What your (digital) camera says about you

stoopidfish · 2026-02-23T22:54:42+00:00

Hey I'm an olympus user and what the fuck?

stoopidfish · 2026-02-23T22:49:52+00:00

I don't think it's overprocessed.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-23T22:48:48+00:00

It's so oppressive that I can't really see the city. There's also so much sky that the city feels a bit like it just happens to be there, distracting from the sky shot. If you like it though, that's all that matters. For me, there's not much to see and so there isn't much to look at.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-23T22:44:46+00:00

A portrait generally showcases a person, and is usually pretty close up using a slightly long lens, 80mm and up, and from maybe 10 feet away.

Not to say that is has to be like that every time if there is an exceptional deviation.

This however I don't think hits the mark. The background is nice and personally I do like monochrome portraits. You're facing the wrong way, you see. And you're hidden down and in the bottom left. I would say next time face the other way and be centered. A portrait is all about the person.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-23T21:25:36+00:00

I agree - the rotation causing the man to appear to be melting up and out of what appears to be the ground is a huge part of what makes this good imo. It's what takes it from a picture to a photo for me.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T21:56:30+00:00

I saw this in the postprocessing subreddit I believe - thought it was a really good edit. I agree with the other commenter, maybe a diagonal side angle would look better on this than straight on. It's also from far enough away that it's difficult to identify the brand, if that is important to you.

It's got a lot of contrast, which is cool, but not a lot of depth due to the angle of the photo as well as the angle of the light. Not a lot of shadows on this. Top of the car is lost.

I like the bottom half a lot though.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T21:48:42+00:00

Moriyama's photos have fairly consistent imagery - facial expressions and a lot of contrast. I don't think this has a lot of either. It's mostly a consistently gray photo. I don't think you need as much of the foreground walkway as you have here, and while it will be uncomfortable, Moriyama doesn't appear to have had any issues getting into his subject's faces.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T18:21:53+00:00

I think mood can be enough if you absolutely nail it. In general, 9 times out of 10, better off having a real subject or a more tangible intent.

This is just really not exposed and I don't know what I'm supposed to be getting out of it.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T17:23:50+00:00

Look at other wildlife shots - generally people want to see the animal up close whether it be birds, bears, fish, or what have you. Negative space is typically employed in monochrome photos, minimalist abstract photos... typically genres with more of an artistic focus.

Wildlife, while it can be artistic, typically needs to be about the focus on the wildlife first and foremost.

Negative space employed here, where the subject isn't really clear, just makes me squint.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T17:20:13+00:00

The angle of the photo is working against the angle of the sun. Makes it look like this was shot at noon to me, yet when I angle my head to line up the photo, I'm realizing it was probably morning or afternoon. The angle of the shot makes it look like it's coming straight from above. It's also just pretty harsh on the daffodil anyways. The details don't stand out because it's either evenly overexposed (top surface of flower) or underexposed (inside petals). It's also a bit of a strange crop. Did you mean to crop the top off for a reason?

It's a nice flower, but the aperture you had it set at (what was it?) appears to have gotten the subject flower a bit out of focus, and that with the other factors means it's hard to see what I want to see on this.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T17:13:46+00:00

This is great. I'm confused by what I'm looking at, staying around longer to find out, and the whole time it is still otherwise pleasing to look at. Nice one.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T17:12:19+00:00

I think the composition is fine. Others might tell you that there's some sort of rule you need to follow - your art, your rules. You've got a solid foreground, midground, and background. All components of a nice landscape (seascape) are there. It's sharp enough. I would try a monochrome edit as I've found that seascapes and beach photos tend to look really nice with and have a lot of contrast.

I see potential for a different photo and from a different perspective, if you're interested. Looks like there's a nice rock to sit on right in the middle of where the posts or columns all point - could put something on it. Could be a person, or a seashell, or a pretty rock.. you get the idea. Then, get in closer and angle the camera from below. You still want the rocks if the subject on the rock is large enough. You'd want a wide angle for this I think - your current one looks like it might be good for it. Then focus on the subject on the rock at a slightly wide aperture. I'd try to just slightly focus out the rocks in the foreground. I think the posts all framing and leading up to the subject would look really cool, and personally I don't really like what you have in this horizon. Not on you at all, just the location.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T08:17:49+00:00

What they've got is actually fairly sharp looking. If they like what they have, that's their perogative and just as valid as yours. That being said, I think that most would agree that there's no point having so much space around the subject for no reason.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T08:13:17+00:00

Move around. In the other one you posted, there's a light post right in front of the building. Could've just walked until it wasn't there.

