Check out my photography... looking for Critiques

playboycougar · Post by **playboycougar** » Sat May 30, 2009 5:50 am

So I was fortunate enough to have 10 of my photographs featured at an art display at a local cafe recently. I'm looking for critiques really.... any comments, positive or negative, or suggestions.

http://tr.im/mRY5

PC Engine Fan X! · Post by **PC Engine Fan X!** » Sat May 30, 2009 6:01 am

Pretty impressive shots. Some shots at a local arcade would be cool or a shot of a vintage pinball playfield would be worth looking into -- something to spice up the subject matter and catch the eyes of folks passing by. And have you delved into nude model photography as well? ^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

it290 · Post by **it290** » Sat May 30, 2009 1:43 pm

Hmm... very technical, nice lighting. I would suggest that for the street shots you get physically closer to your subject matter; also experiment with depth of field more, and do some cropping. The B&W portraits are my favorites, but I think the interior shots without people in them also have a lot of potential -- they remind me of a particular photographer whose name escapes me at the moment; I'll try and find his name for you. I would also suggest roughing up/loosening up your photos a bit, but that may just be personal preference. I added you as a contact on flickr if you want to check out my stuff (which has mostly been mobile phone photos lately).

Jockel · Post by **Jockel** » Sat May 30, 2009 1:49 pm

I'm not too impressed, but some decent shots.
Doorway before the City Gate is pretty good, though.
Reminded me of a good friends shot: http://www.lipner.de/013.html
We once even had an exhibition together. But now he's a douche :/

dpful · Post by **dpful** » Sat May 30, 2009 2:31 pm

Ungrouped, they look very plain- almost like snap shots (content wise)! If you put all the ones that were particularly dense together, and then all the ones that were perticularly open together- plus ditch the ones that don't fit in those two category's, I think they would look very strong.

I think a focus on a cohesive presentation would do a lot for the pics (I just flipped through the pages as they were). Without any critique of the technical stuff, my response to the form was- "that motorbike is surrounded by people-- that lady is surrounded by dishes-- that chinese guy is surrounded by junk etc." and It spoke to me

it290 · Post by **it290** » Sat May 30, 2009 11:25 pm

Takashi Yasumura is the guy I was thinking of. Some nice work, check it out.

playboycougar · Post by **playboycougar** » Sun May 31, 2009 5:35 am

it290, thanks so much. I saw that you added me. cool!

dpful and jockel, thanks for the honest opinions. Maybe I'll get a real online gallery together that better organizes the photos into related groups.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Sun May 31, 2009 10:34 am

Kind of short on time and I still don't know how to view fullsize shots on Flickr / also don't want to mess around with opening and viewing through category lists right now.

I liked the skating one.

Do you still shoot film? Basically all digital does for most people is give some convenience - at a high cost. I could've picked up some fantastic 35mm (or perhaps even something exotic, but then I'd have to get it developed) kit and gotten top-end Canon FD or similar lenses for basically nothing - although that's still an option, in a way, if I went for an adapter and just manually focused everything.

What sort of lenses do you shoot with, as well? The camera order (processing tomorrow) should come with a cheapo 18-55mm Canon EOS (the nice one is 17-55mm), and a decent 50mm f/1.4 prime.

Makes me think that maybe we could have an ongoing photography topic in here.

Jockel · Post by **Jockel** » Sun May 31, 2009 11:35 am

playboycougar wrote:it290, thanks so much. I saw that you added me. cool!

dpful and jockel, thanks for the honest opinions. Maybe I'll get a real online gallery together that better organizes the photos into related groups.

don't get me wrong, i think they're good shots.
but nothing jaw-dropping. however, i think a bit less duncan-shots would make it look much less gay

plus what dpful said, seperate between snapshots and "art gallery".

playboycougar · Post by **playboycougar** » Sun May 31, 2009 3:13 pm

Ed Oscuro wrote:Kind of short on time and I still don't know how to view fullsize shots on Flickr / also don't want to mess around with opening and viewing through category lists right now.

I liked the skating one.

Do you still shoot film? Basically all digital does for most people is give some convenience - at a high cost. I could've picked up some fantastic 35mm (or perhaps even something exotic, but then I'd have to get it developed) kit and gotten top-end Canon FD or similar lenses for basically nothing - although that's still an option, in a way, if I went for an adapter and just manually focused everything.

What sort of lenses do you shoot with, as well? The camera order (processing tomorrow) should come with a cheapo 18-55mm Canon EOS (the nice one is 17-55mm), and a decent 50mm f/1.4 prime.

Makes me think that maybe we could have an ongoing photography topic in here.

I still shoot film for sure. I have a fantastic camera that you might not think is so great. It's an old consumer level 35mm Nikon N60> I've owned quite a few cameras through the years but always go back to my first, my N60. I recently purchased a Nikon F5, which is considered the best 35mm film camera. It helped me make some of my best shots ever, but it was unmanageable with its weight and amount of features that needed attention.

Currently my equipment looks like this:
35mm: Nikon N60, 50mm F1.8 prime lens, 35-80mm F4-5.6 (my first lens), and a telephoto that I hardly ever use.
Digital: Canon PowerShot G10

I shoot 35mm when I'm confident that I have time to devote to my subjects. I bring my digital when I'm just chilling out.

it290 · Post by **it290** » Sun May 31, 2009 4:11 pm

Ed Oscuro wrote: Makes me think that maybe we could have an ongoing photography topic in here.

How about a shmupsforum flickr group? Anyone else interested?

edit - ah, some equipment geekery as well. I like shooting old rangefinders; I have a few old former soviet union cameras, but my main film cameras are the Yashica Electro GSN (great camera if you can find one in good condition - the built-in lens is superb and the leaf shutter means you can flash sync at any speed) and also my Pentax ES SLR, which is just a lovely solid hunk of metal. Don't have much film stuff on flickr at the moment as I'm lazy with scanning things.

mulletgeezer · Post by **mulletgeezer** » Sun May 31, 2009 10:19 pm

I'm not too wild about the Derek portraits but most of the others are cool and the lighting is great. I'd say the best by far are the shots of your dog. Such a photogenic beast! Apart from the appealing sad eyes I think it's the front paws that do it, they look scarily similar to human hands. You could go a long way together....

playboycougar · Post by **playboycougar** » Mon Jun 01, 2009 2:33 am

it290 wrote:
Ed Oscuro wrote: Makes me think that maybe we could have an ongoing photography topic in here.
How about a shmupsforum flickr group? Anyone else interested?

edit - ah, some equipment geekery as well. I like shooting old rangefinders; I have a few old former soviet union cameras, but my main film cameras are the Yashica Electro GSN (great camera if you can find one in good condition - the built-in lens is superb and the leaf shutter means you can flash sync at any speed) and also my Pentax ES SLR, which is just a lovely solid hunk of metal. Don't have much film stuff on flickr at the moment as I'm lazy with scanning things.

haha.

yeah I'm down for a flickr group.

Good stuff you got there. I'm all for old ass equipment that still works well. I have this backalite TLR medium format camera that's got to be from the 50s. Pretty cool.

Jockel · Post by **Jockel** » Mon Jun 01, 2009 8:07 am

mulletgeezer wrote:I'm not too wild about the Derek portraits but most of the others are cool and the lighting is great.

Oh it was Derek, not Duncan. I must have thought about the horse from the simpsons ;O