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Showing posts 76 - 95 of 95, (reverse)
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 12/16/2011 08:06:21 PM · #76
Every one of these: Minimal, Basic, Advanced, Expert
challenges the photographer to some extent.

And, well, that's the nature of the game isn't it.

Challenges.
 12/16/2011 08:32:45 PM · #77
Originally posted by LevT:
I do feel the current rate of one expert challenge out of three is way too much, one in a month as jagar suggested or even in two would suffice. I don't have a good argument for that, just my strong personal preference of "real life photography" over "digital art", and that DPC's putative objective is to promote photography rather than collage. I understand that we don't have to submit digital art in expert challenges, but as a matter of fact that's what can be expected to do well in them, with rare exceptions, so we are being pushed in that direction.


I favor your argumentation. The images in all expert editing challenges are IMO inferior to the other challenges and tend to become extremely illustrative and borderline commercial. We all have the choice of side challenges or just to add to our portfolios these type of images.
One every two months is probably a good choice of including an expert editing.

12/16/2011 09:18:55 PM · #78
Originally posted by skewsme:
Originally posted by bspurgeon:
Originally posted by jagar:
One expert and one minimal per month, or at least as many minimal as expert, would be fair for all.

Great suggestion.

indeedy

+ 1
 12/16/2011 09:23:23 PM · #79
As the last 4 expert editing challenges, had 41, 66, 86 and 38 participants each it would seem to me, generally speaking, that expert editing is not really that popular with most people. In fact there is only 1 expert editing challenge in the last 2 yrs with more than 100 participants (at least from what I could see, I may have missed one). I know that the participation in most challenges recently has dropped anyway, but there are still some topics that get a good turn out.

Not sure my point here but I thought it interesting how few people really take part in the expert editing challenges.
 12/16/2011 09:26:13 PM · #80
Now this I disagree very strongly with. The basis for minimal editing is root of photography. One should not be relying on editing to make a photo good, that should be done based on the talent of the photographer.

I can honestly say that statement because I know the technical aspects of photography, but I lack the full comprehension and understanding of what makes a photo good and why. No amount of editing will take something I shoot and make it a blue ribbon. That has to exist before the editing. Just like a cake. You can frost it all you want, but if its not cooked right, its not going to be good.

Originally posted by Brent_S:

Actually I don't care for either ruleset as they are both usually very time consuming (minimal puts you into a scavenger hunt looking for the perfect scene without the slightest distraction anywhere in your frame).
12/16/2011 09:43:20 PM · #81
Originally posted by PGerst:
.

I can honestly say that statement because I know the technical aspects of photography, but I lack the full comprehension and understanding of what makes a photo good and why. No amount of editing will take something I shoot and make it a blue ribbon. That has to exist before the editing. Just like a cake. You can frost it all you want, but if its not cooked right, its not going to be good.


true but if the icing is really, really good, the majority of people will eat it up, and love it. not the food critics but who cares about them anyway? :P
 12/16/2011 09:55:30 PM · #82
Originally posted by PGerst:
Now this I disagree very strongly with. The basis for minimal editing is root of photography. One should not be relying on editing to make a photo good, that should be done based on the talent of the photographer.

I can honestly say that statement because I know the technical aspects of photography, but I lack the full comprehension and understanding of what makes a photo good and why. No amount of editing will take something I shoot and make it a blue ribbon. That has to exist before the editing. Just like a cake. You can frost it all you want, but if its not cooked right, its not going to be good.

Originally posted by Brent_S:

Actually I don't care for either ruleset as they are both usually very time consuming (minimal puts you into a scavenger hunt looking for the perfect scene without the slightest distraction anywhere in your frame).


I think I'd agree with Brent about Minimal taking a lot of time, more than I thought it would. Not only do you have to make sure there are no distractions that need to be cropped or cloned out, but for me, since I have the settings on my camera turned way down so I can edit them as I see fit, I would really have to do a lot experimenting with the sharpness, contrast, saturation, and color tone settings to get a decent looking image in minimal. Either that or buy a P&S with everything set up for me. :-D And Expert is totally out of my abilities or interest! :-)
 12/16/2011 10:31:50 PM · #83
Originally posted by PGerst:
Now this I disagree very strongly with. The basis for minimal editing is root of photography. One should not be relying on editing to make a photo good, that should be done based on the talent of the photographer.

I can honestly say that statement because I know the technical aspects of photography, but I lack the full comprehension and understanding of what makes a photo good and why. No amount of editing will take something I shoot and make it a blue ribbon. That has to exist before the editing. Just like a cake. You can frost it all you want, but if its not cooked right, its not going to be good.

Originally posted by Brent_S:

Actually I don't care for either ruleset as they are both usually very time consuming (minimal puts you into a scavenger hunt looking for the perfect scene without the slightest distraction anywhere in your frame).

Hi Paul,
Please notice I also said "I wouldn't even complain about Minimal that much if we could simply crop a little" in my paragraph you quoted from :)

I do very much think minimal is time consuming. Far less than expert, but more than Basic or especially Advanced. You save plenty of processing time with Minimal to be sure. But in my experience if you care about getting a decent score you spend double or triple the time in the field trying to find a shot that not only works for the topic, but one where no score killing distractions appear anywhere in the frame with whatever aspect your camera shoots at. With Minimal, I find myself constantly having to pass over good scenes because one tiny little corner of my frame shows a piece of garbage, power line, part of a lamp, etc. To me this is just a huge waste of time and teaches us nothing but frustration. If we could at least crop a little to remove these distractions from an otherwise perfect frame the "purist" nature of the rule set would remain intact but more people would have time to participate. Make sense?
 12/16/2011 10:55:16 PM · #84
OMG this discussion is so...

