Handholdability of medium format cameras

[MattKing]

Have you considered that cropping someone’s photo could also be viewed as an insult?

Depends entirely on the context. I wouldn't consider doing it if I didn't think that feedback was welcome, and I would never do it in any way that did not make it clear that it was a suggestion, and reflected a personal preference and/or personal experience.
Unless of course the crop suggestion was purely practical and functional - which only really applies to things like catalogue or journalistic photos.

I’m sorry you took it as a personal insult.
“Naive” needn’t be as negative as you seem to think.

I'm prepared to learn that "naive" has a special meaning outside of common use that I'm not familiar with. In common use it means uninformed and unsophisticated, and is generally used as a pejorative when applied to those who have a fair amount of knowledge and experience, even if not in an academic setting.

 

[chris77]

Van Gogh is possibly the worst example you could give. His paintings are basically nothing but highly swirly bokeh.
But the history of painting is full of blurry and indistinct foreground elements. It’s a way of framing and it’s a way of creating context.

What a silly statement..
Sorry, are you by any chance a relative of 'Trendland' ?

 

[Sirius Glass]

Van Gogh is possibly the worst example you could give. His paintings are basically nothing but highly swirly bokeh.
But the history of painting is full of blurry and indistinct foreground elements. It’s a way of framing and it’s a way of creating context.

 

[Helge]

I am so enthralled we have such an expert on composition and art contributing to this discussion and the site in general.

Well, you should be if your standard of posting is this.

 

[Helge]

Depends entirely on the context. I wouldn't consider doing it if I didn't think that feedback was welcome, and I would never do it in any way that did not make it clear that it was a suggestion, and reflected a personal preference and/or personal experience.
Unless of course the crop suggestion was purely practical and functional - which only really applies to things like catalogue or journalistic photos.

I'm prepared to learn that "naive" has a special meaning outside of common use that I'm not familiar with. In common use it means uninformed and unsophisticated, and is generally used as a pejorative when applied to those who have a fair amount of knowledge and experience, even if not in an academic setting.

If I meant uninformed and unsophisticated I would have written that.

Have a look at some of the definitions from various dictionaries: https://www.google.dk/search?sxsrf=ALeKk03lHVTxcLVMKkw1IW8JUdw6OYI7yA:1602367266849&source=hp&ei=Ii-CX8XhMIPikgWqwaGICQ&q=naive+dictionary&oq=&gs_lcp=ChFtb2JpbGUtZ3dzLXdpei1ocBABGAAyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECcyBwgjEOoCECdQAFgAYOMSaAFwAHgAgAEAiAEAkgEAmAEAsAEP&sclient=mobile-gws-wiz-hp

At times it has been coveted as desirable trait in an artist.

If it’s good or acceptable to suggest by second guessing someone’s photo, how come words are so different?
I’m taking a critical look at your fondly held notions, in the same way you attempt to do with the photo.
Only the method is different.

 

[Helge]

What a silly statement..
Sorry, are you by any chance a relative of 'Trendland' ?

What a Trendland thing to ask.
Let’s take a look at a bit of van Gogh:

You where saying?

Another Dutch painter from a few hundred years previously, Rembrandt, made plenty of use of douche foregrounds and sketch like elements around the main subject.

 

[chris77]

There is not a single area out of focus.
You might be dreaming?

 

[chris77]

Do you know what bokeh actually is?

 

[Helge]

There is not a single area out of focus.
You might be dreaming?

Exactly.

 

[chris77]

vangogh is f64 if anything..

 

[chris77]

Exactly.

Thank you for clarification.
No further questions

 

[Helge]

Do you know what bokeh actually is?

Do you?

 

[chris77]

good night everybody.
Got no more cookies..

 

[Helge]

vangogh is f64 if anything..

He’s an impressionist. He couldn’t be further from.

 

[chris77]

He’s an impressionist. He couldn’t be further from.

