Hello, hello, Warren... Hi, Warren, okay, let's see... Okay, I think we're good. There we go, yes, we are good. Let's just go back to the right. There we go, here, that's the wrong thing. There we go, hi, Warren. Okay, let's see... I think we're good. There we go, yes, we are good. Let's just go back to the right. We've got that, we've got that. All right, so we're going to... just a little bit early today, so we're all... all fine, all fine. Now, as you may have noticed, those of you who are... what's the word? Observing about these things. I... I don't know whether it's the third or the fourth or the 17th, that's because I had the... the chat window, or the actual stream was open when I was getting the pop-out chat for me. There we go. Is all the sound all good now that we've closed? Steve W, hey, Steve, how's it? How's it? We've got Fida... Fida Brian.  Which is... that reminds me of a story. When I was a younger, there was a guy called Brian Hunter in our class and there was a misspelling on his... on his name. On the team... on the last list, which said Brain Hunter. Which is a bit amusing. Then we have some... I'm so sorry, I don't... speak Russian, or anything like that. We're called a knapper. BGMI, hello. Hi, from India. Sheldon, how's it Sheldon? Phil Cooning, how are you? Diane Diedrich, we've got Cloudy from Connecticut. We've got... Guten Tag, I'm not a Guten Tag. Yes, well, Guten Tag, yes. I'm German, you've got Mondo Mondo from Texas. And John, who I think has been optimistic with the sunny leads. And then... Jimmy Jam from Washington State. So there we go. So we'll just give a couple of minutes, just to let everybody... talk with you. Oh, we've got another leads. It's all leads today. And then Nicola... Nicole from the Czech Republic, how's it? And Michael from Graz in Austria. And Eric and Steve W. in Klonon, Russia. Steve, how you doing? Susan Wiley, hello there, Susan. And then EJ... She says that... EJ says the audio is a bit out of sync. It may be occasionally... I'm not quite sure why what's going on. It could be because it's just like a little bit of a catch-up. We've got Brandon from Oregon. And Johann Strube from Belgium. Hi, Johann. Alan from Scotland. Clara from the Ukraine. Hi, Clara. How you doing? There we go. So we've got Tony from Dublin. Lloyd Spencer. Reaching Tree from New Jersey. We've got random guide channels from Florida. I used to spend a lot of time in Florida down in Tampa. I had a girlfriend live there. Manu from France. It's just all coming. Sven's here. Hi, Sven. It's just... It's so good to have you. And thank you ever so much. Everyone for being here. The reason there's a little echo I'm afraid is that I'm going to turn my camera around is that I am in what my wife calls the pit of despair which is a very empty room which is why it's kind of echo-y today. My hair dude left. Thank you, Lloyd for striking me again. And also the ceiling is double volume in here. So if you go to the dictionary and you look up really awful rooms to record audio in there's a picture of this one. So there you go. I did say to my wife today I felt that I probably needed an office out in the garden or something which would kind of negate these things. But there we go. Lovely. There we are. So as I said I have been placed in the KVSD it's the room at the back of the house. It's the old servants' quarters which makes a sound posh but yeah we live in a very old farmhouse and the front half the house is all very nice and the back half is where the servants used to live. So that's why I've been sent to, I've been banished to the back of the room. So there we go. So yeah I have to say so Ponte Prid you should spend some time down in Berry Island hanging out with Mark Cleggorn of all those sort of things. Yes the resonant you see resonant sounds not a great thing but I like the sound of it resonant. I'm in an opera house. So here we go. So as I said thank you everyone for all of your submissions it's fantastic to I haven't looked at the images yet but it's fantastic to see you all submitting obviously because we have a huge number of images tonight I think it's like 64 or something and I will try and obviously give as much input as I can into each one but obviously because we can't dwell on them for too long otherwise we'll be here absolutely all right. Anyway so let's get cracking with the images. So here we are so we have let me just bring up this there we go. Now I don't have any names attached to these so so I won't mention names by anything can you all see it just give me a quick heads up that everybody can see that picture of what looks like a blue trash can on a a tennis court fence I think yeah we're all good there because obviously there's a bit of lag here okay so I'm going to guess seeing as everybody is completely quiet about it that yes you can see them seen yes okay right just so we know. Lovely so here we go so this first image I think yes you've got this is the we call it a blue trash can and it looks like it's a tennis court I feel what you're looking what you've been drawn towards here is the pattern of the light on the trash can and if this is what you're going for then the best thing to do is kind of make that the subject of the image completely and the best way to do this is to reduce totally omit anything that can detract from that idea so what we're sort of seeing here is that the left hand side of the image so we've got the chicken wire fence and the very deep blue where it looks like a pole or something is casting a shadow on the dustbin that's where the image is on this one for me I feel that it really wants to be you want to focus on that you've got a lovely contrast between the greens and the blues and then you've got this patternation of the light coming through the chain link fence for the tennis court and it's funny when I look at this all I can hear is a ball being hit, that plank block of tennis balls but everything on the right hand side of the frame is not really it's not really adding anything to the image but the bin with that lip and the bottom, I think if you cut all of that stuff out and you were tight on the crop with the stuff on the left hand side of the frame then you would, I think it would be a lot better and Lloyd has sort of said it's sort of stranded between abstract and clear context I think that Lloyd is right there that you've got the right idea but you need to hone in on one or the other so yeah it's a nice strong start here we go so we've got here some some frost which I like the look of yeah really again, the time of day is right, obviously frost is going to be in the morning so you've got that going for some lovely texture to this image it's sort of wonderful it's got this kind of frosty and it was a strong frost outside this morning as well so I can kind of which didn't do any favours for my broccoli there you go I think it's very similar to the previous image where you've got this grass stem and what looks like old kind of maybe thistle heads or something like that or actually moss probably on the hand side and what I find is somewhat just ever so slightly detracting is this border on the side there's a dark thing where the panel ends and the next one starts Simon if you on the there's a list that we put up there's a Google Drive link that we put up every month on the Mighty Networks page which you can upload to and that's where you can get so if you're new to the the channel or membership then that's kind of where they where they go up we do this once a month and the link will go up in the next couple of days for the next next round I find that that piece on the left is again sort of detracting so I would like to see you kind of focus on just a little bit actually when you've got lovely textures lovely colour that you've exposed all the lights it's lovely it just needs to be tighter I think that you're probably trying to include maybe a little bit too much and that may be a lens choice or something like that but do think about what you have to work with the more that I look at this image the warmer it's getting for me which it seems an odd thing to say but I really do like what's coming through here and yet maybe just a tighter crop I think that might be really good but yeah the light is lovely and everything is really fantastic okay so doggies so we've talked about black labs in the past here on the channel and I think here is the thing and I can sort of see I see where you're going with this I see the idea that you're looking to bring this dog and make it more of an abstract shape especially black labs the way that the sheen on their coat plays with black and white one of the things that is troubling me with this particular image is that this dog's nose is in focus and not the eyes it's if you're going to do that sort of thing if you're going to be very unusual with the focus point then you need to make it more pronounced you need to really go to town on it you need to push that and make it completely obvious that this is not a mistake but this is something you've done on purpose because at the moment it feels like it's a mistake it feels like your focus point is incorrect the focus in this kind of image we feel like it wants to be on our eyes it's not a private Facebook group there is a oh this might be because there's a lot of patrons recent, new patrons there is a link that I put up every month so if you go back through the previous Patreon posts you'll see that there's a new link every month where you can upload images to these critiques there'll be a new one coming out soon so if you are here it's because you are part of somebody who can submit maybe you've joined recently so you didn't see where to submit images so looking at this I think the eyes you really want to be focusing on the eyes I think that's probably the stand out thing for me is that the eyes would like to be in focus I'm going to guess that seeing as the blacks on this or the blacks in the shadow are all fairly equal you've gone for this as a stylistic choice which can work but if you're going to do that then those eyes need to be bang in focus and given that this dog has orangey, yellowy kind of eyes I would try and like them quite a lot you've got a softbox up here maybe bring it down just slightly so you're throwing more light into the the iris not the iris, the red of the dog so you're really punching those eyes in enough that you can be quite striking especially with the contrast with the black and white alright ok so we've got now I did a quick flick through earlier and I think this is our friend Mr Charles hello Mr Charles lovely so yes it was a snowy winter scene so John there is a see this is with if you subscribe you're not a member I know whether there's so many people in the chat because this is live so basically what's happening is here that if you are a member of the patreon community or the channel membership supporter then you get a chance to submit an image to this that's what it is ok I understand why because this has gone live so it's not a private link but yes there we go so what we've got here is a lovely sort of you know sort of street scene yes this is a street scene by the time that my brain is all over the place lovely sort of coastal scene the light I feel is it's kind of the right sort of day but it feels flat I don't know maybe this is a winter thing because of the low the low arc of the light during the winter that it tends to give a bit of a contrasty sort of feel and this kind of echoes back to some of the worst critique that I've ever received at photo school which is that an image was flat yet contrasty which at the time was like what the hell are you talking about pupils it's the right word yes thank you John so yeah it's the light it's the right level but it's just yeah there's something that's kind of sort of I think it's because of the time of year the light itself is inherently blue even though it's kind of like it's low in the sky it has a cold quality to it and of course if you want this image up it will feel sort of weird because snow and warmth and stuff don't really go together but maybe what you want to do is go the opposite direction and be quite cool in your approach to the all the puns are coming through Russell it's probably because I'm in an odd room today it's not a usual recording space the acoustics here are not particularly great the one of the things that I kind of look at it you know is that aside from the light thing I think your composition is interesting because you sort of got like a little split and there's two things that kind of jump out for me one is this stick whatever you want to call it on the left hand side that's kind of going through the foreground and into that sort of breakwater thing that I'm finding that kind of distracting and then this this yellow sign on the right hand side which I can't make out I don't know what it sort of says here but that is really it's pulling away from everything that I want to be looking at this wonderful looking house with the observation tower you know all that sort of stuff it's really a case of looking in the foreground for these things and sort of getting rid of them and Peter's made a fair quote the building itself is competing with nature I don't mind that kind of thing so much I think that's the last bit of composition these days most people do live in these environments but I think if you got rid of those two elements in the foreground that are dealing with it or you know messing us up but a little bit of just a change in composition would sort that out and then I think the light I can't quite put my finger on it but there's something the light doesn't do for me this might be a case where I think maybe black and white would be I think that a black and white would be an interesting look on this I'm going to try and see what we come with alright okay so from the I was going to say I feel like that was west coast for some reason but now we're back in New York so we've got a lovely eagle and this is Empire State if I'm not mistaken was it the Chrysler building one of the people would tell me in the comments I think it's the Chrysler but yes the Chrysler building sorry I shall go back and read them yeah I like there's a little there's some interplay here going on the thing that the kind of now that I sort of look at it that sort of bothers me the composition feels a little bit wrong it feels like it's very central but moving slightly to the left whereas you've got this wonderful diagonal line and I'm going to hazard a guess is this the New York public library or somewhere like that I don't know I've never been to New York so I don't know but you've got that wonderful diagonal at this kind of more classical style you know sort of frontage of the building then you have what I think is quite a modern building in