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Is this a good composition and then is it Art?

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Robert Watcher posted this picture in his wonderfully rich ongoing current travelog on Nicaragua.


20121227-130316-2.jpg

Robert Watcher: Nicaragua #100​


Robert,

This is better conceived as an image. I like this composition. I hope you will do more where you carefully weigh the elements........... This composed picture is still more interesting in the long run as it is not about things going wrong but the way of life.
I disagree about the composition on this one. It's not that I hate it, but find it weird as it has the parasols over their heads and look like they are under them, and the direction they are taking makes it look like the will ram into the wall. Perhaps if taken with a wider aperture and the background not as distinct, they would be more appreciated by me. As is, I appreciate the scene, but not for its compositional structure in the picture.

Maggie,

Yes it's untidy but also a glimpse of what is was and will be. This is not a moment of news but something timeless that could have been taken in Kabul or 12th Century English or some Belgian country village. The different colors with sections of red, on the right point down to the reddish path on the left as does the gesture of the nearest man on the cart. They are going forward but are in the present, engrossed in discussion to know what they are passing by. This composition is deceivingly messy but really very simple. It points to their journey ahead and, without seeing them, we share that they are involved with some intimate conversation of two buddies who likely know each other very well.

Without the color, this composition would would still work, but not so well. Had it been staged, it would have been cleaner and we'd have seen less distractions. however, in my view, this is one brilliant image that's worth pointing out. It's not just about what it is and what it's about, but is symbolic of our own lives too, how we pass things so involved in our own issues.

Asher
 
well, actually, it is not the original composition, it has now been cropped and is better, in my opinion. I actually thought the image was good but not because of its composition but more because of the context. The original composition had the parasols from behind over their heads and looked like they were under them while we could see clearly that there was a cloth on top that extended over the second parasol that was more to the right. As you can see, I have a good visual memory and I can see it clearly in my mind, even though it has since been cropped. I think the cropped version is better, as it really does bring what Robert was trying to show more clearly. Obviously, this is the type of image where you may not have time to change aperture, you may not have time to compose from a different angle. Does that make it bad, no, of course not, but I was responding to your comment about how great the composition was, while I didn't think the composition was its strength; instead the strength for me, lies in its context.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
well, actually, it is not the original composition, it has now been cropped and is better, in my opinion.


Well, Maggie and Robert,

I'm surprised, indeed, to see it's changed and so has it's composition and content! The folk in the b.g. on the right are now missing so they are no longer being just passed by and ignored, if that's what happened in the original. This is one reason why text edits are not possible here in OPF after a number of hours so comments remain relevant, LOL! What it does not cover is the artist altering the original. This is what Lucas has repeatedly done with Star Wars and even changed the conditions under which Hans Solo shots a fellow at a bar! The original showed him shooting first while the new version show him firing only after being shot at first and therefore in self-defense. Well one can argue that it''s the artist's art and he/she can continue to mould their vision as it grows on them. Or else, one can say that once art is published and stands on it's own, we the public have a stake in it, an investment of energy, so to speak and therefore the work shouldn't be changed!

This fact of changing is a good reason for us to provide storage for all posted pictures so what we talk about remains constant. The artist has the most rights in the work. I do not question the right to make new versions. It's the artist's perogative to present his/her work according to their own wishes. We're just the observers, consumers and fans who decide to what extent we invest in any offerings! Still, after spending time with a work, we're invested in it and "feel" we have rights.

Well now there have been two version of this interesting image. I'll return to compare my impressions on the original and the new version.

Asher
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Interesting thread you have started here Asher. For comparisons sake, I will include the original that I posted as well as the uncropped version from the camera:



20121227-130316-2.jpg

New Crop with Less Distraction

20121227-130316.jpg

Original Image Posted

20121227-130316-orig.jpg

Uncropped Image
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
well, actually, it is not the original composition, it has now been cropped and is better, in my opinion. I actually thought the image was good but not because of its composition but more because of the context. The original composition had the parasols from behind over their heads and looked like they were under them while we could see clearly that there was a cloth on top that extended over the second parasol that was more to the right. As you can see, I have a good visual memory and I can see it clearly in my mind, even though it has since been cropped. I think the cropped version is better, as it really does bring what Robert was trying to show more clearly. Obviously, this is the type of image where you may not have time to change aperture, you may not have time to compose from a different angle. Does that make it bad, no, of course not, but I was responding to your comment about how great the composition was, while I didn't think the composition was its strength; instead the strength for me, lies in its context.


Maggie - - -I happened to agree with your assessment and so played with the cropping so that it better represented what I wanted the image to show - without as much extra distraction.

I do not spend much time with my files. I crop and process very quickly and when things look good enough to me, I am satisfied. That does not mean that that is the only way to deal with the image or that I consider it the best - - - it is just good enough for me and then I move on to other images.


