Photographic rules do they really apply to a good photo ?

How is the question of something being art, in my or a young kids objective? Wether I consider something art is subjective not objective.
Whether you consider something art is neither objective nor subjective. It’s irrelevant.

The fact that you believe your opinion on the subject matters is ridiculous.

Art ‘is’ - that’s not an opinion, it’s a fact.
 
Nor is there a need to ‘like’ it ;)

More seriously
If great literature is written in French, then I’d have to study French in order to understand that work. If that is a fact (it is) then if I have no understanding of art photography or abstract sculpture (or jazz) how can I judge the quality of it as art?
To bring this down to something less refined, there have been many movie critics that have slammed films when they came out that are now considered cult, I.e American Pyscho. So while critics might be deemed well versed to comment on a topic their views might not always be valid.

Another one on photography. Rhein II, to me it is pretty dull but someone paid $4 million or so for it. So take from that what you will.
 
The rule of thirds should always be broken - it is an awful 'rule'

Why should it? is that not creating just another 'awful rule'? Sometimes rule of thirds happens to make the best composition of a given scene, and can't be ignored.

Personally, I shoot for me first and foremost, I don't tend to hang many of my 'art' pieces. Occasionally one will stand out and I'll go to the bother of sending off for a good quality print. If others happen to like my images, nice, nothing more really. Photography for me is as much about getting out and 'capturing' memories as anything else, a little bit of therapy into the mix. I don't think I have ever labelled myself an 'artist' for my photography, more inclined to do that re my drawings [both sketches and cartoons] but I stopped that years ago, very possibly because I started doing more on the photography side. Started to spend more time editing digital images than I would sketching and I feel like I lost a lot of imagination along the way
 
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Whether you consider something art is neither objective nor subjective. It’s irrelevant.

The fact that you believe your opinion on the subject matters is ridiculous.

Art ‘is’ - that’s not an opinion, it’s a fact.
What sort of poncy statement is that? "Art is" Nobody is disputing that art exists.

Who decides when something is Art if it's not the viewer / experiencer?
 
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What sort of poncy statement is that? "Art is" Nobody is disputing that art exists.

Who decides when something is Art if it's not the viewer / experiencer?
Well at the risk of sounding elitist - 'experts', in the same way I don't know whether a tumour is malignant or a building design meets regs, or a cake recipe will work, or whether a device is a 'computer', I don't have the knowledge to decide what is 'art'.
But I do have enough knowledge to know that art is not what I decide it is, or what I like, In the same way I know the earth isn't flat.
 
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Wether I consider something art is subjective not objective.

Agreed, absolutely. What you consider something to be is certainly subjective. But...

Suppose I consider the moon to be made of green cheese. That then would be subjectively true because I believe it. Does that make the moon really green cheese objectively?
 
Well at the risk of sounding elitist - 'experts', in the same way I don't know whether a tumour is malignant or a building design meets regs, or a cake recipe will work, or whether a device is a 'computer', I don't have the knowledge to decide what is 'art'.
But I do have enough knowledge to know that art is not what I decide it is, or what I like, In the same way I know the earth isn't flat.

Well I think you're using the word Art in a different context.
I can draw a pretty picture, write a lovely song or create another piece of art. It's uo to the viewer or listener to decide if it's pretty or the song lovely. Likewise the piece of art I created.
 
Agreed, absolutely. What you consider something to be is certainly subjective. But...

Suppose I consider the moon to be made of green cheese. That then would be subjectively true because I believe it. Does that make the moon really green cheese objectively?

Art is not a matter of fact like the moons structure, it's a matter of preference and evaluation. As in beauty being in the eye of the beholder.

Which is why this subject has been debated for donkeys years. :)
 
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Well I think you're using the word Art in a different context.
I can draw a pretty picture, write a lovely song or create another piece of art. It's uo to the viewer or listener to decide if it's pretty or the song lovely. Likewise the piece of art I created.
So - do you believe that music isn't art?

I think this may be a further clue as to your level of understanding of Art. :)
 
So - do you believe that music isn't art?

I think this may be a further clue as to your level of understanding of Art. :)

Where on earth did you get that from? I will answer anyway. Some music is art, to me. One direction? Not for me, but I'm sure it is to others. Which is the point.
 
Art is not a matter of fact like the moons structure, it's a matter of preference and evaluation. As in beauty being in the eye of the beholder.

Which is why this subject has been debated for donkeys years. :)

Back to our cancer treatment (Art). 3 different Oncologists (Art experts) might have a slightly different opinion. Given the fact there's no simple consensus, Dave from the pub decides that his opinion is worth as much as the experts - seeing as they can't agree.:thinking:

Where on earth did you get that from? I will answer anyway. Some music is art, to me. One direction? Not for me, but I'm sure it is to others. Which is the point.

That's it exactly - you believe that in some way your taste has something to do with whether or not something is Art - and again, you are 100% objectively incorrect.