the mid ground of this gloss still of the Chrysler I don't know somebody said it's a composite I'm going to go with the fact that it's real life okay and I feel if you kind of moved things around and this doesn't matter if it's Grand Central Station okay let's assume for a second that these are all shot in situ that it is the same it is one place rather than worrying about the whether it's composite or not is that the composition you have that diagonal then you've got the upright and then you've got the eagle and they all feel like they're kind of jammed in together that there's nothing that they're sort of mushed if you move around a bit if you change your position just a bit you've got the pieces in a more balanced way you've got this eagle down the front you've got the sweep of that architrave not the architrave, the banister kind of thing you've got these lights at the bottom all of them are interesting but I feel that this image hasn't made the best use of them somebody's mentioned about cropping out the lights down the bottom that was Russell yeah actually I think there could be an idea but I think the thing that when you look at this whoever's photographed this has recognised a good idea levels of the image but I think that composition wants to be I think there's more here I think you recognise there's a photograph but there is more to it for you to discover here in this image it could be image stacking, it could be all sorts of sorts of things Ted but this is kind of one of the things the fundamental feel I hear I think is that the composition is letting this idea down so there we go alright ooo a complete change of pace complete so we've got here yes a moody quiet because obviously we've always missed it it's so quiet now this is a great point about looking at the tiny details in our image and there we go Michael so he's saying it's not stacked so we don't worry too much about the technicalities of images unless that's specifically the issue because I think then we will find that we end up focusing too much on that rather than on the core aspects of the image so with this image talking about the technicalities I feel that it's sort of from a yeah as I said actually Russell is a good point it's a nice composition it's lovely the mood is right the exposure is great I think the treatment of the black and white is good the composition I think looking at this because it is so symmetrical there's one of two things if you came down lower so this feels like a photograph that's sort of head high if you came down to this like waist or knee height that you may get more of a reflection of those lime trees I think they're lime trees or something in the background and so I have more of a harmony so look at the split down the middle and I was going to sort of talk about the stick in the middle in a second is that you end up more of a composition if you can't do that then as people pointed out the reflection in the middle doesn't feel like it's one or the other so move your viewpoint slightly up so it's quite clear that you've cut off the reflection and focus maybe on more on this empty sky to give us this moody sort of quiet sort of feel and yeah unfortunately that stick that is sticking up there so you can't physically go and move it and this would be a case for I think yeah sort of cloning it out just you know just tidying up that thing I wouldn't go overboard with tidying up the thing so it's completely avoid things I find that's too much but that stick is extremely competitive within the image you know and I find it I find it a little bit but I love the moodiness and of course when we zoom out like this there we go so this is the whole thing sorry I do apologise it's because I clicked on it and I'm looking at the chat so this I feel that we're still kind of you know actually I do apologise I'm so sorry I've been looking at this and things I'll recount my thing about the cropping because it's now out here I think the stick comment still goes but now that I'm looking out like this it is a lot less sort of a lot less of an issue with the crop it's because I have I'm in bridge and then when I click to get the chat window up it zooms in just a scooch so it's kind of it clipped off a little bit okay now that's better you see there we go so let's try that again there we go okay so now so again lots of changes lots of changes and we'll take my mistake as a good example of how an image can change when you see the bigger picture so I did that on purpose so here we go so a nice so a completely different approach to what is actually quite a similar environment it's a winter's sort of woodish countryside and stuff like that I like this blurry sort of feel I have a feeling with this have you used flash on this have you done some slow sync flash or second cutter second curtain drag or whatever you want to call it wherever you are looking at this I like the I like the fact that you have tried something different that and could as few men for doing this or women so I say man I grew up in South Africa and it's a kind of lahe man kind of thing and what I would like to see with this one next time you try this I think it's outstanding is to jump around a lot more make the whole thing like a big smear right really kind of try and play with it a bit more I think somebody said about reflection I think there's possibility of reflection maybe out of a train window something like that but yeah I think I think this is a good example when people look at a scene that we would knee jerk towards photographing in a certain way and try something different and I think what you've tried here is great I really like it excuse me I'm not that fussed about the reflection if that's it because it's part of this abstractness it's kind of cool I'd like to see more of you try more of this kind of stuff excuse me right so speaking about reflections so we got we got the sun on the water here and stuff like that it's a cliff web I think he's getting so upset right so here we go we got a seascape with this kind of lovely patination patination seems to work for today on the sand going out and stuff like that and earlier we talked about the image with the tree the house on the on the side of the the sea shore we talked about colour temperature and this I feel is also a good example of where I think the colour temperature is slightly wrong this image and maybe this is because I did this video recently we've talked a lot about colour but my background certainly growing up all the manuals all the magazines and stuff we used to read a lot of the colour was very often very saturated it looks hugely saturated I think this is an image which would kind of bear taking taking this you have an abstract quality in this in the sand and it could be reduced to something extremely stock extremely strong with maybe some actually in camera filters so if you get some leaf filters or something like that or even bits of cellophane in front of the camera you know try them out you don't need to be in Photoshop or Lightroom and play with these things you know you can try them try them out if if you don't want to go and buy very expensive you know cockpit filters and stuff like that you can buy old sheets of from either from eBay or if there's a local theatre near to you or something like that ask them what they do with their gel sheets when they're what's called burnt out I used to work in a theatre we used to use gel sheets in park hands because of the nature they're on and they're off eventually the colours bleed out of the gels because of the heat of the lamps and we used to throw the gels away because they're no good so if you can go to go to a video go to a theatre and also for some old gels or something see what they got but this I think would really benefit from being maybe warm or if you want to go to completely opposite make it super cold really like bold blues and stuff like that I think you know it's great that you've seen the image but yeah I feel that it needs it needs a little bit more it needs either sort of some warming up or cooling down or playing with the colour just a little bit but I do like the way you will see you've handled the exposure there it's pretty good error plans and this is not New York LA I don't know see I'm second guessing here of all these places I don't know someone's going to tell me London which is not so here we go interesting you know we talk about colour I'm so pleased we're seeing some interesting colour today because obviously the colour is balanced for the daylight outside and then you have the weird colours that airlines choose to use I don't know why could be Chicago that you know why it's Congo blue Congo blue was always my favourite colour anyway so we've got this sort of thing so we've got this guy in the mask and he's sitting there next to the window and things like that now the guy in the mask and the window I'm not entirely sure what the relationship between the two is so we've got some NYC I get the colour and I get that you're trying to add some foreground interest and stuff like that which I I get it I think this guy's not quite enough I don't know if that makes sense and I've mentioned it a few times in the past you've got that William Eggleston with the drink picture where there's actually quite a lot of the interior of the plane and not so much of the outside now obviously the focus of the image is on the inside this one the focus is for me the the cityscape outside and how's it going and the guy on the inside I'm not feeling that he's I don't feel that he wants to be part of this image I think this would be a stronger image just with that with him gone and if he's if he's a if he's a friend of yours then just say look John do you mind just moving out of the way quickly or make more of the image about him we've talked about this in the past where this is kind of people in the left or people on the edge of the image intruding in when they're not quite of this thing and stuff like that and one of the other either include him and some more of the interior of the building not the building of the airplane or get rid of them one of the other and then make more and I know it's tricky because you're not sitting in the window seat but maybe make more of the interior of the plane with this because if it is NYC which I think most people did I have I look down to Florida and stuff I look at the window and see New York in the distance and stuff because of the route we're taking and that's kind of I think what you were looking at is this kind of using the window frame as a frame you know it's kind of one of those things all right okay so some trees these are not trees these look like allows allows from you know the big cap to see anyway so love it and this has been shot on film how's it film because you win the prize for today for dust on your negative sorry so this is kind of my thing I love film I love the image I think if you were going to do something maybe again tighten up the crop make it a little bit more these guys are going to be central they need to be central if they're going to have some wonky movement they need to be wonky movements this feels like it's not quite one or the other I also don't know if you've actually if this is a native square format or if you've cropped it if it is native or you've cropped it these guys need to be middle or at the moment they're one or the other which is a bit of a shame and seeing as you've shot film I'm going to give you just a little couple of heads up here about when you've scanned this first of all you've scanned it maybe you've scanned it yourself or it's gone to a lab or something but there are hairs on this this negative which in a sky that is uniformly one tone like this and when you shoot filming you need to be so careful get rid of those hairs cloning them out if you are scanning these names yourself you need to get yourself compressed air give it a little burst that will sort you out a little bit and if you're also if you're processing film yourself try and make sure that you're processing more importantly where you're drying your film is as dust free as possible so there we go Mr. B if one of the guys in the comments could point you in the direction where you can submit and give them things otherwise I'd have to just go in it over again the whole time so one of the quick ways of seeing if there's dust and stuff like that on your images after you've actually scanned them in Photoshop is to make a curve with a layer in Photoshop that has a curve that does this like a little sawtooth and that actually shows you where all the dust is which is quite conical because it gives you that and that's the problem when you have this kind of image where there's a lot of neutral tonality those dust things especially this hair on the right hand side they stick out like a sawtooth also just ever since like you just watch your crop on the left hand side there's a little bit of density change at the top and that's probably because you're quite close to the edge of where it's the actual frame on the negative and stuff like that but apart from that I spent so much time talking about the film stuff yeah I think what you've done here like you've seen I would like to see this maybe a little bit more simple you know focus in on these things individually see what you can find because there are such interesting objects and especially caps and stuff and they lend themselves so nicely to black and white I think there we go alright alright okay now this is interesting because I've zoomed in there and it's like boom so we've got here interesting you know saw street scene my walk in his dog and stuff like that you know and it's interesting you know when we talk about we look at these photographs that so often it's not an exposure that's the problem it's not so much of other things that are the problem it's usually the cropping and it's usually way that you have composed the photograph which is probably why Google or something composition photography is kind of usually the most search for thing the what I kind of find is looking at this image you know you've got a man with a dog and there's a little bit of focus as a real issue but that's a technical sort of thing what I kind of feel is that there's too much on the left where the street signals I don't know what you would call them in UK like in America traffic lights and stuff like that there's too much of that stuff going on on the left hand side you've got what looks like a hot dog vendor I'm going to guess it's hot dog here with the umbrella all those things because they're in a shadow they're extremely distracting they're like wow just look at me look at me look at me where's the man with the dog he's what we want to look at so move the camera this way that's curving off that right you know off to the right