BTW - I crop and process all of my images - bar none. That has been my process since I went into the profession in 1979 and started processing all of my film and prints both colour and black and white in my wet darkroom, and carrying on in the same fashion with my digital darkroom over the past 12 years.

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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Interesting thread you have started here Asher. For comparisons sake, I will include the original that I posted as well as the uncropped version from the camera:

Thanks, Robert for sharing all 3 versions of your picture.


20121227-130316.jpg


Original Image Posted​


This one has such a strong feature being passed on the righthand side that we are allowed to consider it in the story. So people being passed by is there to be experienced. Yes, there are wires but they do not appear to be obstacles as some seem to be just dangling free. The action perceived by me, at least, is the "passing by" of local activity while engaged in conversation, perhaps. There's some confusion as to where the parasols belong. It could even be that one is the roof of the cart!


20121227-130316-orig.jpg


Uncropped Image​


Here, the view is so wide in the uncropped image. The cart is moving through this intersection and the relationship to the parasols is less confusing as we have more of the concepts of the street.


20121227-130316-2.jpg


New Crop with Less Distraction​


Now, with severe cropping we have to face the only action besides the cart moving is the sweeping aside of the wires. Before they were not as important. Now the ranking of this idea has achieved it's proper place, matching your intent.

This shows so clearly how cropping can alter one's perception looking at the same information by removing it from the influence of other elements in the scene.

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
On the subject of crop: I would have cropped out the cars and bicycle on the left, which are unrelated to the action, but not the fruit stand on the right, which gives context and allow me to understand what the umbrella are used for. The first time I saw the image, I thought they were on the cart. I would have kept most of the top because the first time I say the image it was the tight crop and I did not understand what the wire was.
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
I would have kept most of the top because the first time I say the image it was the tight crop and I did not understand what the wire was.

I guess that your comment supports my reason for cropping and posting the image as I first did - to support a series of images about the wires being down. The reason I shot this one was solely to capture the man pushing the wires out of the way. The context is with the other 3 images that are part of the set. Take this cropped shot on it's own and as Asher has commented on - it can take on a totally different meaning if one wants to.

My Logic : The reason for my first crop was so that some of the wire and a little bit of the setting showed (context), but was close enough to see what the man was doing (intent). The final crop focused more on the hands pushing out the small wires (intent), but does not show the setting (context). The uncropped image gives more context (fine if I were only showing one image about the fallen wires), but loses the concept of the hand pushing the wire out of the way.

As for composition, there was no other way for me to take this shot at the time this situation quickly developed and so to me it supports a series of images better than being on its own - - - for this story of the fallen wires anyway. But it doesn't bother me that others find something different from the shot or from the different crops. I find that interesting as well.

But I must say that I am not one to theorize about my photography or extrapolate the content of my photographs to find some meaning or value in them. If a photographic image is pleasing to me - it is fine. Some hold stronger value to me than others because they are more visually appealing --- and sometimes they have content than is more powerful to me than the visual appeal or composition and so those things have less relevance to it's success.

I do take a lot of images - so many in fact that many photos that I consider very good, are buried on hard drives somewhere and will never be seen again - simply because they did not suit the purpose and need I had at the time, or their may be been stronger images that won out in the culling process. For me that is the creative process of photography. I quickly forget what I have done and move on to the next. I just love to use my cameras as a creative expression (not always simply for the image, but many times to tell stories) and there is so much to take in with the viewfinder and capture on film or the digital sensor.

Oh Oh - am I getting off topic (LOL) - sorry.

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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Glances!

.............

But I must say that I am not one to theorize about my photography or extrapolate the content of my photographs to find some meaning or value in them. If a photographic image is pleasing to me - it is fine. Some hold stronger value to me than others because they are more visually appealing --- and sometimes they have content than is more powerful to me than the visual appeal or composition and so those things have less relevance to it's success.


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Robert,

Your approach to photography comes naturally out of your enthusiasm, it seems and appreciation and it just flows through your lens with torrents of imaged. I understand now that the pictures you show seem to be part of glances around you as you travel. So scenes need to be experienced in the groups you show and felt more than thought about individually. It's a grand visceral experience you seem to be after. The separate images, stones on a country wall, are just shaped to fit, and that's that.

I'm fine with that. :)

Still, once the images leave the creator, they can get a life of their own and be looked at individually. Some may even stand out and demand us to stop our own glancing attention and be drawn in. When that happens, we then are left with one world, that of the single image. It happened here. This one image simply escaped!

Asher
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Still, once the images leave the creator, they can get a life of their own and be looked at individually. Some may even stand out and demand us to stop our own glancing attention and be drawn in. When that happens, we then are left with one world, that of the single image. It happened here. This one image simply escaped!