I'm coming down on the side of Expert editing rules because that allows for everything, including the minimalists. You don't have to use every tool in the box every time.

The most extreme basic editing is to just leave your shot in the camera, forever.
 12/16/2011 11:00:23 PM · #85
Originally posted by Brent_S:
I do very much think minimal is time consuming. Far less than expert, but more than Basic or especially Advanced. You save plenty of processing time with Minimal to be sure. But in my experience if you care about getting a decent score you spend double or triple the time in the field trying to find a shot that not only works for the topic, but one where no score killing distractions appear anywhere in the frame with whatever aspect your camera shoots at. With Minimal, I find myself constantly having to pass over good scenes because one tiny little corner of my frame shows a piece of garbage, power line, part of a lamp, etc. To me this is just a huge waste of time and teaches us nothing but frustration. If we could at least crop a little to remove these distractions from an otherwise perfect frame the "purist" nature of the rule set would remain intact but more people would have time to participate. Make sense?

I could not agree more about cropping. I don't mind anything else about Minimal, but inability to crop drives me nuts. Finalizing the frame during printing has always been at the heart of the photographic process. So, the minimal ruleset allows you to do all kinds of esoteric image adjustments "in-camera", and does not permit simple cropping... does not make sense to me.
 12/16/2011 11:03:30 PM · #86
Originally posted by pixelpig:
OMG this discussion is so...

I'm coming down on the side of Expert editing rules because that allows for everything, including the minimalists. You don't have to use every tool in the box every time.

The most extreme basic editing is to just leave your shot in the camera, forever.

This is true, however when comes to voting an Expert challenge, voters will tend to score lower Minimal or Basic images, as they'd expect a very elaborated digital art photo...
 12/16/2011 11:06:13 PM · #87
Perhaps we're stearing off topic with the expert vs minimal convo. But with 8 expert challenges(which includes three from this past month) since Aug and only 1 minimal. It's more of, why so many expert ones? even though I'd say it is easier to find a fun topic for expert editing. We could though still use more basic themes for minimal. If we have one end of the spectrum would be nice to have the other once in a while too. I'd enjoy both more if they were not a weekly thing though. I see them as treat challenges ;)

Message edited by author 2011-12-16 23:07:23.
 12/16/2011 11:09:07 PM · #88
Originally posted by gg3rd:
Originally posted by pixelpig:
OMG this discussion is so...

I'm coming down on the side of Expert editing rules because that allows for everything, including the minimalists. You don't have to use every tool in the box every time.

The most extreme basic editing is to just leave your shot in the camera, forever.

This is true, however when comes to voting an Expert challenge, voters will tend to score lower Minimal or Basic images, as they'd expect a very elaborated digital art photo...


Nope, not true. The minimalists will vote minimal editing high, because that's what they like.
 12/16/2011 11:10:42 PM · #89
Minimal editing rules are the most exclusionary, with the longest list of things that are forbidden.
 12/16/2011 11:42:23 PM · #90
+1 for me. I wrote something similar.

Originally posted by Techo:
Perhaps we're stearing off topic with the expert vs minimal convo. But with 8 expert challenges(which includes three from this past month) since Aug and only 1 minimal. It's more of, why so many expert ones? even though I'd say it is easier to find a fun topic for expert editing. We could though still use more basic themes for minimal. If we have one end of the spectrum would be nice to have the other once in a while too. I'd enjoy both more if they were not a weekly thing though. I see them as treat challenges ;)
12/17/2011 01:31:18 AM · #91
Maybe we could have some called Free Editing, and allow people to edit in their preferred way whilst considering every entry in voting on its own merits, without preconceived expectations..
12/17/2011 02:59:35 AM · #92
Yeah, being able to crop would be better in minimal, that's for sure and as I said earlier having the same amount of minimal challenges as expert ones would only be fair, this is not the case today, the last minimal challenge was back in May, this is not the way a serious photography site should be going. We need polarities in anything we do but always in a balanced way.
 12/17/2011 04:29:33 AM · #93
Originally posted by IAmEliKatz:
So basically,

Basic Editing
Advanced Editing
Expert Editing

And the once in a while

"Free Editing"

No rules. Use any portion of any image (Copyright comment goes here) and brushes you want to create your image.


I think this is a great idea.
 12/17/2011 06:43:28 AM · #94
Originally posted by Techo:
Perhaps we're stearing off topic with the expert vs minimal convo. But with 8 expert challenges(which includes three from this past month) since Aug and only 1 minimal. It's more of, why so many expert ones? even though I'd say it is easier to find a fun topic for expert editing. We could though still use more basic themes for minimal. If we have one end of the spectrum would be nice to have the other once in a while too. I'd enjoy both more if they were not a weekly thing though. I see them as treat challenges ;)


Exactly +1
 12/17/2011 07:18:36 AM · #95
Originally posted by MAK:
Originally posted by Techo:
Perhaps we're stearing off topic with the expert vs minimal convo. But with 8 expert challenges(which includes three from this past month) since Aug and only 1 minimal. It's more of, why so many expert ones? even though I'd say it is easier to find a fun topic for expert editing. We could though still use more basic themes for minimal. If we have one end of the spectrum would be nice to have the other once in a while too. I'd enjoy both more if they were not a weekly thing though. I see them as treat challenges ;)


Exactly +1


Here here +1
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