and you know so John and SH have sort of I think said similar things move them in you know move off to the right you know it's it's like I feel that you know what's going on in the background with the hot dog and the dust off it we don't care about that man somebody said the dog butt picture we care about the dog's butt let's make that more of the thing let's get rid of all the distracting crap in the background let's not and I think somebody has said about using the exposure brush to reveal some detail I think that's going in the wrong direction that's making the image even more competitive we want to actually kind of make it less we want to focus on things interesting which is this man in his own world walking his dog I'm going to take a flyer any person who is old or older so any grey head who lives in a city centre has probably lived there for a long time so maybe you know he's thinking about all what's going on and stuff like that but I think the composition here is what's lacking I think you want to go to the left you know and oh hi Diane I think Diane you really want to move that camera to the left Britt so you're bringing the guide into the left and we're seeing more on this kind of curve of this wall on the right there we go alright oh there we go zooming in and out so you guys probably like this alright so from this okay right this is totally different this is so we got here a little bit urban exploring so we've got holding the wall some doors and a corridor and all sorts a very interesting image and I would like to see more from this I would like to see more of this series I think we got a good idea going on here I don't often sort of you know sort of advocate let's say crazy processing like HDRs and stuff like that this might work for this there's I think you've got something here where the subject itself which is this kind of broken down building and this hole in the wall and whatever's going on here lends itself to more of a kind of funky processing so without being hackneyed and contrived and stuff like that if you are able to maybe next time when you're here is put a figure in one of these you know sort of down not necessarily in this doorway but way down maybe room number five just a little figure if you wanted to go for the spooky element it's kind of things like I like the framing I like this kind of hole in the wall which is framing this piece it works for the whole thing I think you know it's good job good scene if this is who I think it is I think you'll get a lot better you'll start to push yourself so good stuff here I would be interested to see more of this style of image from this period but yeah I think if you really wanted to mess with people's minds tiny figures just somewhere at one hand something that when people look at it they go oh my god yeah alright ooh look at that something jumped in here okay so here we got oops sorry no come back there we go alright so we got some sort of bits and stuff again now it's interesting that you know the theme of tonight was composition and it's kind of just a foot just like a foot there what do a double exposure something like that yeah so we're looking here at these birds and the seas escape now what I'm kind of feeling here is that I can't actually decide what it is that you're trying to photograph what is it that I am what is it I'm supposed to be looking at it is the birds or is it the rock rocks and the sea behind it's one of those things where again an aperture choice would have kind of helped with this if you had very shallow depth of field that it wouldn't help separate out what it is if it is supposed to be the rocks in the sea then I think the birds are a huge distraction because generally speaking there's a huge generalisation that we feel that like animals and people and stuff like that tend to be the thing that we are drawn towards as a subject whereas static items are rocks and things tend to not be the same thing I do think you know you've got the right idea you're getting there that you know there's some you're filling in a little bit of foreground with those twigs and stuff like that but then it's kind of I'm losing it I'm not quite sure where we're trying to go with this also the birds because they're black I'm not doing you any favours I know can we just wheel in the white birds please or the greavers or the colourful birds you know it is struck because they are because of the nature of their plumage to paraphrase a multi python sketch they're going inky black so I think I'd like to see you kind of either to sign but if it's one or the other what are you photographing here I think you've got the right idea but it does lack a bit of focus I think that is probably my biggest my biggest issue with this particular one so next time you confront with a scene like that try to decide exactly what it is that you're trying to photograph and how best you can highlight that so there we go alright so I think this may be from the same the same theme alright Mr B so very quickly to submit an image for the image critique either if you are a member of the Patreon supporters which there is a link in many of the videos you get to submit an image or if you are a channel supporter which is through the membership channels on YouTube that you get membership to like a private place where you will sort of hang out on chat and you can also upload images there so there we go so right so we've gone from the doorway to I'm going to guess is the same to now the toilet fair enough alright so here we go I think and I thought hi pixel drama thank you ever so much that's awesome you are a man you are a person of rare taste I like this I think Sven whereas previously when you had the hole in the wall the hole was very much dominant because I think with this one you kind of you've chickened out a little bit either you're going to have to pull back a little bit more and show us only thank you have photo thank you ever so much I want to show you only the hole in this cracked window frame or pull back and kind of have more of the detail but then the focus which currently is on the window frame on the toilet so the whole thing is out of focus and then the toilet is in focus it's things like this I do like environments like this for photography but often we've talked about this in the past where there is this idea of letting the subject carry the image and we can't let the subject always carry the image because often that's not enough and often when I do kind of one-to-ones with people there is a theme like that that people go I am just going to I'm just going to photograph this interesting thing and because it's interesting I don't have to worry about it too much so so so here we go so Sven yes I like that and this I think is pushing you a little bit was good if you can get back there just go back there go back come back somebody somebody has been looking somebody has been looking at my work yeah okay lovely so it's a lovely sort of thing with this okay so there's a lot so this feels like it's a shopping mall and there's a couple of things that immediately I really like I like the shapes I like the abstractness of this I like a lot of the things in here but then there's a lot I really don't like I'm sorry man okay the banister at the front the escalators the curve of the thing the light the little kind of LED neon kind of whatever you want to call them lights in the walls awesome the stuff in the right hand side the sort of seating area with the with the geometric floor lights okay nice the stuff in the top left those windows and excuse me those windows and the oh my god don't slip sign yeah it's it was going so well it's just been but yeah this is the kind of thing this is where you see things my gut feeling with it is possibly I think a square crop might have helped you a little bit more here the stuff on the right hand side the geometric planters in the seating area so I'm kind of fine with that and I think if you crop square you can have this interplay very clean very kind of let's say 1970s futuristic feel coupled with that stuff but the stuff in the top left hand corner is so out keeping with the rest of the image that that's all I can see and now that I'm also once you see that yellow don't slip sign that's all you're going to see it's unfortunately it is such such a nightmare but well done for seeing good interesting geometric shapes if you are interested in this kind of photography this kind of these shapes two American photographers or two photographers from the 1950s and 60s Ezra Stoller and Julius Sherman so I'll just write them in there Stoller and Julius right those guys look at those guys learn from them because they will they if you're into this kind of architecture you sort of think they would just go wow awesome right so really but yeah checking things out I do miss shopping malls I love shopping malls but here in here in Suffolk land where I live we don't we don't have any shopping go come back there we go bridge used to be good and now it's just rubbish okay so okay alright okay so I love this I love this this this building as a regular viewers of the channel will know that I love architectural photography and so if you I love I'm sorry I come down hard in here because it's easy to it's easy to see little issues with it this building amazing and what a lovely patternation is this kind of pixel thing so immediately with this because it's built and John is picked up and already this needs to be straight this needs to be proper verticals you know which is which is a problem now obviously traditionally you would either photograph this with with a large format camera with some planes or you could have the tilt shift lens or we could do what most people do is go into Lightroom and fix the verticals try in when you're taking these kind of photographs try as much as you possibly can to try and get those verticals vertical especially when you're dealing with an image like this which is all about geometric shapes so you know how many people have said in the comments just boom it's not straight that is unfortunately when you're dealing with these kind of images that we are so quick to pick up in our minds and our guts, guts specifically that these things are not straight so do check on the straightness it would be interesting to see this at a different time of day I feel that your lighting on this whenever it's been lit is a bit flat it would probably benefit from maybe a struggle the light kind of not being so even on it to give it a bit more form and texture because I can see that we're looking at a corner of a building but it's not immediately obvious because the light is reasonably flat so try getting it at a time of day when there's more shape to the building and also talking about cropping right down at the bottom there's just the top of a street sign thing coming through so just be aware of that because it's kind of just I did mean Julius my text my typing and everything has just been it's been awful recently I do apologize it is Julius Shulman did I say Sherman right if I said Sherman that then feel free to come around and give me a slap because I've been trying to do three things at once it's terrible but yeah that sort of thing and anybody who does like photograph in this thing yeah if you're going to be like this it needs to be straight up and down alright okay lots of colour I like colour I like colour so looking at this this is kind of one of those this is kind of one of those very strong images and with with no disrespect to you because this can often sound like it comes across as it's kind of like oh that's nice sort of thing this feels like one of the photographs that I used to come across and we and those of a certain age will know the image that you come across in the old manuals for cameras and how basic photographic books that taught you very basic sort of things and be like oh you're talking about shadow and colour and stuff now one of the things here this is immediately this is so red this is what red which is lovely and it's so red because you've got the contrast in here with the shadows and the black and the stuff like that and that immediately makes any colours stronger again long time viewers will know that I like to eat almonds when I'm doing this sort of thing which is bad because I get harm dust in my throat I've got to say everybody put their hands up and say cropping this wants to come up just a little bit the window frame is too high in the frame it wants to come down it's a heavy thing it wants to be at the bottom if you have visual things that are heavy and this is a heavy visual thing if you're at the top of the frame they will feel like they're constantly wanting to fall down if you put the heavy things at the bottom of the frame it's going to make the frame itself feel a little bit more weighted settled so because we're just studying this it wants to be lower down Diane feels it's too tight I don't think necessarily it's too tight is the wrong thing I feel that the frame itself is in the wrong part of the frame I think it wants to be down I don't mind the black patch so much it gives weight to the colour Alex Webb and photographers of that ilk use shadows quite handily and those shadows are helping this red really pop out so it's all that's always a thing Steve if you are finding that there are elements that you can't get rid of find a way that you can include them you know I feel you said there's a weird air-conditioner unit that is just rubbishing the photo see if you can include it give it a try rather than trying to have a lesser picture for excluding it maybe there is a stronger picture for including the thing that you think that if you exclude or make a stronger picture something like that there we go see this is kind of fun because we zoom in a little bit it's a key and then we zoom out so we got a key and a shell a nice little interesting a nice little interesting still life looking at this I'm going to guess this wasn't a found thing the chain wasn't just there if it was then forgive me I'm in kind of two minds about this that one it's like there's not there's not a heap of things going on but in the second in the other part of the mind I find it kind of interesting I don't know why and sometimes it is tricky I think so John is talking here about the sky and we talked about context we talked about how images all kind of fit together and stuff and it feels like there is that sky the top right is a little bit bright but it's it's somewhat balanced by the shell and the the rock in the foreground what I'm kind of struggling to see is somebody mentioned in here connection what is going on here what is the point of this photograph it's not the light because the light is not a thing it's not the composition because this composition is not a thing and I do apologize