What in the name of all motherfucking tarnation are you babbling about?

What, you mean you haven't come up with some convoluted system of blocking those messages by now? Getting sloppy in your old age.

That was my lame (apparently) attempt to be rude. Its hard because I love you so much!

I know!I was replying in kind! In American!

Fuck social. :@

I poked around earlier and couldn't find the source of it.

I don't know whether to complain on the invite page itself - that's attacking the symptom not the cause, I guess.

If all UK-based registered Wikipedia users saw it, I can't be the only one annoyed.


Hrm, I wonder if it's related to this "CentralAuth" thing? Maybe I've been signed up to some WikiMedia service I don't want that causes this, rather than Wikipedia itself.

There's a whole bunch of pointlessly small icons when I log in. None of them links (!?) and none of them seem directly related to the message, but perhaps they are in some way, or there's some other stuff somewhere.

Bleurgh.

X-S

Hey.. oh. Thanks I think. If you're genuinely interested in what you are working in then I think it should become part of your individual social postings. I could post much more stuff about work but I don't because much of it would be relevant to my customers but maybe not my personal social circle. But you know, sometimes them things cross over <draws appropriate Venn diagram>

 

But yeah, should be targetted to US users that Wikipedia thing, is it definitely Wikipedia doing it? I didn't mind when the banner popped up from Jimmy Wales asking for donations. In fact I donated I think.

Oh yeah, there's a difference between talking about something interesting you're doing at work (even if it's partly for promotional purposes) and ... flat out promotion - 'we now sell x', '50% sale now on' or whatever. Your stuff is never that.

Your stuff is interesting because you care about it and because you're really creative with it (which relates I think to there being some overlap for you, this isn't just commercial). And creativity is always pleasant to see.

And most of all I like "real-life" photos, which is what Mouse seems to do well with a few snaps of new guitars and people who come into the shop.

 

Whilst phone photos are often shit in terms of technical quality I seem to like a quick snap of something at work more than a well composed photo. That's one of the reasons I like twitter, I'm sad enough to like seeing photos that other people put up (mainly from painfully boring celebs :$ )

Yeah, I prefer 'snaps' over proper photography too. I've never really got art photography, I find it kinda pointless and dull.

But yeah, I like the way non-SLR photos look. They have a sort of intimacy. And I like 'this is what I saw today' type pics.

By "non-SLR" do you mean compact cameras?

If so, I'd guess the reason the pictures look different is because people tend to use compact cameras for different things than 'proper' cameras like SLRs; they see SLRs as for 'serious' (i.e. possibly boring) photos.

(edit: the reason I ask is that there are cameras like the Olympus EP3 or Panasonic GH2 that aren't SLRs, but aren't compacts either, and probably aren't used the same way compacts generally are.)

Also, I would guess that when you think of 'SLR photos' you're thinking of landscapes or portraits or something, as opposed to pictures of nights out, or snapshots from around the home. I also like pictures of people in their surroundings, rather than headshots.

non-SLR photo:


SLR photo:


I guess my (not particularly good) point is that the camera used to take a photo has less to do with how it looks than the reason for taking the photo in the first place.

edit:
I realise I'm not exactly common in that I tend to take snaps around the home using whichever camera (compact or SLR) I happen to have nearby. Occasionally I'll choose the SLR specifically, if the picture I have in mind calls for a telephoto lens (the compact only has a wideangle), but not often.

Apart from that, I'm with you on the 'snaps' thing. Landscape photos have to be really good to interest me, whereas pictures of people or where those people live* I find interesting almost by default.

* by 'where they live' I mean where they live their lives, i.e. the city they live and work in, the places they go to, where they work, not just their house.

edit:
I will stop editing this post now :$

Nah, I was using 'non-SLRs' to encompass compacts and phone-cameras and so on. But what I really mean is fixed focus (I think that's the term? The ones where they're focussed at infinity (I think :(( ) and you can't alter the focal length (I think :(( )) cameras. I Think they lend the photos taken a particular quality - maybe conventional (due to what they tend to be used for) rather than innate but I suspect it's more innate than that. Something to do with how they show depth or something. I'm not sure.