You are qualified to tell us what you like - and as a musician, probably better qualified than me to give a justification for your view - but you can't decide something isn't 'music' because you don't like it.
 
if I want a cancer treatment plan, an oncologist will do a better job than Dave down the pub.

Nothing sums this debate up better than simply assuming that Dave does not go down the pub to relax after a long day of treating cancer patients at the hospital where he works as a respected oncologist.

One thing that art is, is rejecting such simplistic dichotomies. That you can just look at a work with a tick list and say whether or not something is art based on some arbitrary criteria. And that includes the dichotomy of claiming it either has to be either objective or subjective.

Art is first and foremost expression, it is something that exists in both the intent of the creator and the understanding of he observer. They may overlap, they may diverge wildly. Neither is wrong, not right.

That this debate can still be had after thousands of years is because there is no simple answer which can end it with everyone going "oh aye, of course." There is no objective criteria that everyone agrees on that can be applied like a science. Nor can it simply be dismissed as something subjective as to whether the creator or observer considers it art.

And there is never going to be any agreement or resolution when people see it as a question to which they have the one true answer. If you think that way you are looking at the issue wrongly. You are treating it as a science. It may encompass science, but it transcends it. Art is emotional. Art is about the human experience. Call that poncey, but the alternative is reducing it someone with a clipboard checking off a list of rules. That is not art.

Art is not a science, it is an art.

Except when it is not, because that is the problem with simplistic dichotomies.

When Dave is not at the hospital or pub,
 
Back to our cancer treatment (Art). 3 different Oncologists (Art experts) might have a slightly different opinion. Given the fact there's no simple consensus, Dave from the pub decides that his opinion is worth as much as the experts - seeing as they can't agree.:thinking:



That's it exactly - you believe that in some way your taste has something to do with whether or not something is Art - and again, you are 100% objectively incorrect.

You are qualified to tell us what you like - and as a musician, probably better qualified than me to give a justification for your view - but you can't decide something isn't 'music' because you don't like it.

I don't accept your oncologist analogy. Its so far removed it has no bearing whatsoever.

Art is a philosophical concept its not a tangible function. It's an umbrella term.
If you are sculpting a pot you are not making art. You're making a pot. Others will decide if it's art.
 
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Why should it? is that not creating just another 'awful rule'? Sometimes rule of thirds happens to make the best composition of a given scene, and can't be ignored.
If the best composition requires something to be on a third then that is where it should be. But it should be there because it creates the best composition not because it is a rule. Telling beginning photographers that it is a rule to have significant parts of their images on a third will not help them to produce the best compositions; rather, it will inhibit the best compositions and foster wooden compositions.
 
100% agree with this Keith.

I see it as more a composition option than a rule, it just happens to be refered to as such. It originates from painting, long before photography too, painters would oft use their hands to 'frame' a scene [they didn't have the benefit of OVF/EVF or digital gridlines] it happens to be what viewers found more aesthetically pleasing. PLacing the main subject, what you wish to have attention most immediately drawn to - on one of those third lines [or indeed spirals] Of course we can chose to 'break' this 'rule' whenever we desire.

What i posted earlier was as simplistic as it'll ever be to me, I think some see any kind of 'debate' as an excuse to argue. Some are forgetting what the OP even asked
 
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If the best composition requires something to be on a third then that is where it should be. But it should be there because it creates the best composition not because it is a rule. Telling beginning photographers that it is a rule to have significant parts of their images on a third will not help them to produce the best compositions; rather, it will inhibit the best compositions and foster wooden compositions.

I agree, 'rule' doesn't fit, should be more composition guideline. Like the actual grid-lines that painters and photographers of old used [many of us still do]. But it still works well for many a composition, I think you have more issue with the wording?

It's the whole 'art' debate has gotten w***y here, wasn't even mentioned in the OP. Seems everytime the subject of 'art' is inevitably mentioned in what started as a pretty simple thread like this - the obnoxious creep out of the shadows
 
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The rule of thirds should always be broken - it is an awful 'rule' that makes for boring, formulaic pictures.
technically the rule of thirds is a simplification of the golden ratio and is not a rule, per se, so much as a guideline. The golden ratio is a mathematical construct that explains why something is visually appealing to humans because of its order. However it it useful to understand rules and guidelines to progress to knowing when they are, like every technique in photography, over used (see HDR et al, as well as the thread in this forum on what sort of images are you bored of).

Yes constant use of rules of thirds as gospel can result in images getting monotonous but then again if all you do it portraits with Rembrandt lighting so can that, yet no one would say Rembrandt lighting is awful..
 