if you felt that you spent some time trying to work on this composition I appreciate the work that you've put in with it but it's not quite it's not hitting the mark I'm not picking up any signals from it and we've I've talked about in the past where we think about if you need to explain an image if you need to tell people what it is that you're trying to do or whatever then the image is kind of not working you know because we want to we want to see and be able to pick in the story and I think Dionne just mentioned this in the chat that I'm not seeing I'm not seeing I don't want to say the point of this but I feel that you have an idea here that you're working towards that if you were sitting next to me you would talk me through it and then I might go oh okay cool blah blah blah blah but that's what you haven't communicated it clearly enough to me so maybe take this idea go back think about what it is that you want to say and see if you can communicate it clearly to me through the through the medium of photography rather than having to write write an essay about it but thank you for submitting alright okay so alright so the first I think the first portrait of the evening okay so let me just sorry I'm just going to just get a link for Mr B um there we go I'm going to give that so we got here so this is the first portrait of the evening with some interesting writing that's what there we go alright so we got here so a nice sort of an interesting portrait and of course now apart from the fact that we you know that I like architectural photography I am a portrait photographer by trade so okay so I might get into so immediately um I think one of the things that that leaps to mind here that a lot of you made a lot of other people may tell you this when they look at your photographs this one they may say there's no separation um now that's the two of my kickers and headlights and stuff like that um okay whatever I don't mind you can I use separation occasionally mostly for family stuff but for my own stuff not so much one light and you've got with the background and stuff so you can get away with one light you don't necessarily need to do a sort of thing having said that you have an exceptionally small modifier on this light for a half body um I could sit in her eyes she's got very tiny catch lights so either you've got like a one by one softbox like a one meter one meter um or you're using a beauty dish that's quite far away from her or something like that but first for an image like this I would probably go back to my one and a half um and sorry here in the UK obviously we use metric but my one and a half meter up to box um so I don't know what that is in inches 60 inches um something like that because nice nice soft light you can control it and you can light the background at the same time with it um and that would also make it just a bit more of a wrap around light um that would also kind of make her eyes just a touch right at the problem with people have this kind of you know this kind of skin tone and have brown eyes is that those brown eyes need a lot of light in them they need to be boom like smack with light because it just the the um the iris absorbs all that light um so you really want to because you want to make the eyes pop in this situation though um because of the the tone of the image um it's not so much of a crucial thing but just something to bear in mind um her actual pose is fine she's got a nice sort of outline of her face it's not breaking just I mean if you're being overly pedantic about it I would probably move her from from this just to a little bit more like that it is it's a tiny thing um and and then also her hand um that hand I'm going to come around I'm going to chop it off alright it's right it's so obvious and that's the problem it is it's a thing of dominant color it's a dominant brightness in an image that's dark um and it's detracting from her her shoulders not so much of an issue um so um integrate um thank you ever so much for supporting um there should be an email that comes to you um to get the um the link for uploads we do this once a month um and what have you um yeah brown eyes are our special you know my son has brown eyes and and like when he was born I thought oh my god I'm gonna have to blast him with flash it's like because you know I've got blue eyes and and blue eyes just yeah because of the nature of the the pigmentation it they're a lot brighter um but brown eyes if especially if you're going to do something really you don't want the eyes to go black because that's the thing you don't want the eyes to go black um they need uh they need a bit more boom boom you know um um uh so anyway so we're talking about the hand so yeah so what happens we can see obviously I'm wearing a black outfit if I do this right you've got my face and you've got my hand right so your eyes just jumping up and down between the two of them um shoulders are not too much of an issue you can turn that down a little bit in in in in post if you wanted to um but yeah that hand is I I would think that hand was to come away I know she's sort of she's sort of holding I don't know what she did she's sort of holding her shawl like this bring the hand around make it and maybe kind of just lift her up um or rather than her doing this uh you I know you can't really sort of see but if you get to sit down and put a hand on a on a bench right and then sort of and it will sort of turn but you know sort of thing I don't know sort of thing but you want to just um you know elongate the neck um I can do a whole video about posing um for uh for portraits if you'd like um hands up if you can't feel like it anyway uh but yeah better part of that I think it's nice the the the you got some movement and the hair which is which is good um you know um what you can do if you do want to um like her face just a little bit is get somebody really close like like literally just on the edge of the frame with a um oh actually I've got one in a second hold in a second alright do do do alright something like this oh he says here's one I made earlier right so just a little bit of kicker back in here because you've got a bit more control about that here we go alright so there we go that's a laster light um try light um but if you are super cheap um just go down to your local art supply and get a piece of foam mix uh art core foam x board um and they usually um you know sort of white fairly solid core bits of cardboard um they're white that would that would look pretty cool there we go um if anybody lives in America if you can just put into the thing um like is it my cause is the art supply store um something like that but yeah um um foam core board is what you're looking for and buy some black as well because you get a negative fill with that alright more masks but that is the world we live in okay alright so some masks so this feels like this kind of street and you are outside you're photographing through um at this person who's looking through the window um quite interesting um um yeah it's it's kind of it's sort of an odd thing to say because again a lot of street photography I feel wants to work as a sequence wants to work as part of you know a bigger picture um and this this kind of feels like that for me there is a thing I must say I am uh okay kind of like things about the thing we don't mention aside um you know so various ideas about you know vaccinations and stuff like that um you know and whether masks work or not is kind of I don't really want to get into it but there is a thing that these these masks are now prevalent um in in many parts of the world um you know and for many people have given an opportunity possibly to engage in um let's call it a sort of neo noir sort of feels of images and and it's still kind of relatively new that I think you could you could like with an image like this you could run with the processing and do like a cross processing thing or you know do some color shifts or something like that to change it up now Volcat67 is saying that he would like to see her face in expression and and I I kind of I'm I part of me agrees with that and part of me goes I do but part of me also goes I'd like to see this because of the nature of the image that it's with the reflection is these streaks of light that have a kind of kind of futuristic sort of feel coupled with the mask and coupled with her outfit which if we got rid of the Arctic Canada goose thing I forget what it's called on our sleeve here is timeless it could be what I say timeless it could be you know you know the sort of futuristic and that's kind of where I sort of feel that we could go with these sort of things um you know that it's a thing I think you know Lloyd has just mentioned sort of crop and and I at the risk of sounding like it's a sort of theme about cropping um a landscape because of the nature of these these lights might work actually quite interestingly um yeah I think someone's mentioned there's some dead space at the top in the bottom I think that's possible um I if I do do street which is very rare um I generally tend to shoot um landscape mostly because that's kind of obviously how we are seeing seeing the world um but I would be interested to see this as a sequence of things where you could do a series of images where these people are kind of where we are only focusing on the eyes and that's kind of the thing I think you know somebody mentioned about her eyes being expressive um given the nature of the background and the fact she's wearing darker clothes and stuff like that the eyes are the only thing in the image that we can really hang our hats on that they are the only thing um yeah well you never know John I've been looking back at this and going oh remember how happy we were who knows anyway that's why we don't talk about it because it's just ugh life is just so drew alright and here's a lady who's like I don't de-jerry at all um it's not me um so an interesting image I think that's fair to say and mostly because we've got a character who's in here now what kind you know I talked earlier about letting the often we see something and we see an image and we think that's amazing that all I need to do is photograph that thing and that's a good enough image and I think this lady here falls into that category that we photograph and kind of go it's enough because that person is interesting um from a technical point of view with one or two like the there's some lights down at the bottom they're a little bit distracting and stuff like that it's it's fine as a photograph I don't think it's really doing anything it's not really again you know mentioned earlier about you know having a photograph if you need to explain to me and stuff like that then it's kind of not working it's not necessarily grabbing I think maybe if you again context and sequences are so important with these kind of things I think if you did a series of street portraits so instead of her just kind of she's walking along on her phone if you stopped her and you said may I take your photograph and she said oh yes you know right oh okay right see there we go right so somebody's just said this is Lynn Yeager that she's very famous and stuff like that um see that's context right but if you said to her may I photograph you right she would kind of go yes or no right but maybe you better ask her see what she said um you know I don't know who she is and that's kind of part of the problem right is that if it's if if you don't know who these people are then it means nothing I can I can show you some photographs of some very famous southern africans but you don't know who they are so they don't really carry much weight especially if they were photographs of similar is a similar style so if you want going to do this yeah next time you see her just say look excuse me Miss Yeager would you mind can I can I take your photograph see what she does you know um where she can do it say no right which is easy for me to say sitting over here but yeah see see what she comes up or if you see people like this ask her if you can just take your take their photo take their portrait in the street maybe with some flash you know do something a little bit different um you know characters there's often you know little photo project with people and photographing you know characters that they see give it a try but uh but yeah apart from that it's all quite alright alright so this is yep okay so alright so we got um this lovely little green thing now earlier I was talking about you know with the picture with the red about how when you put a especially primary colours against the darker background they immediately have more zing to them now I don't know how much of this is post um if at all but this is a good example of how um our colours can be so much brighter cheers John thank you so much for being here it's wonderful to have you and your feedback um yeah I really like this um nice colours the lighting is really nice and stuff like that um the only thing if I'm going to be really nitpicky um Moente um if you um sign up as a patron um to our patron which is clear I'll put the link in there um then um then you have the option to um send in looks we do this once a month uh with the images um so we got there yeah so there's um this little green tree whatever it is coming through so lovely so so so it is beautiful it's there's there's water on it to even make it even more lovely and stuff like it's not just dry it's lovely colours and there's that little stick and I know I hate being nitpickety schnickety nitpickety and there's that little stick rhinox to it that looks like a straw please get rid of it it's you know just just it would have taken you like a second just to pick it up and move it out of the way um because this this picture is beautiful it's lovely just get rid of it it's it's really nice it's simple it's it's understated it's got impact though it's it's got texture it's got loveliness um it's delicate which is not a word often used in photographs but it's delicate that's an absolute compliment um but that straw yeah you know gotta be that that's that little straw thing this this this guy over here oh please make him go away but yeah beautiful beautiful lovely lovely image and here now I'm going to guess this may be by the same same person so uh Andreas yes if you are part of the patriotic group um you may um submit um uh submit images um so um this is also this is lovely um I don't know if this is uh I'm gonna I often give the benefit down so this let's say this is this is real the the images on here um this one with this this flowers in black and white um I like the treatment the treatment is very interesting um I think this center section of flowers that are turning more towards let's say zone 6 slightly zone 7 for those of us who speak