Also (and this was also encompassed in that 'non-SLR' thing) I like out of focus, blurry, scratchy, noisy, washed out images (combinations thereof, not all those at once necessarily :D ). I like the sketchiness of that - that's more like visual memory - vague and imperfect and hazy. 'Good' photos are too stark - they're neither like looking at something nor like remembering something and (perhaps as a result of that or perhaps just because) they leave me cold. There's something alien and, I think, alienating about them.

Regarding subjects... I'm also not generally moved by 'narrative'. I don't care about 'here is a working man who has lived here his whole life and you can read his life story in his pose' kinda stuff. I find that... sort of arrogant and patronising. I mean photography's always had this problem of an implied veracity or fidelity with reality, and the tension between that and 'constructing' an image - creating meaning rather than simple depiction.

I'm rambling. I like snapshots. Photos that don't try to be more than simple depiction (and depiction of something worth depicting) or recording (<- I realise that's a dodgy term here. It's an intent of the photographernot a property of the photo). And I like it to look that way - like something shot from the hip without much thought, sketchy and inexact and suggestive.

Ah reet, I think I understand what you mean. By 'non-SLR', then, I'd guess you mean small-sensor cameras with fixed lenses (like on phones), which, yeah, have an innate quality: deep depth of field (everything in focus), limited dynamic range, harsh tonal transitions, etc.

The whole "out of focus, blurry, scratchy, noisy, washed out images" thing isn't really innate to any modern dedicated camera (i.e. a device designed primarily for taking pictures), so more often than not it's added after the picture's taken (witness the popularity of Hipstamatic and Plastic Bullet).

Why do you find the pictures you described (in your next post) arrogant and patronising?

As for the problem of implied veracity, well, tbh I wish the whole "the camera never lies" things had never come about, although it has led to some interesting things that deliberately confront the concept.

It seems to me that the kinds of photos you like are street photography pictures, this sorta thing:


That's the kinda thing I like too, although that seems to be a minority opinion if camera forums are anything to go by (that picture would be derided for being soft, noisy and badly-framed).

I do like the noisiness and badly-framed-ness of that but not the subject. It's too... how can I put this. It's trying too hard. It's obvious and trite. Also I think you can tell when it's an intentionally jaunty angle or a renowned photographer very self-consciously using a disposable camera or something - which again becomes contrived and nasty. (so yeah, adding noise intentionally after the fact is definitely offputting. And aye, it's shame even phone cameras are so 'good' now :C ).

Patronising. Because it's making arrogant claims it can't live up to and expecting me to swallow that. It's trying (if only implicitly) to be both an 'honest' and 'true' recording of 'reality' and a constructed image/meaning/narrative at the same time. I feel like the ambiguity (and the viewer) is being exploited. Drawing (which includes painting and sculpture and so on)feels more 'honest', it doesn't make the same claims.

The only 'art' photos I've ever liked are those of... oh man what's his name. Richard Billingham. Stuff like:



There's narrative there, but it's not shoving it in your face, it's gentle and open-ended. Evocative rather than... declamatory. And visually beautiful, there's an almost baroque visual intensity/richness to it. The flatness is also intriguing. I dunno, his images just work on me.

That's an awful photo. Too busy and no point of focus. I actually like the one that Caer posted, although I'd prefer it without such a smug look on the boy's face.

I love Richard Billingham (he came to my uni to give a seminar). I think strong narrative is so important in photography trying to stand up as art. It's not just throw-away photographs of strangers either (like Martin Parr, who I like-a-little-bit but not very much since I read more about him and his past: it makes it seem like he's looking down his nose at his subjects) but in this case - his family.

There is a terrifying Japanese photographer who's a bit similar to Billingham, just with more polaroids of vaginas, if I ever remember I will tell you.

I thoroughly disagree about narrative but am glad you like Billingham :Y

...and I like vaginas! (manthorp)