful suggestions...
My website has over 10,000 images. I do not expect sales from it. These are bodies of work that include alot of documentary images taken for that purpose with only the time I was there to get the images...so, I don't expect them to be perfect art or even art of all. I do the best I can with the time of day and light. There are many golden nuggets in the 10,000. I think people understand what I shoot and why. They know I can go after a perfect image when that is what I am after. They also know that when I'm documenting something, the job is complete for the purpose intended. Many of my images are for my own sake of getting out there and shooting something.
If I was doing an art-for-sale website, my site would be terrible! Know what your WEBSITE is all about. If it is images as art for sale, then focus on that and purge the website of anything that is not PERFECT. There may be some great but not perfect shots---they gotta go.
I would be very careful of posting other people's images on your website. One, people may buy their images instead of yours (!) and you have no control on their expertise (such as the comment on the ferris wheel which I have to agree with that poster). On the other hand, you may be trying to build a multi-photographer site. If so, then you need to have the final say on what they post (and I think that should be acceptable since it is your site).
One person gave you advice on all the images in the slideshow, you should probably give that a thinking. Sometimes you have to be careful what you ask for!!
Hope this is a useful critique!
Troup Nightingale