Thanks Asher. Please don't feel that I don't enjoy the journey others take with my images. That is totally fine with me.



--------

I understand now that the pictures you show seem to be part of glances around you as you travel.

It is interesting that you have made this observation Asher. Funny thing now that I think of it, that this approach has also worked for many years in my professional photography career of weddings, events and portraits.

I do not consider myself a spray and pray photographer who shoots for the odds of getting one right. I shoot a lot, but also pride myself on having few shots that I am not able to use. I shoot quickly without much thought at the moment - - - but that is because the thought process and planning have already been done in my head before I raise the camera or at least fire the shutter. I kind of summed that process up in a post on my journal : http://robertwatcher.com/journal/index.php?jp=195&title=getting-the-shot-anticipation-pays-off

In reflection I think that it is this way of my catching "glances around me" that allowed me to separate my work from other professionals and for my clients to see something different than what they were seeing with others. Fortunately for me, that perception has resulted in me demanding higher fees than other photographers in my working area who in some cases are probably are much more technically astute or interested than I am. :)


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AN ADDED THOUGHT : I just considered this part of your response "Your approach to photography comes naturally out of your enthusiasm". In addition to enthusiasm, I firmly believe that there is a way that I look at the world - an awareness maybe - - - that allows me to quickly anticipate what I want to capture. Other photo enthusiasts may pass over the same things that I am aware of. Some of this may be developed - but going back to snapshots that I took with my mothers camera when I was young, I really think that there is built-in visual ability that precludes what camera or instrument I use to express what I am seeing and feeling. I know several photographers who are way more enthusiastic about photography than I am, are more dedicated and practice like crazy, and have way better gear and understanding of technical terms - but who you and others may not take much note of their photographs.

This is not meant to be creepy or arrogant - - - from my experience in life I have just come to this conclusion. Which really means that almost everyone can produce to the same level if they put enough work into it. But for some getting to the end result is just more effortless. As a matter of fact things that I have no interest in like tinkering with automotive engines would be almost an impossibility for me to learn to do and if I spent enough time could probably accomplish with much effort.

Don't know why I've gone down this path this morning but . .
. . . What do you think on that matter? I think this may fall into the type of discussion you have opened with this thread.


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Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Well then Robert,

"Glances Around Me" is your branding! I'm so glad I hit it right as I was concerned that I might be overreaching in my interpretation of your approach to photography.

Asher
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Well then Robert,

"Glances Around Me" is your branding! I'm so glad I hit it right as I was concerned that I might be overreaching in my interpretation of your approach to photography.

Asher

If you feel you may be overreaching based on responses I have made in different threads over the years I have been on your forum - - - please don't. Anything I say is just how I feel about something at the moment and is never a response to being upset with what someone has posted or a defence of my approach to photography. Just consider it idle babble.

To be frank, I just am not one to analyze my work or why I do something. I simply do things that I love doing or that allow me to create and express. I always hope that I am changing and being progressive. I detest stagnation - especially as I get older.

For most of my life, those things have been drawing, poetry and song writing when I was young, music and photography in my mid to late teens and as strange as it seems, computer and web programming using math and algorithms to create whatever I want on a computer screen, out nothing more than numbers and logic.

"Glances Around Me" is catchy. If I end up using it in my professional work, I hope the royalties won't be too high! LOL

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fahim mohammed

Well-known member
After paying due homage to everyone's opinions on the why, how, what, where and when of art and photography, permit me to say this..

Composition...what made you stop and photograph something? Capture that ' what ' and you have good composition.

Content...what made you stop and photograph ? ' what ' you have the content.

Why and how one photographs...it is because ' you ' are ' you '. I can never be ' you '. So I should not copy your ' why and how '.

Be thankful, ' you ' are ' you '.

Want to be ' me '. Cannot be.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
After paying due homage to everyone's opinions on the why, how, what, where and when of art and photography, permit me to say this..

Composition...what made you stop and photograph something? Capture that ' what ' and you have good composition.

Content...what made you stop and photograph ? ' what ' you have the content.

Why and how one photographs...it is because ' you ' are ' you '. I can never be ' you '. So I should not copy your ' why and how '.

Be thankful, ' you ' are ' you '.

Want to be ' me '. Cannot be.




I would like to have more comments on my photographs. Why? Not because I want to photograph as if I were somebody else, but because I have no other way to perceive what other people see when they look at one of my pictures. So I would like to know what they see, what they feel, what they understood and, yes, even what they would have done differently. For example, when someone tells me "I would have cropped it this way" or "I would have taken the picture from that other angle", I don't take it necessarily as a suggestion to do differently but it allows me to understand what elements they see as more important than others.

This is what I do when I comment: write the kind of critic I would like to receive myself.