zone systems um might want to be just a touch brighter um sort of turning sort of uh more zone 7 than more zone 6 um if you are into zones um I think just just to make them stand out a little bit from the rest so um so those who don't speak zone system uh that's what Adams knows this and blah blah blah um zone 5 is just like a kind of a neutral gray so like what you see on the edge roughly of the frame here um this sort of gray zone 6 is um sort of skin tones with a little bit higher and zone 7 is kind of quite high on IT so what you'd normally see on here with some texture in it um so basically it's just a little sort of whiter um zone 8 is quite getting into specular 9 is super white and then 10 is paper white anyway um looking at this the composition feels a bit not right the tonalities and stuff lovely I love the tonalities um something's not right about this composition um Diane is and I keep want to say Dion but sorry um Diane is saying um landscape I'm not sure I'm there is something I you know I don't really want to kind of be one of these let's just move it around to see how it goes all the time um there's something that's not working on this in in terms of the composition I'm not entirely sure what it is but I would like I think this would benefit from you going back and having another look at it and really spending some time with it look at it upside down look at it back to front look at it and see if it starts to speak to you a little bit more um I don't know if I can do this in in in um in bridge uh let's see because I think you can do it in Photoshop yeah there you go see that's now upside down that's kind of there that's beginning to feel like it's a little bit more got something but that's what you've got so if you sort of sit that yeah it's still not quite right but that feels a little bit more like there's something there than that I don't know why I think it's the nature of the excuse me I think it's the nature of the subject that they're all over the place that then there's something not quite landing um something in there you know and I'm sorry I can't be more specific than that but sometimes it is a case of your gut is telling you there's not something that's not quite right about it you can't quite put your finger on it but I'm feeling that it's the composition there's a beard here look at that it's coming oh there's a there's a face um yeah look at this alright so really like in your face now there's a problem with this apart from the fact this guy's got a really kind of like he's got like like totally in us experience you know he's totally into us um which is the wrong but he's really engaging with us um here um is that his beanie is ever so slightly too low um now I know we're this is this is getting into nitpickettiness um um is that there is such a slither like the tiniest slither of catch light in his eyes that it's only just making them I right um I would say if you look at this guy and kind of go right okay dude I love I love that the the intensity you're giving me is just amaze balls to use but you know what would be even better right if you don't want to say to him dude can you just look to beanie up a little bit just go look down your nose just get him just to be a little bit arrogant right and he will bring his chin up and what will happen is he will then raise his beanie and then have more catch lights in his eyes so it's stuff like that but again this is this is easy to say after the moment right it's easy to look at this and kind of go oh you could have done this you could have done that because we're not having to deal with this person we're not having to interact with him so it is one of those sort of things and you get this feel um the more that you kind of do this right you get a feel for doing these sort of things you get a moment to to know this things that next time you do this with somebody with beanie you'll look for the catch light right and the more you do that it becomes second nature but yeah so rather than saying to people can you just move you this and move that which they generally don't quite like doing when you're asking them to move bits of their clothing around but yeah make make him say you know what come on that's not your war face give me your war face you know it's that kind of stuff it's playing it's it's interaction right and and getting him to do the thing that you want him to do that improves the image without actually knowing why is he doing it but apart from that I think it's really intense sort of look I would just possibly maybe a bit of dodge and burn and that brickwork around behind so we're really drawn into you know with eyes and maybe you know because of the nature of the beanie just do a little dodge and burn them right I don't know why okay so this one a little bit smaller okay alright so here we have looked like Japan you know like a little or somewhere in the Far East you know I sort of I sort of see their I like the you know the clouds and the mountains and the hills and stuff is really lovely I feel the sky is somewhat lost here I get what you're trying to you're trying to make it feel a little bit more timeless that it's that you know because obviously these things are quite odd you know it's like castles in Europe and stuff like that you know we want to see them without the trappings of modern life around them so that we have a bit more of a spiritual connection to them unfortunately this sky is really bright and that's probably because it is it feels like it's just like a blank overcast day which is a bit of a nightmare really isn't it it's so hard to do something with the light especially when you're dealing in black and white and things of that nature something that you could do here and again it's getting a bit more technical gymnastics and stuff like that but you could always try either not necessarily an HDL because I don't particularly like HDLs but if you did two exposures so you do one exposure for the do three do one exposure for the building the building and the hill the building is on then do another exposure for the hills in the background and then one exposure for the for the sky now obviously with the sky you don't want to make it super dramatic because that sort of takes out what you're looking for but you do want a little bit of detail in there I think you want a little bit of detail that's my particular take on it you may prefer having the whiter sky like that and if you're going to do that again it's hard because obviously we see it on a screen and the screen I think just by nature takes away so much from an image especially if this was printed on like a fiber based paper or something like that there would be a lot more to enjoy and I'm only seeing it like this size because I don't know why the image is so small but I'm only seeing it this I think if we were to say this as a print there would be a lot more detail there would be a lot more subtlety that we sort of see in here but I think this is one of those images that we talked about I mentioned the zone system that if you look up like a zone system printing and you know like old school black and white printing that would really come alive with some sympathetic printing on it I think that's that's a thing yeah sympathetic printing would make this look so much nicer a little a little ball with a guy right okay so we've got same same photographer I did say at the beginning of the month if you wanted to submit more than one photo that would be absolutely fine and of course we've got there's probably even some in a few this I feel this is this feels like it's more of a snapshot I'm going to compare it with your previous image I'm not seeing too much on this obviously because it's more of a I don't want to say like it's a fun image you know like a silly image it's but it does feel like it's just kind of it's somebody who didn't spend too much time there I don't think he spent any huge amount of thought on it and oh please excuse me if that comes across as me dismissing sort of things but this feels more like a snapshot compared to the other one you know and I think you know so wrestlers would say it makes me smile and it did make me smile initially and yeah so in that regard it worked but I don't think it's much more because of critique about it but I would like to see this guy with the little smiley face on a journey through your office that'd be quite cool alright ok so now here we got just a little bit more it looks like a cabbage I don't know what that is in front of you so this kind of thing there is I think there's scope within photography to photograph the things that are around us all the time that we often dismiss as potentials for subjects as ideas for things like that you know if you look back sort of photographers in the 1920s and stuff like that they photographed lots of random things you know man-rave photographing the dust under his bed and all you know all these kind of things and go for it you know we've seen tonight all sorts of subjects of things and it goes to show that anything can be a subject for a photograph you know and it doesn't need to be or to this doesn't need to be super arty you know sort of things like that it can be just whatever that you know sort of floats your boat but so often with these things it's context and it's sequences and it's placement if you do, if you just do a picture like this or the smiley face that you showed me earlier individually you kind of go as a sequence, as a story as a narrative as a whole series of images then they start having a bit more context and you've got here which looks like a cabbage that's being chopped up during dinner time why not take a sit a week of all the vegetables that you chop up just photograph all the vegetables and see what happens at least then there's a context then the viewer can put them into a place in their mind so this I like this again we were talking earlier about quiet and you know I think gentle photographs I remember somebody talking to me once about so gentle comedy and Thomas was like oh I don't really get it but I get it now you know there are photographs that make us I don't think initially that they really inject anything into us then I'm like oh my god I feel remarkably changed but I look at this and I go the contrast and the juxtaposition between the field and the pastures but you know what you know what I mean and this is road closed sign in the middle of a field now we can sort of see a little bit underneath there is looks like the remnants of a tarmac road you know there's a place in Pennsylvania that's set fire Centrelia you know I put in mind of that kind of thing although this is not quite Silent Hill territory like there but there's something about this you know I I don't think this necessarily needs any more you know it's sort of fiddling if you want to call it that again I would like to see I would love to see a sequence like this and I think those of you who live in America I don't want to say your privilege but America is because of its vastness it has a lot of this kind of stuff you know and what have you there are things that are just lost and abandoned that you can photograph that are interesting whereas simply here in the UK you know things rarely get abandoned like this they rarely get forgotten about and I think if you are doing this kind of thing in America or somewhere else where you are able to you're Australian, South African and other places of that nature have similar things that what you should do that I certainly enjoy doing is when you get there don't take photographs for a little while just be in the environment be in the moment today we went for a walk we live in a farm that is attached to a farm that is still working and we went for a walk with the farmer and there is a neolithic campsite just down about half a mile away from the house in a little every year the British Museum come and excavate that and I look at that and I go 200,000 years ago whatever what caused people to decide this is where they wanted to be what was it about and this is kind of if you tap into the vibe of the place the vibe of the landscape then it injects something into your image it may not be obvious but at least be in tune with it and this is kind of the thing I like this sort of thing I think that its wonkiness and all of its stuff like that it just lends itself to it again I would love to see a sequence of these photographs you know somebody said about the vignetting yeah that's a film that looks like it's the edge of either a neg that's popped or it's it doesn't feel like it's a slide film I don't mind so much you know it's sometimes we need to sort of decide if the technical really detracts from the image or if we're just kind of nitpicking for the thing each to their own obviously but essentially somebody mentioned film because it does have this organic kind of feel to it it is life juiced scenery hello yes welcome here we go this is very interesting some sort of modern art kind of stuff sort of going on going on here I do like these kind of images I like the geometriciness you want to call it that I'm not completely sold on the composition which again has been a theme it's always a theme there is something now I'm looking at this image which is I you know that you've seen something interesting and I appreciate that it is a piece of art so the installation in a building or something and there's nothing wrong absolutely I photograph this kind of thing all the time I love it but looking at the photograph I feel that there is a better picture hiding here in plain sight and that is I don't know if I can zoom in on it but if I do this hopefully that will sort of thing so you see this kind of black shadow that's in between the two of them if you cropped it right in there so we don't know what this thing is that that feels like that's where the picture is that really for me you've got this kind of very strong geographic strong geometric shape going on that aligns itself with this plus the way the light is just playing off the edges of that same steel or whatever it is so cool I think yeah you've seen some lovely stuff here but next time you're in here with these things don't be afraid to chop them up you don't need to include all the things my Facebook page is public so if you look up Alex Kilby you'll find my Facebook page and there's an album in my photos called Take Modern or London in it or something like that where I went to Take Modern and you'll see I've done a lot of similar sort of things but I'm sort of chopping them up and stuff like that so don't be afraid to crop in and get full on into them so we have here sort of a street scene with some of the markings on the road and stuff like that it's hard I think with this kind of image that again these blurred motorbikes and stuff like that feel like