Wrong again..
Never mind

 

[Helge]

View attachment 256746​

Classy.​

 

[Helge]

Wrong again..
Never mind

What is he in your world then?

 

[chris77]

Post-impressionist and above all pioneer of expressionism..

 

[Arthurwg]

There is not a single area out of focus.
You might be dreaming?

Quite right. And while there may be a place in art and photography for OOF foregrounds, the photo in question is not that place.

 

[Helge]

Post-impressionist and above all pioneer of expressionism..

Ok, fair enough, nice speed googling.
But Post-Impressionism has always been a sketchy label.
Many Impressionist paintings has strong PI elements.
As early as Turner (who kind of started it all with help from Ruskin) there is strong expressionistic elements.
Pathetic fallacy and all that.

But that really has little to do with what was being discussed here initially.

 

[chris77]

Bye trendland )

Ok, fair enough, nice speed googling.
But Post-Impressionism has always been a sketchy label.
Many Impressionist paintings has strong PI elements.
As early as Turner (who kind of started it all with help from Ruskin) there is strong expressionistic elements.
Pathetic fallacy and all that.

But that really has little to do with what was being discussed here initially.

None of the images you posted could be categorised as impressionism, and there is no bokeh in them whatsoever.
So please.. i don't know what you are trying to do, but.. well.
Nevermind

 

[Helge]

Bye trendland )

None of the images you posted could be categorised as impressionism, and there is no bokeh in them whatsoever.
So please.. i don't know what you are trying to do, but.. well.
Nevermind

See if you won’t answer despite your put-on, clumsy, bohemian-coy, blasé.

The images posted certainly have impressionist elements, and more of those than real, expressionist elements.
You shouldn’t have used the direct phrasing of one of the first google hits: “pioneer of expressionism” (also the title of a dubious book).
That kind of gives your depth of grock away.

Like postmodernist architects are really in most senses modernists, in stance and in their use of shape and vocabulary, so are Post-Impressionists really Impressionists at heart.

There is a great deal of higher abstraction and symbolism in much Impressionism, even early on.

And the whole reason this is mentioned, is that one of the main characteristics of Impressionism and of van Goghs art, the prominent, impulsive brushstrokes, resembles out of focus areas. And are probably originally, at least partly, developed as an abstraction of that.
I never said they where the exact same thing.

 

[Helge]

Quite right. And while there may be a place in art and photography for OOF foregrounds, the photo in question is not that place.

Oh, if you say so...

 

[Lachlan Young]

There's definitely an interesting sociological study to be done on the creation/ enforcement of a synthetic hegemony of the camera-club mentalité that photographic composition is to be unyieldingly followed as a set of simplistic yet totalitarian rules - which nevertheless fluctuate according to the strange whims & sponsorships of the middlebrow tastemakers involved.

 

[grat]

Rules of composition are not laws of nature. They're guidelines to producing pleasing images, and usually they work. Anyone who shoots 6x6 (as an example), has probably looked at the rule of thirds at least once and thought "You have got to be kidding me!".

Out-of-focus foregrounds are fine-- I agree, in this case, it breaks up the relentless horizontal imagery-- but I also agree that without a gradual transition into rest of the photo, it's disparate-- disconnected. A razor-sharp, strikingly lit landscape has been photo-bombed by a fuzzy rock.

But, that's only because the discussion came up. Ordinarily, my reaction would be "That's a really nice photo. Something about it seems a little off", and I would classify it in my brain as a slightly less than perfect image, but fantastic to look at nonetheless. I apologize to the original photographer-- Must be a bit irritating seeing one of what you should consider your better photos being dissected in a thread that's almost certainly going to disintegrate.

I think, from a technical perspective, that it should have either been focus stacked (two images, one near, one far), or perhaps this is one of those cases where scheimpflug might come in, and some front tilt might shift the plane of focus enough to bring both the foreground and the critical background elements into sharpness. I'm still learning the limits of that trick, though.