Obviously, not all photographers want this kind of critic. When I realise that my comments are not wanted by a given person, I simply stop to comment the images of that particular person. There is not point in writing critic which is unwanted.
 
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fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Once again Jerome, either I was not clear or you did not understand what I wrote.

This post ( which you have selectively quoted ) was not about receiving , giving, wanting critique or opinions or not.

I was trying to write what to me makes for a good composition. As the op title asked ' is this a good composition ?'.

A good composition in a photograph , to me, is one that includes all the elements that selectively and together attracted me, made me look and photograph something. If I could capture that ' thing ', the chances are it would attract some viewers too!

This has got nothing to do with wanting or not wanting people to provide feedback or not.

As to why someone photographs the way they do? Because they are ' them ' and not me. I might or might not photograph the same way. Neither is right or wrong.

Again nothing to do with wanting feedback or not. That is another topic, another discussion and nothing to do with this thread and/or post.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
After paying due homage to everyone's opinions on the why, how, what, where and when of art and photography, permit me to say this..

Composition...what made you stop and photograph something? Capture that ' what ' and you have good composition.

Content...what made you stop and photograph ? ' what ' you have the content.

Why and how one photographs...it is because ' you ' are ' you '. I can never be ' you '. So I should not copy your ' why and how '.

Be thankful, ' you ' are ' you '.

Want to be ' me '. Cannot be.

Fahim,

But we're all connected. What we deem to be a good photograph comes from many common sources as well as our own private experiences. We're influenced by each other and we're capable of sharing insights as to how things work on us when we relate our reactions. That's the point of feedback. It gives us occasional new insights into our own work: to create and refine and then even achieve our own goals.

One has to be careful not to be trying to make other folks pictures like one's we admire, yet our standards actually come from that understanding of great pictures we have previously been exposed to! Still we can try our best. The idea is to help each other, each of us on a separate journey. We have to be confident enough to protect original artistic ideas while putting up with rough opinions, even suggestions that can lead us off course.

Still, I'd rather face such hazards than just working in isolation. Besides, I get so much pleasure from other peoples view of the world sampled with their lenses pointing were I am not or cannot be!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Once again Jerome, either I was not clear or you did not understand what I wrote.

This post ( which you have selectively quoted ) was not about receiving , giving, wanting critique or opinions or not.

I was trying to write what to me makes for a good composition. As the op title asked ' is this a good composition ?'.

A good composition in a photograph , to me, is one that includes all the elements that selectively and together attracted me, made me look and photograph something. If I could capture that ' thing ', the chances are it would attract some viewers too!

This has got nothing to do with wanting or not wanting people to provide feedback or not.

As to why someone photographs the way they do? Because they are ' them ' and not me. I might or might not photograph the same way. Neither is right or wrong.

Again nothing to do with wanting feedback or not. That is another topic, another discussion and nothing to do with this thread and/or post.

My apologies for having taken part of your post out of the quotation (I corrected that) and for having misunderstood it.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Jerome,

Ideas of good composition, motivations in photography and feedback are all mutually supportive and reinforcing. It seems that most of the time, we can't help dealing with all three when we consider any one of them.

Asher
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Fahim,

But we're all connected. What we deem to be a good photograph comes from many common sources as well as our own private experiences. We're influenced by each other and we're capable of sharing insights as to how things work on us when we relate our reactions. That's the point of feedback. It gives us occasional new insights into our own work: to create and refine and then even achieve our own goals.

One has to be careful not to be trying to make other folks pictures like one's we admire, yet our standards actually come from that understanding of great pictures we have previously been exposed to! Still we can try our best. The idea is to help each other, each of us on a separate journey. We have to be confident enough to protect original artistic ideas while putting up with rough opinions, even suggestions that can lead us off course.

Still, I'd rather face such hazards than just working in isolation. Besides, I get so much pleasure from other peoples view of the world sampled with their lenses pointing were I am not or cannot be!

Asher

Asher, great. Where have I said otherwise?

But Asher is Asher. I am what I am. In the way I photograph. You are you. I might like your ' style '. That can be learnt. Maybe even necessary. But I can never be you, as a person, personality, likes/dislikes, what I see and interpret that which I see. Why? Because I am me. You are Asher. And therein lies the individuality of each of our photographs. Neither is good or bad. It is just the way it is.

And nobody is born with a camera ( and least not yet ). We learn from others. We teach others. No one is an island unto themselves. Though many thought they were.

p.s is Robert's photo a good composition? Is Robert satisfied that it serves the purpose it was photographed for? If so, then it is good.
 

fahim mohammed

Well-known member
Jerome, nothing to apologize for at all.
And I do understand your reasoning for when/ when not you might provide feedback.

Asher.

This thread is not about the how, where, when, and why's of giving and receiving feedbacks.

Regards.
 
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