they are intruding on what you're trying to take a photograph of they weren't supposed to be there which is a shame because they are supposed to be there it's a classic it's totally they're not in the frame but they're not out of the frame they're not part of the picture but they're not part of the picture they've got to be they've got to be more and this again comes back to its competition everything is right here your ideas of the black and white and using one of the stuff is great this use of the road markings is lovely the composition needs to be worked on a little bit I've been in similar situations this is really nice the graphic is so good and the picture that you took it's better in your head I think that's kind of one of the things that picture is better in your head and this is advice to me as well next time I see a sort of thing is sit with it a little bit look sit with the guys right, silent thing see if you can coax out a better picture from the possibilities that we have that is the thing it needs to be it's there all these pictures tonight none of them are like, oh my god this is like nothing there's always something that everybody is seeing something we just need to coax it out just a little bit more sorry, I've been talking for almost two hours I'm just going to breathe it so we have a I'm looking to crash so we got this very interesting abstract of the a street and then a parking spot this guy striding and all very interesting individually the parts are all kind of cool it doesn't feel like it's coming together somehow there's a couple of things I think the inclusion of the guy striding, yes absolutely needs that kind of organic feel to it the sign that's intruding from the left looks like two things are around sort of thing on I think is somewhat distracting, it's not really adding to the image something that if you are able to with this photograph go back and make a contrast here really up the contrast on this make it almost black, white and basically nothing else in between so like an old lith piece of lith film see all happens because you've got these two lines you've got this diagonal road line, you've got the brakes and then you've got the sort of parking space side and then this drainage thing that just intersects the entire thing and then this guy's striding this all feels very I know I've used the word graphic earlier it does feel very graphic and I think with that kind of thing punchy black and white would really oomph heft one of the things I feel a lot of people and I include myself in this especially these days is that we are almost frightened to really take things to extremes with the photography that we want shadow detail we want highlight detail we want all those details and sometimes detail is not necessary doesn't need to be like that Alex Webber, I know I mentioned Alex Webber like a ton but a lot of his images don't have any shadow detail so you don't just go with it it just see what happens see what happens some type of contrast again and a lot of people I say as I would like to see more of your work one of the drawbacks with these is A, I'm not speaking to you directly and also I'm only seeing one image or two images or maybe three it's one of those things that if you are interested if you would like to have more time if you go on the the TPE course site which I'll put a link in the description there is there's an option to have like a little 30 minute one to one session a one to one session of chatting and having some feedback with images which is always helpful because we can then talk about things and see more images because having one as an individual it lacks context it lacks so much obviously it's useful to give the feedback but I feel that a lot of the feedback often that I give that might be better or different probably if you can see two or three images together of a similar subject hello some wildlife we haven't had wildlife on here for ages which would be nice say it's got an owl look at him sleepiness there now we talked about the dog way back in the beginning of the session there was a real I love this like with the dog but to the exclusion of anything else it makes such an impact if you think about the impact of this this owl boom little flecks of snow with his beak and it's got his eyes out of close with this sort of half open I wonder what would happen if you were looking straight into the lens also I think and now I'm sort of just looking at it as well it's like on his coat which is like wow lovely some detail I must say I haven't really looked at wildlife photography for a long time but it's this kind of thing it's a really nice photograph I'm sure that people who are more versed in wildlife photography and especially bird photography might say there are things that are technically wrong with it but you know to a lay person I am a lay person when it comes to wildlife photography that I like this I like the look of it you know I do feel I think maybe one of two people is that the you know the bird feels like he's a little bit low in the frame just like a scooch but I kind of look at this and go do you know what it's there's often in certainly modern photography a feeling that things should be perfect and we all kind of fall into this from time to time we could have done this we could have done that we could do a little bit of clone here and if you did this and you did that then everything would be sort of fine and that's kind of that drifts into the world of you know wanting to make everything perfect and wanting to feel like we are input giving feedback in some way and yes it feels the image feels like it's kind of squiff I don't know quite how but I look at this and I go the thing that it did for me was the impact I think that's kind of thing first and foremost the impact it did and if we were comparing another 10 images like this of ours and all the same thing then the subtleties like composition like the very the very fine minutiae of the image would come into play but this it just feels I think you know what I did would kind of probably make this image a bit stronger is that his plumage around the side or his feathers are the same tone as the eye shields whatever you want to call them and if you toned everything down outside of this part of his face I say he can be a girl but gender neutral but who knows then that would bring out this part which is the focus of the image so I think a little dodger on this would really go a long way to making this picture just snap and as I said I know he's a bird and we don't have much control over what the bird is like close your eyes, close your eyes these eyes are kind of they're not open, they're not closed they either need to be like this looking into the lens or they need to be asleep at the moment they're coming couldn't walk so they need to be one of the other I don't know how you would do that with dogs, you make a funny noise you go and the dog will generally look at you I don't know how you do with birds but speak to a normal thought see what they can suggest ok so we've got some some smook all right, what have we got ok ah Jonathan, so in South Africa Howzit is a just a slang greeting for hello and I I don't know where I picked up as a kind of a thing it's yeah it's a slang, I originally came back with a channel because I felt really odd just down in front of a camera and going so I'm going to talk so I went, how's that? so here we go, you've got some guys some interesting lighting, you know he's been reflected on there, he's got some smoke and stuff you know some nice layering going on I think I've seen your photography before it's it's kind of a gritty sort of urban sort of thing you know there's this is kind of the photography that I used to take you know and this is not like saying oh I grew up in South Africa but when I was a student I quite liked this kind of thing and it's nice to play with lighting like this, it's nice to feel like you're somewhat playing on the edge but you're pushing sort of boundaries and trying different things out and I would suggest to a lot of people who are watching this is to just approach things from a different angle to you know if the light is the thing and quite frankly the light is the thing in this image there's not the composition is kind of interesting and you know a little bit playful but it's the light, the light is the thing that's going on here now there's some we're losing some stuff on the highlights and stuff like that and what have you but rather than nitpick about that and saying we're losing the highlights and his forehead is blown out in South Africa we should go do you know okay that's whatever you've recognized the light that's the thing that we are looking for is you need to recognize the light that's going on and somebody's talking about the reflection it seems to be dividing opinion I like the reflection because at least you've gone beyond just the office of saying why is the light and the light is enough we're now adding a bit more you know it's things like that it's the change the the boots logo that's coming in on the reflection you could be pedantic a burner so it was a bit distracting and stuff like that but it's not breaking the image yeah I think it's good I think the light is the thing here that I'm sort of drawn towards and good for recognizing and good for so doing it in a way that makes a bit more sense it might be it might I'd be interested to see what this looks like in color I think that boots logo might ruin it because for those of you who don't know boots is a UK pharmacy and their logo is blue in the reflection there's part of it coming in which might be a bit too much but there we go but yeah this thing is you know you can sit down and talk about you know highlights on the forehead and things like that ultimately you know these kind of things are about recognizing potential for you know potential images and finding the light is that first step I think you know if we were looking at the same photographer in say five years time who's still doing these blown out the highlights after having been told about them then I think there's a case for saying look you're doing it wrong but you know really I want everybody to go away feeling like we can push on from this because it is a gross thing I'm not going to smoke up anybody's butts but you know I think we need to make it also sort of celebrate the the small wins so this is Holi actually my little boys friend at school his dad is Indian so he went to a Holi celebration at Georgie's house a couple of weeks ago and I wanted to go pick him up back covered in blue so for those of you who don't know Holi is an indie festival where they all throw colour at each other like powder paint kind of stuff so it's one of those things where yes it's going to wreck your camera because it's paint powder paint and it gets everywhere what I'm kind of seeing with this is Holi is such a it is well known for colour for in your face for dramatic stuff that I would like to see more of that this is a guy if you look around you've got the guy in the bottom left he's got some of the blue on his face he's got some red and all sort of stuff like that and he's got colour the guy who's up on the shoulders is not he's got a bit of smear green stuff like that yeah I think there's so much more going on here Diane has mentioned about flash that would be good especially this time of day twilight I think you've got to start to struggle a little bit with exposures and Holi's frantic as well Holi is a very crazy kind of thing and some slow-sync flash I think would go a long way to really making that pop because at the moment it feels like with all due respect it feels a bit snapshot-ish like this is a friend of yours who's on so many shoulders if you're trying to get the feeling of Holi across and the colours and stuff like that you know a pop of flash put plastic bags all around your camera stick it out with an elastic band and stuff like that and get in there and just get dirty but I think that would definitely help next time next time around and if you do live in India which this may well be embrace this kind of stuff you know what it's about get to the heart of these things alright excuse me so we've got some what is this it looks like a little abstract what's going on here's some plants and tarmac or something like that I do like this I think we've seen a couple of images tonight where there's been very strong colours I think the window and the green plant with the leaves this would this wants to be the same thing this wants to be puncture right it wants to have some black and the greens it wants to be vibrant obviously you can do that in post if you start doing those kind of things in post it does change it a little bit but if you under expose this a little bit it would give you a chance to make the blacks a little bit blacker because you do that even though you aren't exposing the greens and the greens are quite delicate they're going to be a lot more pronounced against the the black and the asphalt see Lloyd's kind of not keen on the blurred foreground I don't mind it so much this is again I think this comes down to sort of personal taste I think it makes it feel bigger like this it does feel like it might be a little bit fake I don't know sort of things but I feel the color here is the first thing that you really want to be focusing on you've got the right idea I think the technicalities and again the minutiae of depth of field and stuff like that is something to be worked at at a later date but the color for me feels like what initially drew you to this image and if we work on the color first making that color pop making it really strong punchy then we can start looking at what would be the most beneficial most appropriate sort of use of depth of field and again I think it's one of these things where it would be interesting to see an image that is completely in focus and then shallow depth of field to make comparisons to sort of see because I'm sure there are pros and cons to each one and I think obviously the audience people in the chat are saying that it feels like the out of focusness at the front is a little bit too much but again I think we can do the comparison with those which would be interesting but I think you know look at the color first and then move on to the other bits how are we doing here by that so I'm just going to pop out of here half way through it's like two hours away we're going to be here all night jump in for the long ones and let me guess that has now stopped showing it on that has now stopped showing it on Ziggy on OBS yes it has alright I'm just going to change it around quickly OBS there we go alright back again alright okay so we got it move along a little bit quicker because otherwise I'm going to be here for ages so yeah so bridge