From the USA

My turn to apologise. I intended nothing of the kind. It's just that the real photography debate seems to have no solution.
I like the lawn idea. An artist couple in the UK sowed grass seed onto some kind of backing and then projected an image onto it. Where the light is bright, the grass is green. The shadows grow yellow, with intermediate shades for the mid-tones. I tried this with cress and it died and stank.
I have heard that Japanese fruit growers would paste a cut-out paper character onto unripe fruit so that when it was picked, it carried a message.
Humans are a never-ending source of wonder, eh?
 
Jim,
I forgot to answer your first point and it's a good one. Good for what?
Perhaps it's a loaded word. We use it as a synonym for virtuous and we can easily, but unconsciously, conflate the two.
Any suggestion for a different word would be useful.
 
Suggestions abound. Solutions might be a bit more tricky. How about 'successful', but then one would have to provide criteria for judging such. Competent? Satisfying is my choice, but then what I am satisfied with might not satisfy others. Anything that evokes a positive response, so perhaps 'favourable' is ambiguous enough to allow for wiggle room in interpretation.....
Treading carefully, trying to avoid toes, I said good for whom? rather than good for what. We create these images for other human beings to look at, and for me, it's the human response to the images that intrigues.
 
No toes have been harmed so far.
I should have written "Good for what purpose?" but it didn't seem as snappy.
Different photographs have different purposes. A military picture of a war zone will (presumably) be judged by how much it reveals of enemy activity. On another occasion a landscape photographer may make a picture in the same terrain with aesthetic intentions. Obviously, we'd judge them quite differently.
But what if another person later uses the landscape to illustrate a book on the conflict? What if some artist appropriates (horrid word, horrid practice) the military images to create a "new" work?
So, "Successfully solves the problem" seems to be the best we can do, so far. It leaves us with the problem of discovering the problem itself and it's a bit lumpy for an inspiring slogan.

We lucky people seem to be mainly concerned with aesthetic judgement, with a dash of admiration for tricky problems skilfully resolved.
 
If I may venture - we seem to agree. Successfully solves the problem is a phrase that, among other phrases, could well be used to apply to some photography. The difficulty in using words to describe images has not yet been overcome - completely. Nor will it, nor perhaps should it. Else, no need or use for images. Interesting, thought provoking discussion with no falling out - much appreciated and thank you. (This is not meant as a signing-off, if you have more, please post it.)
 
I hope we could disagree and not fall out too. Nothing is gained by behaving like politicians or children.
 
I've had a further thought about what we are calling rules. This is a parallel example so I must ask for some tolerance.
In cricket, there are rules about how to play – so many persons on a team, and so on. Very tricky to break a rule on the number of persons.
There are other, less obvious rules. You can't throw the ball; you have to bowl it, which has a slightly different wrist action. You can rub the ball on your trousers to polish it, but not on your fingernails to make it rougher. People who like cricket enjoy this sort of thing. No doubt other pastimes have equally fascinating minutiae.
You can break these rules of course, but however cleverly you do it, "ye canna break the laws o' physics." and the ball itself will obey these, whatever cunning scheme you have devised.
It's the underlying principle of what distinguishes one image from another that interests me. The first question has to be if there is anything like gravity and momentum in image-making, anyway. Does the solution lie in the object or is it in our minds? Or both? In our upbringing or in our nature? Neither? Can this be an answerless question?
 
In a sense there are two completely different aspects to photography.
There's the technical side, which involves a lot of conscious thought, where you have to have your wits about you . It involves lots of rules, such as " When developing film put the fixer in AFTER the developer". You can't break rules like this.
Then there's the visual side which, in my case, involves very little conscious thought, and tends to be done intuitively, on a subconscious level. I was walking along the banks of the River Derwent last Tuesday, with a 35mm camera and no tripod. Every now and then I would see something interesting. I didn't stop to ask myself why it was interesting. I simply raised the camera to the eye and assessed the subject through the viewfinder without conscious thought. Sometimes I would move on without pressing the shutter release. At other times I would move a bit closer, or slightly to the left, to change the arrangement of shapes. Why? I have no idea. But sometimes it worked and I took a photograph. Some things don't look quite right. Or feel quite right. Others do. In this visual side of photography there are no helpful rules to follow. You are on your own.
Does it work? Well, I made about 30 exposures. And from these I have made 6 prints in the darkroom that I'm quite pleased with. Two weeks ago I got through 2 rolls of 35mm film, made two prints, then found I didn't like either of them...
So, to answer the question that David has just posed, I would say that the solution lies in the mind - but you also have to find the right object.