If you are sculpting a pot you are not making art. You're making a pot. Others will decide if it's art.
We agree on this.
We disagree about who's opinion (and whether that opinion is based on knowledge or taste), and we'll leave it there ;)
 
If you are sculpting a pot you are not making art. You're making a pot. Others will decide if it's art.
you could say that for anything that is art. If your painting a portrait or landscape it’s just a paining and so on.

the difference is the intent. If you’re sculpting a pot to be a functional item in the kitchen then yes it’s unlikely to be art. If you’re sculpting a pot to have no other function but to be a sculpted pot then it can be art.

it tends to be that art is defined by the grasp the artist has on what they are producing and their understanding of art. Example I’ve been to Tate modern a couple of times and was wholly unimpressed.

i saw Tracey Emins tent ‘Everyone I Have Ever Slept With‘ and thought it was very far from being art but she’s got accolades from a number of educational art institutions so I guess that makes it art (sarcasm). Also a whole raft of “pieces” that just got me thinking wtf is that Eg Carl Andre's Equivalent VIII, the pile of stacked bricks and so on...
 
"There is no generally agreed definition of what constitutes art" - Wikipedia.

There will now follow a heated discussion about the accuracy and validity of Wikipedia articles. :naughty:
 
"There is no generally agreed definition of what constitutes art" - Wikipedia.

There will now follow a heated discussion about the accuracy and validity of Wikipedia articles. :naughty:

But comments will only be valid if you have made an in depth study of Wikipedia. :D
 
Anyway, back to the rules that aren't rules but have to be met to win club competitions and ignored to win national competitions. Including guidlines as to when the rules (that are not rules) should be ignored, as a rule.
 
I'm having a bit of a chuckle here, reading the debate....

Even Michelangelo would have learnt the rule of thirds, so did Tracey Emin's, any artist worth their salt would have learnt all these basic 'Rule or Principles' its the starting point you have to learn how others might see, for you to be able to communicate to others...

Same with photography..

You learn the various settings on your camera, that produces a sharp, well exposed photograph,
You learn the various 'Rules/Principles' that will turn the settings and subject into a basic pleasing photograph.

So what's the difference between this basic pleasing photograph and another image of outstanding merit..

The Photographer using this basic knowledge, then either by breaking a rule or principle, or adhering as the case may be, changing various settings on the camera in a way that changes how the camera translates that to how they want. How they use a editing program or not as the case may be, to what sort of paper they print the image on. And yes it's possible to create an outstanding and pleasing image breaking the rules and principles.

But if you don't know them or understand them, you will never have consistency.
 
I'm having a bit of a chuckle here, reading the debate....

Even Michelangelo would have learnt the rule of thirds, so did Tracey Emin's, any artist worth their salt would have learnt all these basic 'Rule or Principles' its the starting point you have to learn how others might see, for you to be able to communicate to others...
The rule of thirds only dates back to the late 18th century so Michelangelo will not have heard if it. Leonardo came up with the idea of the Golden Ratio which Michelangel will certainly have heard if but he would never have used it to save his life as he hated Leonardo and all his ideas.
 
The rule of thirds only dates back to the late 18th century so Michelangelo will not have heard if it. Leonardo came up with the idea of the Golden Ratio which Michelangel will certainly have heard if but he would never have used it to save his life as he hated Leonardo and all his ideas.

The Golden Ratio or Divine ratio, as it was originally called, dates back to at least 100 years before CE (or 100 years BC for us old folk). Not sure who is accredited with discovering it, but Euclid documented the geometry.

Their would seem to be fairly good evidence from sketches and drafts that both Da Vinci and Michelangelo used Golden ratio proportions when designing the layout of at least some of their paintings and drawings.

edit: I've got the date wrong, its 100 years CE, not "before: CE :-(
 
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Anyway, back to the rules that aren't rules but have to be met to win club competitions and ignored to win national competitions. Including guidlines as to when the rules (that are not rules) should be ignored, as a rule.
It seems to me for most things it's a case of going through it and coming out of the other side (and not just in photography). Some people never get past the rules stage, some people try to bypass the rules but then can't produce repeatable quality and some people serve the rules "apprenticeship", prove they have knowledge and skill built on a solid foundation and can then start to stretch the boundaries.

And that's what the critics, galleries and the like want isn't it? Someone who has served the apprenticeship, stuck at it, proved that they know what they are doing and why, developed an expansive hinterland and then pushed the boundaries of the field in which they work into new areas


See also Dunning Kruger effect

512px-Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_Effect_01.svg.png
 
These days, unfortunately, it seems some people never descend from Mount Stupid to progress with their journey, as they're buoyed up by all the like-minded others standing up there admiring the view and praising each other's achievements and alleged brilliance!

Sadly, I think the Plateau of Stupidity may often currently be the case, and this will continue for as long as it's considered to be socially unacceptable to do anything other than say something positive about peoples efforts, no matter how inept or incompetent they may actually be, in case you hurt their feelings and damage their mental health.
 
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Maybe we could all start offering a bit more CC of images posted on the various sections then? Find ways to offer helpful advice without tearing the poster a new one.
 
The rule of thirds only dates back to the late 18th century so Michelangelo will not have heard if it. Leonardo came up with the idea of the Golden Ratio which Michelangel will certainly have heard if but he would never have used it to save his life as he hated Leonardo and all his ideas.
What about Splinter, Shredder, Donatello and Raphael?
 
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