through the night again you know I took all my composition you know quite a lot and this one I think you've got the right idea it's kind of getting through there we're looking at nice images that you've drawn to something but it doesn't seem to have a focal point to it I think that's kind of the problem with this one is that I'm not seeing any sort of point to this image beyond the interesting lighting and stuff like that with bridges especially there's lots of leading lines and stuff like that if you're able to go back and revisit these try and see what they look like when you try and cut out the background the stuff in the reverse the buildings and stuff like that it's that feels like it's distracting and you've lost the point of what is you're being drawn to which is the bridge here so if you can go back try and photograph this bridge without any of that sort of modern stuff in the background and see what it gives you okay lovely so these are for these kind of things absolute sucker and I do like this my initial thing is that it is it's flat sorry to say the contrast in this is lacking it just wants a little not a huge amount it doesn't want tons the composition is lovely with the exception of this chap on the right hand side that's poking in but this wants a bit more punch and I think it will really sing it's a lovely image you know that guy on the right hand side really needs to go but outside of that I like this I don't think it's going to set the world of light but I like it because it's a nice sorry nice is a terrible expression in photography but yeah it really wants that punchiness and I think again I'd like to see more of these kind of images from you they're really lovely but yeah next time punchy and possibly try some more exposure with this and get this clouds smeary I think that would be nice I know it's a bit hackneyed for some things but you know give it a try so here we've got okay so an interesting building an aquarium with lots of snow now if you compare this to the one previously which was a very much a very strong shape of architectural thought this has the potential to do the same thing but you kind of missed it you're stuck in limbo you've got your friend in the front you're photographing and there's a lot of there's a lot of messiness at the bottom there's snow that's piled up against it there's been scraped away from around it and stuff like that and and I think even though the lighting is really lovely on this building you've kind of you've been stuck between two it's like you've turned around and taken a grab shot and then moved on go back, revisit this forget about your friends forget about the stuff that's going on the floor look at the top this building I know that it's snowy but it's steaming this building is steaming look at the top there's that snow coming off because it's being blown up or something like that but there's the shots there and it's such an interesting looking building go back if you're able to and let the building speak to you take a moment we talked about standing in a place and finding the voice that the image is giving you do that go back might sound a bit stupid but go up and just stroke the building let it talk to you just say hey, building you and me we're going to take some pictures today see what it was to say to you then it will come out it sounds hippy but trust me give it a whirl we're going to rush to take pictures hello duck hello duck hello duck hello dragonfly so we've got a duck and a dragonfly oops that is the whole thing so again we were talking about the owl earlier with the wildlife I like this little dragonfly guy coming in here this feels like you've cropped into a much larger picture sorry it feels like you've got there's a big frame and you've chopped a bit out of it which is nothing there's nothing wrong with that obviously your image quality is going to suffer and I feel the reason you've done that is because you've noticed that the dragonfly is near the duck that makes a cool picture and what happens with this is that you you think it's more of an interesting picture than it possibly is because you kind of go that's something oh kind of cool whereas initially you were just photographing this duck and so I've talked about letting the scenes carry and thinking that the scenes should carry the image and stuff like that if you would actually kind of not worried so much about the dragonfly that's coming coming in here which I'm sorry it's not making the image it doesn't approve it enough to warrant cropping it in like this and making the image feel ic which is a technical term for I think I think the extreme cropping that's gone on here you know that it feels like yeah it's the picture that could have been interesting which is I don't think it's a loon I don't know it's a duck I'm going to go with the duck you know well it's not a duck let's say an aquatic bird just non-descriptness I think as a larger piece it might have been better and by larger I mean where the bird in question is smaller in the frame and there's more context around which is quite interesting because the colours on the water and stuff are lovely and stuff like that but there we go yeah so next time does this improve the image enough to warrant what I'm doing here now to this feels interesting I sit on my legs which is why I keep popping up it's the National Bird of Canada I did what is it? C-A-N-A D-A this this kind of looking down on stuff interesting again because these drone shots give a very strong graphic quality to the world that we live in I've always find because it's just a different way of looking at things now with this image especially because it's snowy and so that sort of changes things up already we are going to go to the place of composition and cropping there's lines there's wavy lines down the bottom great that bend with what looks like it could be an amphitheater or a set of steps or something like that I'd like for that not necessarily to be on a kind of third but a little bit higher just a little bit so there's more of a bend more of a curve through and possibly less less land and more water because that water is very green very interesting sort of thing so I guess it's compositional ideas about photography that are so important to play with things sometimes if you see a scene there's potential here is to let it sit with you this is kind of how we're talking about letting things sort of stew with us for a bit and I know with the drone it's kind of slightly different but definitely try it don't be in a rush to in a rush to kind of take the picture too quickly do do do do okay now this is a fairy is this I want to say that this is a place in the lake district or something you get like there's been pictures here before I think it is I think it's somewhere famous you also win a prize everybody tonight have a composition win a prize technically the black and white lovely it's really nice it's moody the length of exposure is really good there's a bit of a mixture here all those kind of technical aspects are really nice and then and I know you can't go on there and start pulling out all those bits of logs sticks and things what have you but I'm sorry they are so detrimental everything else in this picture is lovely and smooth and textured if it needs to be and then you've got all the crap that's been floating on top of the lake for the drain hole that's kind of washed up on the side here it spoils the image I know you're looking for like foreground because you've got these rocks on the foreground which means you have to get all that rubbish in but the drain itself I think you could crop it I'm holding my hand up here you could crop in there with the drain into like a corner it's like a weird crop rather than it being first and foremost like having it in a corner like this first and foremost and misty that guy and then the control tower for the dam it just it just everything you've spent so much time getting so many things right here and I think the foreground is absolutely letting this thing down which is a shame I think it could have been maybe if you want to get together with the guy with the drone I think it's Charles photograph the drone down the plug hole because I'd love to see what's down those things and I can't imagine for a second what would happen if you fell down the drain that would be awful can you imagine anyway it's so many things right and yet so many things so close but I really like a treatment on it it's just a case of thinking about the composition the plug hole can be a foreground can be a foreground don't think that you need to have it as the main subject let me know where it is is it the Lake District yeah you know well there we go it's like but that's the thing if there's something interesting that people can photograph they will do it forever it's like that place the the oh my god the viaduct up near Milkenes all the brick holes so here we go the little sunsets and yeah do you know I like this it's not the world's most amazing photograph it's not I don't think it's going to win any awards I'm sorry to say I don't think it has enough pizzazz to it if you want to call it pizzazz but I do like it I think this idea of the sun setting or coming up you know behind this tree is kind of nice good job on not blowing out the tree trunks too much so there's enough detail in all this kind of thing in there what I kind of would like to see that you've got this it feels primeval almost woods are primeval forests and mountains they are core things that shouldn't change too much and I think this inclusion of this lighter part in that valley which looks like it could be either mining or there's some sort of you know modern thing down there that if it was just taking out a little bit so you change your angle just a little bit just so it's not looking at it too much then you know I think that would improve this image so much I do I do feel also that sunsets and sunrises and things where light is a major player especially in a natural environment rather than like an urban city graphic environment probably feel better in colour but then again you know I don't know what the colour looked like that day but I'd be interested to see if you could look at the colours and colour and get a mood it has a mood right now but see what the colour the mood looks like in colour would be quite fantastic I think Jonathan so you're asking about my current favourite people who are sort of unsub... I think you know and you've said you mentioned you've sort of subtilt to most people that I think the closest to the sort of thing that I certainly talk about I would answer in more depth but after talking about for almost two and a half hours I'm afraid my brain is a little bit sort of focused on these sort of things but I will try and see if there's anyone sort of pop into my head alright so so again you know we were talking earlier it was reflections previously with the girl with the mask and here we've got four people looks like there's a pub I it's interesting little interplay you've got two people who are busy talking to each other and there's a second pint she's on her first and she's saying listen you need to to get on with it or you need to stop drinking so much whatever and you've got then the two guys who are just not really involved with each other they're not really so talking but it's an interesting interplay I don't think like so much of street photography that I tend to find better as a series street photography you can look at things and there can be so many things that are technically not correct about them you know like she's got all those taps above her head and things like that but ultimately street photography is about life and it is about reacting to people going about their everyday lives it's not about contriving to make things look perfect and that's sort of the thing is that other than looking at this image and going well it could have been this or it could have been that or you could have if you change your positions a little bit then all those globes at the top of the image would be equidistant through the centre and yada yada yada but really the framing is central you know so that's a nice at least you pay attention to that and then you're waiting for an image and she's obviously been talking and I think probably been quite animated as some people get when they talk and you waited for her to do something interesting it's a shame that nothing crazy happened on the other table to give a little bit more bit more umph but those are the sort of things you know that's how they come and go again you know I think could as to you for getting the framing of the actual window frames even paying attention to that I think a lot of people wouldn't um you know if you do want to be 100% pedantic I think if you take a step to the left then the lighting globes on the inside would be also equidistant but apart from that I think that's looking looking pretty good okay um yeah I mean obviously we can't change what the people inside are doing so I'm not going to talk about things like the bags and you know that bloke's foot and things they're just they are what they are you know them you know we can't hold them so there we go so a little bit of um bit more again I think obviously this must be a drone you know up in the air there's it's it's nice you know I think that's kind of again I really I hated that people saying those things about my work on other street and I apologize for saying it um but it's one of the things it's it is an interesting photograph um it's not necessarily my cup of tea but it's it's colorful it probably could use big a little bit more punchy just a little bit not over the top but just to give like rather than whacking up the saturation I think it could have done a little bit more sort of vibrance to it so in the old days you know if you'd photograph this on let's say you know some sort of kind of box-down color film and then photograph it on the velvia you know seeing those sort of differences and I think that given what you're looking at with this this big estuary because I don't think it's the sea because there's some stuff in the horizon um you know and that the colors the way that also the clouds are playing on the whole thing is about color and so you really want to make the colors pop you want to make the color the subject of the image um you know that's kind of really what what we're here at the moment it feels just a little bit like it's been through the wash 10 times and that's that's unfortunate it's it really wants something I don't think it necessarily needs things like you know Russell that suggests like a canoe or something like that I think your overall thing just needs it feels a bit washed out a little bit a little bit damp flannel like you've thrown a damp flannel that's the