Alan
 
Alan,
You describe the way I go around, looking for images. Something appeals and we stop to look.
[May we discount seeing something that already interests us? I don't wish to denigrate anybody's area of interest, but a bird-watcher or a steam engine enthusiast will always stop for a rare bird or engine, where an ordinary person might give a glance and pass by on then other side.]
As you say, it seems to be unconscious, but it also seems to be better developed in some people.* My experience is that something attracts our gaze and we prepare to take a picture. One part of the preparation is setting up the tripod or raising the camera to the eye but the other part is inspecting the scene more closely. The limitations of LF oblige us to observe more intently than an iPhone user, who carries a virtually unlimited supply of dark sides.
When we are set up, it's my experience that the process shifts from reactive to analytical. Should that object at the edge be included? Do I want more sky? Will a filter help? Is this the right lens? Should I open up to get a faster shutter speed? It's always possible that an intrusive branch, intrusive people, inappropriate lighting or the lack of a place to stand will make us abandon or postpone the shot. We can all fill in this list. We've all been there.

* I did once come across someone who had no sense of composition. We needed to make simple records of a large number of pack designs which we sent out to a studio. At the same time, we had an artwork studio, with a technician who maintained the equipment, but was not always busy. I set up a neutral-coloured scoop with a large light-source above so that any object could be put there and recorded faithfully. I ran off the first batch of slides, both of individual products and groups, with the technician observing. Then I handed over to him. He was entirely unable to arrange a group of boxes. If they were within the frame, than that seemed enough to him. Mine seemed better in some way, but he couldn't see what that difference was. He was not a stupid man at all and he was not unwilling, so I was baffled. I still am. How could he not see?

(Even more amazingly, I once came across a woman who didn't like chocolate, but that belongs on another forum, if there in one.)
 
Perhaps I might offer a different understanding, if only to differentiate shades of meaning. Rules is rules, as ably demonstrated by fixer AFTER developer. But values is subjective, subject to the values of the practitioner. It matters not one whit if the practitioner values fixer before developer, that rule is not subject to any practitioner's values. That particular rule is inviolable.
My values, e.g. steam train rather than bird, will affect the subject matter I try to capture on film. My obedience or otherwise to the inviolable rules will DETERMINE the outcome of my attempts to express my values on film.
If my values resonate with others' values, perhaps we could call that a successful solution to the problem. The technician who could not compose a pleasing arrangement demonstrated values that did not resonate with the studio photographer.
Perhaps I could (should?) sum up with 'values determine the why we attempt to capture in this manner, but rules determine the process'.
I'm not entirely happy with the precis, but I've never really bothered attempting the description before now......
A woman who doesn't like chocolate? More for meeeeeee!
 
Interesting thoughts. You are coming at the problem from a different direction. Resonate is a good word and an idea worth pursuing. So far, none of us has managed to express all this in a way that we'd put on a T-shirt.

I can attest that fixer before developer will save a lot time and paper. Grrr! Best pictures I ever made.

And I'm sorry to tell you that there were other woman present who thought the same as Jim. All gone.
 
David, if you want a corny T-shirt slogan, how about this?

USE FILM
DEVELOP THE SKILL
FIX YOUR DREAMS

Alan
 
Alan, I wasn't asking for one to wear myself, but you have come up with three. I like FIX YOUR DREAMS, because only film photographers will understand it.
 
Alan, I wasn't asking for one to wear myself, but you have come up with three. I like FIX YOUR DREAMS, because only film photographers will understand it.

Don't forget the other connotation of "fix", as in drug use :p
 
I want a T-shirt with 'Of what use are lens and light to those who lack in mind and sight?' But I read it somewhere, it's not mine.
 
I want a T-shirt with 'Of what use are lens and light to those who lack in mind and sight?' But I read it somewhere, it's not mine.

Love it! Here's is one I made up myself and had stamped on the back of my first iPad:

The life so short, the craft so long to learn.
 
Apologies for momentarily drifting away from the subject of photography, but this has reminded me of a shirt I once saw: "Life is not short, it's just that we're dead for so long."
 
Joanna,
Well, yes. That hadn't occurred to me. My drug of choice is coffee.
 
Alan,
I believe it was stamped on the back of Geoffrey Chaucer's iPad first.
 
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