Jorge Kreimer wrote:

Sharpness is a bourgeois concept.

Bourgeois concepts are a bourgeois concept!

Jorge Kreimer wrote:

You're being too smart for me right now. I had to look that up. I'm just gonna stupidly nod my head and say "yeah, totes!".

Fist Full of Ish wrote:
Wow!  Sure, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Great. Ok so I like that you are creative and you try a lot of different things and kinds of photography. However, this might come across as a little harsh and I am sorry in advance. I'm just going to talk to you how I would like to be talked to. This isn't about you as a human being, just about the work and that can always be changed, if that is what you want.

There are a few issues, from my point of view anyway. First, the retouching. There are spots in certain pictures were I would say things weren't cleaned all the way. Like the picture of Ryan and Liz, the collage I guess I would call it. In the second one look around her hair and even around his a little. I can see the work there. There's also a lot of skin smoothing going on in an obvious way on almost everything. I'm not sure if that was on purpose in order to give everything a dreamy effect or if that is just your preference. In my opinion, it makes people look waxy. Like the pictures of Violet for example, in some of them the skin on her face doesn't look right. There is like a separation from over-smoothing between tones.

Another thing is the overall execution. For the pictures of Keya Marie in the white shirt, in the top and bottom pictures her head should've been adjusted so that her chin doesn't vanish like that. She has a strong chin, which is obvious in the middle shot so I would pay attention to that so that you always flatter the model. Also, her hair in the middle picture looks not so great flying up like that on only one side. Then for the pictures of her covered in chocolate, you have a grown woman covered in chocolate syrup (or whatever it is), completely naked, but her smile and poses suggest she's posing in a Miss Teen beauty competition. There is a huge disconnect there. If you want to do nude and happy, look at pictures of Marilyn Monroe.

You have so much creativity and you put so much work into things. The thing is that I can actually see all the work. Things lack refinement. You either go for extreme and throw everything into the image, with everything in focus and center stage, while the models wear clothes that, don't kill me, look cheap so everything starts looking poorly done. That, or you go for the bare minimum background and then have the models wear something that again doesn't look the best which takes me right out of the picture. And lighting-wise, most of these are light very one way, head to toe same even lighting with a harsh black background that I think i's partly painted in, or a very basic off white one. These shots lack shadows and interest with posing and framing.

If you are putting in this much effort, and you have this much energy to do all of this, I have zero doubt that you will only get better. Like I've told other people on here so far, you don't need to have a huge budget to make things look like there is a budget. You just have to push yourself to improve and with time you will easily be able to take something that doesn't cost much, or anything at all, and make it look much better. Again, I will end this by saying that if you are happy with what you are doing then it shouldn't matter what I have to say. Just try to separate what I said from personal feelings, maybe you are already good at that (I don't know you), and if anything I said sounds like I might be on to something, work on it. Hope this helps.

Garry k wrote:
So How would You feel about me returning the favor critique wise

I only want to talk about 1 photo of yours

And How Great it is - and should be the Standard for your work

By all means, send me a personal message here on MM and let me know your thoughts. I haven't shot any humans since like November, and before that I was too busy shooting products for the job I was at, so many of these are older because I haven't had time to focus on what I actually like to do. It would be interesting to know what you think my direction should be once I pick things back up! I already have thoughts so I wonder how they will match up!

Jeffrey M Fletcher wrote:
Perceptive comments. If you're still going I"d be interested in reading your thoughts.

It's all very artistic and I can see many people wanting to purchase prints because of how creative you are. There is something so cool about how you pick your images and combine them in a way that turns your pictures into basically paintings. I mean, as I've been repeating a million times on here, focus is great but it's not always needed depending on what you are trying to achieve. Some of these are so blended into one another that it creates motion and an out of focus vibe and that's appealing when presented like this. At least to me.

My favorite by far is Meditation on J. Sturges and anorexia. If I had to point out things I don't like I would say The Devil and Octopus. The colors are screaming at me and the way the elements are coming together doesn't seem as polished by comparison. Maybe that was on purpose but they just seem like a lot for me and maybe even like they are not from the same artist. Anyway, keep doing your thing. Keep experimenting and growing. Good job!

YAJHILPHOTO wrote:

Great. Ok so I like that you are creative and you try a lot of different things and kinds of photography. However, this might come across as a little harsh and I am sorry in advance. I'm just going to talk to you how I would like to be talked to. This isn't about you as a human being, just about the work and that can always be changed, if that is what you want.

There are a few issues, from my point of view anyway. First, the retouching. There are spots in certain pictures were I would say things weren't cleaned all the way. Like the picture of Ryan and Liz, the collage I guess I would call it. In the second one look around her hair and even around his a little. I can see the work there. There's also a lot of skin smoothing going on in an obvious way on almost everything. I'm not sure if that was on purpose in order to give everything a dreamy effect or if that is just your preference. In my opinion, it makes people look waxy. Like the pictures of Violet for example, in some of them the skin on her face doesn't look right. There is like a separation from over-smoothing between tones.

