Venice Before Dawn

Awesome dawn shot! Stay well!

Admired in: www.ipernity.com/group/tolerance

Good composition. I can look at this very comfortably and feel that I am there.

FYIW this picture has taken the #1 spot in the "Most popular photos" (most favourited) section in my "About" page on Flickr, having clocked up 8,705 views, 445 faves and 163 comments.

But I don't think it deserves to have, having been taken (hand held, because my tripod had just disintegrated) at ISO 12,800, producing a noisy, grainy image. But it was an "impossible" shot - even with a tripod and lower ISO (and slower shutter speed) because the boats were rocking, they would have come out even more blurred.

So perhaps my good judgment is not to be sniffed at? It doesn't matter that it's slightly blurred, because it has "atmosphere" and is well composed. As you know, it's your rather odd sense of composition that puts me off so many of your pictures, but this one is perfect.

Not at all. It's not your good judgement that's to be sniffed at, but the poor judgement of the legions of sycophants, flatterers and other fools who praise and fave my pictures, this one included. I'm just surprised to find you in agreement with them.

Perhaps it's an automatic response that they can't help. Many of them presumably will have faved you before and made you a contact, so feel obliged to keep on doing it. If they're in the habit of liking the emperor's clothes, they'll still say they like them even when he's not wearing any. Whereas, with me, you can at least know that the praise/criticism is well considered and not a passing whim.

I like this one from a purely visceral point of view. If you had succeeded in producing the technically perfect shot you were seeking, it might not have stirred the same emotions.

I'm glad that you like this picture, but you are once again equating what you regard as good composition, based on how you respond viscerally to pictures and where in them your eye is led, with some imagined universal idea of what is perfect composition.

I have fewer than 40 followers on Flickr, and they alone cannot be responsible for the over 7 million views and faves my pictures have received over the years. Nor do I think that most or any of them respond favourably to my pictures through habit or obligation, less still through sycophancy or flattery.

You have your standards and criteria of what makes good pictures, and these are considered and valid ones, but they are not universal, and some respect is due to others - who would appear to be a majority - whose may be different.

But isn't that exactly what the competition judge was doing when he rubbished that Derbyshire photo you like so much? And isn't that what you yourself are doing when you make your unsolicited alterations to my photos, cropping them to suit your ideas of composition and moving boats and buses around?

I'm simply giving my own opinion, and I'm certainly not going to alter it just to go with the flow. You say that the majority of viewers have a different view from mine, but that may not necessarily be the case, despite the many accolades bestowed on you.

I am frequently able to spot your photos from a thumbnail, because your sense of composition is markedly different from the average contributor, whose ideas of composition are generally more akin to my own. So this does suggest a basic standard to which you're not adhering. Perhaps these rules that you keep telling me about?

Sorry, off the top of my head I don't remember the Derbyshire photo you refer to or the competition. But I have had experience of very controversial and whimsical judgments in club competitions in which mediocre pictures were praised and good ones ignored, not only to my surprise but that of most of the competitors and members. But serious competitions, e.g. those run by national newspapers, are usually well judged according to conventional norms.

The many accolades, I would have thought, suggest that in most cases they do have a different view from yours, be it right or wrong.

The average standard of pictures on Flickr and Ipernity is not high, so the sense of composition of the average contributor may not be great, as you have been the first to note when my pictures receive mass accolades.

No, because what you spot is the non-compliance of those thumbnails with your ideas of good composition. You cannot have it both ways, and enlist the support of the 'average contributor', because he is the one responsible for most of those accolades.

I'm not enlisting anyone's support. It's you who does that, by continually quoting your stats. I was simply pointing out that my ideas might not be so vastly different from the majority (as you seem to suggest), because that majority does tend to use a compositional balance that is more akin to mine than yours. This includes some of the people that give you accolades (I don't want to mention specific names) and so it is not a case of my simply having an imagined idea of what makes a good picture.

I'm sorry if you misunderstood the point I was trying to make.
I'll be the first to admit that I don't have your superior linguistic skills.

The Derbyshire picture.
www.flickr.com/photos/14463685@N07/3418721729/in/photostream

I have had one of my best shots rubbished by a photographic club judge who rigidly applied some esoteric formal rule (which the picture contravened) giving no heed to any overall artistic impact, interest or appeal which it might have had. Emotional appeal certainly should (independently of the rules) be a critera of judging.

I know that Castleton picture well, and remember taking it at Easter 1976. I only very vaguely remember its being snubbed by a judge, but I hold it to be one of my finest B&W shots and only wish it could still be taken today.

I used "imagined" in reference to a (quote) universal idea of what is perfect composition. That is different from saying that you have an imagined idea of what makes a good picture.

I agree that in judging, emotional appeal should be taken into account, and in cases is more important than adherence to formal rules.

I'll also add that while our basic ideas of what is good composition differ (and are no doubt irreconcilable) I limit my comments and suggestions to those of your pictures which I like and think can be improved in post-processing. I do not publicly rubbish the remainder of your work, much of which is documentary (bus window pictures, floods etc.) or journalistic (people and architectural monstrosities) and should be judged differently from purely pictorial photographs.

Your memory seems to be rewriting itself, as you "publicly rubbished" a lot of my photos on Flickr (as well as admiring some of them). I do not mind at all, and you're welcome to D as many as you like (or should I say dislike), as long as you accord me the same privilege.

Another point to mention is that you have frequently suggested 'improvements' to my photos (which I have usually discarded) and so it is only fair that you allow me/Roy to do likewise. There is a tendency to want to 'take you down a peg or two' when you consider yourself such an expert that you can impose your views on my stuff and then complain if I criticise yours!

Regarding the Castleton picture, I would say that the subject shows great promise, but the eye is being led down the lane, whilst the interesting features are above. It might have been better if you'd chosen a position that gave the scene more space, but maybe that wasn't possible.

You have frequently suggested 'improvements' to my photos (which I have usually discarded) and so it is only fair that you allow me/Roy to do likewise. There is a tendency to want to 'take you down a peg or two' when you consider yourself such an expert that you can impose your views on my stuff and then complain if I criticise yours!

Amen, though I don't share that tendency. We no longer cook over open fires, and our utensils don't turn black.

No, you consider yourself too much of an expert already.
I wish I did still have an open fire, though.

Das ist unglaublich schön und klasse gemacht…eine tolle Serie!