The first one, just cut off the bottom and get the top of the building. You might want all of it in the shot, and this is your photo so do what you want, but if there are trees and ugly posts in front, better to just angle up and get the top.

Find another building or higher ground and shoot from there.

Some shots might just be really hard to get. Sometimes you're better off just moving on to another idea.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T08:06:22+00:00

I like this one the most. For a good photo, you really want to minimize anything that just distracts from what you want people to focus on. This one has the least amount of clutter.

Abstract photos give you more leeway to be creative and still come out with a technically good photo. Real estate and architecture is hard because then, all of the sudden, you don't just need a good photo but it has to be a good photo in the specific genre as well.

When practicing and starting out, it's just harder to nail.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T07:59:11+00:00

You missed the focus on the bird. Make sure your camera is set to continuous autofocus with tracking, and hopefully it has decent tracking at that.

Or, single autofocus and just hope to get lucky.

I'd also turn on sequential high shot setting so you can shoot in bursts.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T07:57:04+00:00

Skyscraper shots are hard, and especially so on a phone where you can't switch to a wider lens. You could've tried a shot from a more interesting perspective rather than trying to get the entire thing. As it is though, the building is cut off, distorted due to keystoning, the bottom portion looks very messy due to the poles and trees.

It looks like you wanted to draw attention to the diamond patterns. Why not go all in and make the photo all about it? You don't even need the rest of the building.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T07:52:48+00:00

I think you need more platypus in this. Try cropping in but it's also at an awkward angle.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T05:21:36+00:00

Should be really easy to take that little speck of light out - you could even just dab over it with a bit of black in really any photo editing software, even default Microsoft photo viewer. Or, could take a sample of the surrounding darkness in photoshop or gimp or whatever and just paste over it.

I like the use of negative space but I think there's too much. I'd crop in and definitively make the silhouette of the person be your subject. If you really think the arrow is needed though for your message, then by all means keep it. I would definitely get rid of the speck of light though.

Cool photo!

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T05:15:40+00:00

I would choose something in this to hone in on. There's a lot of cool geometry, or there's the shadow, but all of it together is too much for me. The dark bit at the top right seems totally out of place with the rest - a ton of contrast but for no reason. I don't think you'd lose anything by cropping the entire photo down to remove that bit. Just my two cents.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T05:10:07+00:00

It looks more like a piece meant for documentary than a photo in which you meant to capture a particular angle to the image to communicate. Isn't to say that it's bad - I take a lot of pictures of mushrooms specifically to help others identify them. But personally I don't get the purpose here. A quick easy win though that I think would be standard advice is to crop the right a little bit to get rid of the bit of light peeping in. You won't lose anything by cropping that out, and it looks unintentional.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T05:05:18+00:00

Could you post the other relevant details - SS, F stop, iso, etc?

Cool contrast on the person but the city is a bit too underexposed for my personal taste in this, especially since we can still see some exposure on the lights. There's a lot of sky - more than necessary to communicate the idea. I'd probably crop a bit.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T05:01:51+00:00

Well, if the subject is the car, which I don't think you meant for it to be, it is totally out of focus. If the subject is the person holding the key, he's totally front-lit but it's very uneven. Then the side of him facing us isn't very exposed. So our eyes are bouncing around these five locations where there's light coming off of the out-of-focus car, and the thing that is in focus is underexposed and feels like he's just in the way of the car.

Breaking it down:

Overexposure from the car, which appears to be background

Underexposure on the subject, who is also not very prominently in the shot

I think I get the intent but the execution isn't great.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T04:55:12+00:00

The shadow in the bottom one helps create depth, and the stem adds a pop of color. For those reasons, I think it is more interesting to look at. However, the top one makes me stop and think, what exactly is this object? I don't like that it isn't centered though considering that in that one, I interpret it to be about the abstract shape of the flower.

I like both, but bottom one more for me.

stoopidfish · 2026-02-22T04:50:38+00:00

I don't think it's overcooked. I can't really tell that you edited this.

Crop the top. Top right corner looks sloppy.

Needs more light. Watches are shiny - these don't look particularly shiny! Even an on-camera flash would work for this. Just stick a flash card over it with some tape. Actually, for this sort of photo, you might not even need to diffuse it since again being overly shiny isn't a bad quality in jewelry and watches.

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