Discuss the work of a Professional Photographer

[J.Scott]

Originally Posted by lithos

I've got more respect for a single lowly shooter reporting for the Sodomy Times than a gross of the world's best fashion, studio, and landscape photographers combined (and the legions of back-room photoshop heroes and lighting technicians who do 90% of their work.)

Maybe my post didn't express my inner feelings.
I think she is the right person for the job.
Her photography is perfect for the application.

Likewise, I'm not the best Cable Repair Technician in the world, but good enough to put in 30 years doing my best and making a decent working wage too.

[Damn Brit]

Thanks for getting involved in this discussion guys.

First, to those of you who only mentioned the Pop Photo aspect - I think you might have missed my point. Pop Photo merely led me to her website.
To me, regardless of whether the pictures on her site are assignments or not, they are there to not just show what work she has done but her skill as a photographer.
Like I said in the thread starter, some of them are good but I found a lot of them to be mediocre. There's poor composition, under exposure, pictures that don't convey any meaning.
Her site makes me wonder does she have any pride in her work or is she just not that talented and it is about "who you know, not what you know"

Maybe it feels closer to home for me because I'm starting school soon and stuff like that makes me wonder "Is it worth spending three years of my life and fifty thousand dollars because I don't know someone who could give me a job".

I know going to school is a risk, you need a perfect storm. You need the talent, the exposure, the right person(s) seeing your work and some luck for garnish on top. Somedays though, it feels like they took away the carrot and all that's left is the stick.

[Sailor]

Originally Posted by Damn Brit

Thanks for getting involved in this discussion guys.

First, to those of you who only mentioned the Pop Photo aspect - I think you might have missed my point. Pop Photo merely led me to her website.
To me, regardless of whether the pictures on her site are assignments or not, they are there to not just show what work she has done but her skill as a photographer.
Like I said in the thread starter, some of them are good but I found a lot of them to be mediocre. There's poor composition, under exposure, pictures that don't convey any meaning.
Her site makes me wonder does she have any pride in her work or is she just not that talented and it is about "who you know, not what you know"

Maybe it feels closer to home for me because I'm starting school soon and stuff like that makes me wonder "Is it worth spending three years of my life and fifty thousand dollars because I don't know someone who could give me a job".

I know going to school is a risk, you need a perfect storm. You need the talent, the exposure, the right person(s) seeing your work and some luck for garnish on top. Somedays though, it feels like they took away the carrot and all that's left is the stick.

I guess I have a more charitable view of her photos. Her pictures made me think of a studio musician tasked with working on a pop recording aimed at a particular market. Nothing new, nothing special - but reliably delivering the goods.

I know how you feel about starting school, the time and the money. I spent 4 years as an undergrad and 4 years as a grad student, and during that time I wondered about the challenges facing me when I had to make a living. However, I did get a job and have lived well - and so will you.

Jer

[Ratmagiclady]

Hrm, checking out her little opening slideshow, I think I 'get' a lot of it: she does things with motion and implied motion that I can really relate to, ...I think she's trying to show her individual thing about a lot of it, rather than the technical 'standards,' though there's some shots there I would have omitted, especially the long-exposures-of-pretty-lights stuff, much of which fails to impress. Some of them, you could spend some time with, though.

[lithos]

Originally Posted by J.Scott

Maybe my post didn't express my inner feelings.
I think she is the right person for the job.
Her photography is perfect for the application.

Likewise, I'm not the best Cable Repair Technician in the world, but good enough to put in 30 years doing my best and making a decent working wage too.

Cable repair? That's just plugging stuff in, isn't it? Turning stuff off, then on again, maybe unplugging it from the wall?*

That's a gross oversimplification of your job, as is regarding photojournalism as just rocking up and hitting the shutter.

*Unless you're a cable repair guy in one of those eighties pornos...in which case, I salute, good sir!

[Wheatfield]

She certainly runs the gamut from dross to excellence. Some of her images are very, very good indeed. The abstract stuff didn't do anything for me, but I feel the same way about most of Picasso's work too.
Her Miscellaneous and National Geo galleries are all very good to very powerful images. Even the weakest pictures are pretty darned good.
The New York Times stuff is, I think, very good, but must be taken in the context of news photography, which isn't necessarily going to be high art all the time. Sometimes it's just there to illustrate a caption, and the photographer has to do the best he/she can with the sometimes fleeting subject matter.

[J.Scott]

Originally Posted by lithos

Cable repair? That's just plugging stuff in, isn't it? Turning stuff off, then on again, maybe unplugging it from the wall?*

That's a gross oversimplification of your job, as is regarding photojournalism as just rocking up and hitting the shutter.

*Unless you're a cable repair guy in one of those eighties pornos...in which case, I salute, good sir!

Plugging stuff...... Yeah - whatever.

Sounds like an over simplification but I am required to trouble shoot problems in copper telephone cable and then fix said troubles in a timely, cost efficient manner. We often deal with hundreds of cable pairs in a single cable that can be in the ground, air or under water. The only porno I've experienced is customers coming naked to the door. It’s far from exciting, trust me.

The point I failed to make was that once you are in the groove it all just flows. I am admittedly not the best ever at what I do, but good enough, as is she.

[Cosmo]

Originally Posted by Wheatfield

She certainly runs the gamut from dross to excellence. Some of her images are very, very good indeed. The abstract stuff didn't do anything for me, but I feel the same way about most of Picasso's work too.
Her Miscellaneous and National Geo galleries are all very good to very powerful images. Even the weakest pictures are pretty darned good.
The New York Times stuff is, I think, very good, but must be taken in the context of news photography, which isn't necessarily going to be high art all the time. Sometimes it's just there to illustrate a caption, and the photographer has to do the best he/she can with the sometimes fleeting subject matter.

This is exactly what I thought, I really liked her Nat Geo and Misc stuff, I thought it was of good quality.

Originally Posted by Damn Brit

Like I said in the thread starter, some of them are good but I found a lot of them to be mediocre. There's poor composition, under exposure, pictures that don't convey any meaning.
Her site makes me wonder does she have any pride in her work or is she just not that talented and it is about "who you know, not what you know"

She's a photojournalist, not a fine art photographer, she photographs to tell a story, not worry about getting perfect composition and exposure, if there's such thing as perfect exposure.

And what do you mean by, "pictures that don't convey any meaning", have you read the captions? Have you actually looked at the photos, and put some thought into what the photos portray? Could you elaborate on that?

[Damn Brit]

Originally Posted by Cosmo

This is exactly what I thought, I really liked her Nat Geo and Misc stuff, I thought it was of good quality.





She's a photojournalist, not a fine art photographer, she photographs to tell a story, not worry about getting perfect composition and exposure, if there's such thing as perfect exposure.

And what do you mean by, "pictures that don't convey any meaning", have you read the captions? Have you actually looked at the photos, and put some thought into what the photos portray? Could you elaborate on that?

Yes I did actually look at them and put thought into what they portrayed. I didn't start this thread just to run someone down. I just think some of them (mainly in the abstract section) didn't convey any meaning even with a caption.
Perhaps I would think differently if some of less strong pictures hadn't been included, they do tend to drag down the quality ones.
And yes, I know she's a photojournalist and she's been doing it for some time, so there's really no excuse for her not to have filled her website with her best stuff.