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Would people like to say what makes a picture compelling for them? Why do you like one picture and give it a higher rating compared to another picture? What goes on in your minds when you rate a picture a 10, or an 8, or a 5? What is your thought process in coming out with a particular number? Why do you like a particular picture so much, and why do you dismiss another picture outright?
In other words, what makes a picture compelling for you?
I will start the ball rolling by trying to articulate my own thought process when I rate a picture. I suppose it could also be a checklist for deciding whether to post a particular picture or not in a public gallery like this.
The first point to note is that There are no good photographers. There are only photographers who choose to show only their good pictures.
Even Proes shoot a lot of bad images.The proes shoot hundreds of images during a particular shoot, and only one or two will ever get published and are seen by the public. So taking a cue from the proes, we need to choose carefully those pictures that we choose to show to the world. We have to be ruthless. Show only the best. Because the world is unforgiving. Give them a compelling picture and they will swoon. Give them crap, and most will not hesitate to tell you it is crap. Especially with the cloak of anonymity that the internet provides.
For me personally, with digital photography, I will dare show only about 3 or 4 pictures in every hundred. And those three or four would have been carefully post processed before they are posted here or anywhere else. Usually I spend nearly an hour on each image. Its a labour of love for me. Something I enjoy doing.
So how do we decide which pictures to post?
I will simplify the explanation by likening it to a process of passing the picture through a series of imaginary filters.
The FIRST filter you should apply to your picture before you decide to post it here is what I call the Technical Filter
Has the picture got any obvious technical flaws? Such as being OOF (Out of Focus), Over/Underexposure, amateurish cropping, incorrect colour corrections, colour casts, softness, the shakes, evidence of careless post processing, and all those technical aspects which people generally do not forgive. Pictures which do not pass the technical filter should never be posted. Personally I will not give more than 4 points for such pictures.
The SECOND Filter is the Greenhorn Filter.
Greenhorn pictures are downright amateurish shots with poor composition, thoughtless framing, and those that have things like lamp-posts growing out of the subject's heads, powerlines coming out of their ears, girlish colourful stars and hearts pasted around their subjects, wonky horizons, careless use of frontal flash, burnt spots, unintentional loss of details, cliche' compositions, silly angles, snapshots of their cousin's weddings, their daughter's birthday party, etc, etc. Remember, most snapshots are interesting only to YOU because of your personal emotional attachment to the subjects in the picture.
A Greenhorn picture will get between 4 and 6 points from me.
The THIRD Filter is the Average filter. Most pictures submitted by most people (including me) will fall in this catergory. Depending on content, composition, colour and subject appeal, pictures which have passed the Technical Filter and the Greenhorn Filter will usually earn 7 or 8 points. There's nothing wrong with average pictures. They are good. They are nice to look at, pleasing even, but they lack one clear quality which fail to push them through the average filter screen - they dont have that special quality that will make the hairs at the back of your neck stand. They dont draw an involuntary oooooohhhhhh from you. Or a waaaaaaahhhhh.
Pictures which make the hairs at the back of my neck stand, and which draw an involuntary gasp from me will get a 9. They are quite clearly above average, but just short of the perfect 10. They are what I would call inspirational pictures. You tend to make a mental note of inspirational pictures. Some of them are the pleasing results of experimental and innovative efforts at the edge of conventional photography. Many are simply the output of gifted persons. While some are the results of being in the right place at the right time. You tell youself that you must try to copy the technique, or the subject, or the post processing treatment, or the shooting angle, or the framing, or the whatever. Inspirational pictures leaves a lasting impression on you, and may even help shape your own photographic skills development.
Now how can I describe pictures which are perfect TENS? Which is where my original question comes back.
What makes a picture compelling ?
Compelling pictures have an emotional clout. Sometimes you even forgive some minor technical imperfections in them because the content overwhelms everything. They have a strange quality about them, such that they cling to your psyche and refuses to let go. You tend to stare long and heard at compelling pictures, either because the subject connects to you in some way, or it touches you at your innermost vulnerable self. Seeing a compelling picture you want to cry with sadness, squirm in horror, shout with joy, pull your hair in helplessness, or curse your fellow human beings for the atrocities they commit, as captured by a brilliant photographer, and powerfully thumping at you. Compelling pictures are usually shot by photo journalists, who make it their business to be where compelling pictures happen. But not necessarily so, because they can also be a record of a human tragedy.
You see compelling pictures every day in our newspapers - pictures of those jets crashing into the WTC, pictures of the victims of suicide bombers, pictures of man's cruelty to animals, pictures from Iraq, pictures of the genocide in Africa, the famine in somalia, etc, etc.
I hope you get my drift regarding compelling pictures. Most of us will never ever get the opportunity to shoot compelling pictures of the genre I described, but we could still keep a lookout for other not so compelling images.
Like one of my friends said. "...we can only but try..."
[Inspiring Articles in Digital Photography]
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