Another thing is the overall execution. For the pictures of Keya Marie in the white shirt, in the top and bottom pictures her head should've been adjusted so that her chin doesn't vanish like that. She has a strong chin, which is obvious in the middle shot so I would pay attention to that so that you always flatter the model. Also, her hair in the middle picture looks not so great flying up like that on only one side. Then for the pictures of her covered in chocolate, you have a grown woman covered in chocolate syrup (or whatever it is), completely naked, but her smile and poses suggest she's posing in a Miss Teen beauty competition. There is a huge disconnect there. If you want to do nude and happy, look at pictures of Marilyn Monroe.

You have so much creativity and you put so much work into things. The thing is that I can actually see all the work. Things lack refinement. You either go for extreme and throw everything into the image, with everything in focus and center stage, while the models wear clothes that, don't kill me, look cheap so everything starts looking poorly done. That, or you go for the bare minimum background and then have the models wear something that again doesn't look the best which takes me right out of the picture. And lighting-wise, most of these are light very one way, head to toe same even lighting with a harsh black background that I think i's partly painted in, or a very basic off white one. These shots lack shadows and interest with posing and framing.

If you are putting in this much effort, and you have this much energy to do all of this, I have zero doubt that you will only get better. Like I've told other people on here so far, you don't need to have a huge budget to make things look like there is a budget. You just have to push yourself to improve and with time you will easily be able to take something that doesn't cost much, or anything at all, and make it look much better. Again, I will end this by saying that if you are happy with what you are doing then it shouldn't matter what I have to say. Just try to separate what I said from personal feelings, maybe you are already good at that (I don't know you), and if anything I said sounds like I might be on to something, work on it. Hope this helps.

Thank you!  You really exceeded my expectations!

You told me I needed to clean things up farther than I thought!  Then I do!
The skin smoothing:  It just dawned on me the other day that part of it might be because I've never sharpened photos after reducing them for MM.  Could that be the problem?  They generally seem much better before reduction.  I probably should sharpen the whole lot.

The "separation from over-smoothing between tones", I don't see what it is, but I did something different with her tones by following a youtube video.  I guess you see through whatever it was.  I'd like to better understand what you're seeing/how you detect that.

I understand the "chin" thing with Keya Marie.  I'm not sensitive to it yet, so I probably won't catch that for a while.     "If you want to do nude and happy, look at pictures of Marilyn Monroe."  Yeah.  I wish I had worked with Keya a lot more. It was her personality coming through, and I let it.  But I regret not shooting more!

"Things lack refinement. ... everything in focus and center ... models wear clothes that look cheap ... models wear something that doesn't look the best. "  Yep.  'Something to work on.

"Head to toe same even lighting"  That one's interesting.  It isn't something I think about.  Now I look at your pics, and they don't scream "uneven lighting".   So, I don't understand how to improve.?

" ... harsh black background ... very basic off white one. ... lack shadows and interest with posing and framing."  Yeah, you're right.  It's mostly because I've been shooting in people's rooms and I'm just not good at it.

Well, I'm amazed and very thankful that you spent some of your valuable time to help me!

YAJHILPHOTO wrote:

It's all very artistic and I can see many people wanting to purchase prints because of how creative you are. There is something so cool about how you pick your images and combine them in a way that turns your pictures into basically paintings. I mean, as I've been repeating a million times on here, focus is great but it's not always needed depending on what you are trying to achieve. Some of these are so blended into one another that it creates motion and an out of focus vibe and that's appealing when presented like this. At least to me.

My favorite by far is Meditation on J. Sturges and anorexia. If I had to point out things I don't like I would say The Devil and Octopus. The colors are screaming at me and the way the elements are coming together doesn't seem as polished by comparison. Maybe that was on purpose but they just seem like a lot for me and maybe even like they are not from the same artist. Anyway, keep doing your thing. Keep experimenting and growing. Good job!

My thanks for the comments and again for your running this thread.

Yeah, I'm not someone from the sharp as a tack school of photography. Decades ago when I started shooting, I got used to storing the images and working with the chance multiple exposures on film and find it useful enough both as a workflow and a vocabulary that I'm sticking with it.

Besides, it's not like my memories and modeling of the world is crystalline and some stunning example of clarity. So, blurs, indistinct image combinations, soft focus - seem like the better analogy for what I'm seeing and trying to communicate.

Right as well on the ones you like less. The Devil was one I did on my own, a chance multiple exposure that I colored with alcohol inks. A magazine got interested, decided I was an illustrator, and asked for a collection of images in the same direction. Out of things I am, an illustrator is not one of them (although not really much of a photographer either).

So, I called an old friend, who had worked as an art director and graphic designer for a few decades and he flew out for a week to stay with me and help with the technical aspects (I'm especially weak in digital skills) of getting a group of images ready for print. Octopus is one of the matching images we produced.

It was a different project. An experiment in making sure that we could get more delineated and saturated images that would work in the 4 color process without clipping and clogging the screens. We got it. Then the magazine folded before printing.

Thanks again, and best of luck to you.