impact that it's getting it's just it's not quite landing um and if you want to be really pedantic you could Photoshop out the um the seagulls down the bottom left corner but yeah I think this one wants it wants to pop it wants that vibrance it wants to come alive with the color you know this this is on the face of it devoid of life but obviously look when you look at this it is teeming with life give it some life man make it make it make it beautiful okay look at this wow so yeah the lighting here is you know we've gone back to things are all about the lighting and and I love what you're doing with this lighted that there's this this thing that runs down it's like a like a like a rib cage of some spine that runs down it and and I'm gonna sound like Mr. Greg or this composition his composition it's always composition um all this stuff on the top left and not doing it for me um it's really it's the thing is here it is right in front of us um and it's right in front and to the bottom right this this hand rails and stuff on the top left I just like why why they're there just take them away right this stuff here this that's where this where this picture it doesn't need anything else it can be as punchy and as contrast is it as it is but your composition is not not working for this you've got so much interesting stuff going on here and yet it's it's not being served up to us on a plate it really you it's it's there it's so close look at it again I'm pleased that you have chosen to use some inky blacks and stuff like that and really but yeah if you're gonna do that then then don't include all this other stuff that even with this bloody ring flat ring light for this thing I can still see them they're poking in here they're being in the way there's too much this part of the image and that same way you know the actual that's that's the image not all the stuff that's off the side there but good job I love the light the light and the way you've handled it is beautiful show me less of the crap that's around it I want to see this again but Toyota okay I'm really all faster impression so you say here we go so this is a similar idea now it's a completely different subject this I'm going to guess this is a torso a nude study but this is the point or there is nothing else here apart from the light and the way that's playing on the figure and that is gorgeous absolutely lovely this is what I meant about being tighter about not showing anything else that's in the image around it that takes away from the thing that we're looking at this this is this is really lovely I don't think that there's anything that I would kind of add to this except because there's always an except isn't there I would possibly like to see it or at least have the option of seeing two because I'm kind of on the fence about one that's maybe like if you understand zone system and I'm going to guess that you're looking at this you do this feels like there's a lot of zone six you know with the car I'd like to see this maybe just like pushing to zone seven just to see maybe not the whole thing but just this what looks like this leg Z or side with V those guys at seven so the highlights are seven and the back one can stay at zone six just to see if it makes it a little bit punchy it might be my screen it might be the file that you've seen yes I'm going to go but it just feels like even though the tones are beautiful that it needs a little bit it needs a little bit of seasoning just to bring it up but that's really nice and I like it and I'm not going to pick it apart because my throat is it's going and there's no need to pick it apart I think that's beautiful and a good example of honing in on a single thing on a photo beautiful yeah alright ok so it says the word the first word that springs to mind with this sorry I shouldn't do that the first word that springs to mind with this which you've got to love is evident sorry yeah it's it's immediately in terms of the processing and the terms of the person and stuff that puts me in mind of evidence into the American West having said that having said that I feel you've missed a trick here I think the pose is wrong for this this gentleman he is certainly full of character I mean he's an outside man he looks like he's about to get skin cancer you know the toning on his skin and everything there is a story here man he knows he has seen stuff he is you know he is to use a fail ability he has drunk wine up the graveyard right but I don't get any of his story from him I don't get I don't get that in great I know this person but I'm not feeling it from his photo I can you know certainly you know I want to see him I want to see his by him I mean his soul I don't want to see his head I don't want to see his beard I want to see this gent I want to see what he has seen and I can't get that when he's looking in profile you know Russell is talking about his eyes he doesn't necessarily need to look at the camera he needs to be more than a profile so a three quarter so what he is doing right now is this he is very much profile but not profile enough that it is an actual profile because there is a little bit of thing coming through but he wants to be all this so he is kind of three quarter on so we can at least get something and he needs to think about that time the cow got stuck down in a canyon and we had to go a bit and he is giving him time to think about or he needs to be into the camera it is those kind of things you know those fields right Russell is asking about the background if he has done the same as Avedon it was simply a sheet that was up on on a on a frame again oh he is a white spy ok great but that is kind of thing you know I want to see his story and we can't get that one in just a profile if he is going to be profile then he needs to be like a full profile but yeah I like it more characters if you have not seen Avedon's American West go and check it out so here we go so this is definitely not a cowboy this is a big nose and a mouth it is a kid looks like probably three something like that little sort of kid you know it is in another life I photographed children a lot they are they are tricks they have their own sort of thing like that I love the engagement on this I love the thing if this is your own child then actually it is not as easy as people think with your own child because they behave with you very differently then if you are if you are kind of for a better word stranger if you are new to them if you are a photographer for them if you have a window of opportunity a bit of leeway that you don't always get with your own children and my own child is case in point he digs around so I like this it is kind of fun I talked earlier about brown eyes this is a good example so in black and white or anything that is more of a moody light this kid's eyes this is the thing the exposure is not quite right just a fraction not a huge amount what I am kind of not seeing with this which I think might be helped by being just a little bit less in your face is some of this kid's personality there is some coming through like that but it feels like what has happened is there is a weird sort of thing the kids go from no personality to lots of personality so this graph is going up to too much and as soon as it goes too much too much being a little bit further away without doing this kind of crazy into the eye into the lens of the wide angle thing when you are further away works a lot better than this this crop feels like it is too close it is just a little bit too it is too much here and I may be speaking from the perspective of somebody who does who used to sell pictures I couldn't sell this this photograph there is no way of selling this it is too in your face to go on the wall it is too large the face is too big so as soon as it becomes a reasonable size to put on the wall even something like a 20 inch that face is too big nobody wants to have this on their wall if this is your own child you may say it is my child you took the photograph and it is your child there are two things going in its favour for you but I feel that this would be better if it was more treated like a very reasonably tight head and shoulders with the similar expression and you can do that a trick that you can use for this age group is asking about their favourite TV character or the movie character and say they live in my lens can you see them that is the little this thing there is a little bit about a still life checking things out and stuff like that I am going to say obviously we all have our own opinions about images and that is perfectly fine I was going to say this is a public space and everybody is free to see what they like and there is always just be mindful of the person on the other side I am not saying that we cannot give criticism there is always positive criticism and there is always just kind of being not necessarily otherwise about people's pictures but yeah anyway moving on we have a still life going on here and interesting now when you look at this I cannot really tell what this is like a piano or a puzzle I am fortunate with this kind of the sharpest things are going to draw our eye they are going to really leap out here and what is going on is at the bottom left there is a key or a flange or something that is really sharp and also because it is highlighted it is a dark thing it is super shiny and it is drawing my eye when you have focused on the third string holder whatever you want to call them and you pan it down and so it is not quite working out so I think you need to just be a little bit more mindful with this also in this regard I know we have talked a bit about contrast this evening these with this contrasty kind of image you have got lots of very bright specular highlights against dark solid black things and they are really competitive they are really drawing their eyes they are really leaping out and going look at me which is kind of not what we want to see so if you want to be really pedantic about this and sorting that kind of thing out and if you are really struggling with them I think and I stand to be corrected but I think you can use like hairspray because it dulls down the surface it makes it less shiny and it helps you deal with all those sort of things so that is always kind of kind of thing so there we go yeah it is like this specular highlight here it is too much against this yeah I think it is just kind of kind of things more window frames and their photographer themselves hello photographer you know the colouring on this is kind of interesting but then again those are sort of things of personal choice I am sort of looking at this and sort of going feel like I feel like you are looking at this and kind of going there is more here that you have got four people all sort of in their own world doing their own thing you know not paying attention to anything if you are in the chat is this Edinburgh I don't know if you are in the chat or something but it looks like I want to say it is Edinburgh it feels like it is Edinburgh anyway it feels like there was an image here that you sort of saw that I don't know if it is necessarily come off it you know we are talking about frames earlier and I feel this one wants to be maybe just a foot wider something a little bit the edging because these two girls on the edge are right on the edge and this very thin frame of the window is around them I think if you came back just a touch and gave them a little bit more space it would draw the eyes wouldn't necessarily and the reason I say that is because if you have chopped them off then they are right on the edge of it and they are sort of out it is not right but if you go a little bit further back and give the outside the window frame more space I think it just gives the image of a breeze and I know there is nothing you can do about it but that car in the reflection I think is absolutely destroying this shot whatever was in this shot that car is that car but it is not your fault because it is not your car there is nothing you can do about it unfortunately the more we look at it the more that we see the car is you know I don't mind necessarily the reflection of the photographer but the car is you know again it sort of comes back to is it worth is this a good enough shot to worth hanging around to try and change and I feel that possibly not in this case I think you got the right ideas and one of these will come off for you but it is not this one do I say so there we go quite a lot I think I do so there we go right here is another drone shot for all you drone haters out there here is another drone shot this is probably my favourite out of the lot this is a little bit more this is a little more playing into the strengths of drone we are making it more graphic we are making breaking down to more abstract things so Charles if this is yours again I think this is the strongest this is the direction I feel that you would like to be going with this this feels so much stronger so much better again tight not the compositions think about the abstract patterns think about how it kind of would work better the house at the top of the image not really add into it this little triangular pattern with the roads and the trees and stuff down the bottom so much better and I think your handling of the image here this sort of colour negative thing is very nice so there we go alright I don't think a polariser is necessarily going to get rid of that car but you never know you never know it's not a chicken it's a rooster hello rooster so we have chickens as well I wonder if somebody put them away tonight it's like quarter to 11 I'm thinking oh a chicken's away lovely colours beautiful colours that rooster is he's roosting he's doing his thing I am a rooster really nice I think the framing on this is great against the red this door awesome really good stuff I wonder if this guy does this all the time because this feels like this wasn't just a snapshot if he does do this all the time get rid of the drinking bowls it's just the dog bowls are not adding to the picture unfortunately but everything else is really nice the colouring is lovely the luminescence on his tail is wonderful feels like you dodged that out a little bit it looks like some halo around his tail if this rooster does do this all the time next time try it with just a little bit of fill and flash just like a smidge I think that would make the colours in his plumage absolutely pop and try and and just goes back around by like half a stop or something and ever so slightly faster shutter speed as well because his wings they're in that kind of weird place where that motion blur is not right but it's not wrong they're in that kind of sort of grey zone but really like it the dog bowls and just a little bit of pop bit grey I think my chicken would like to meet him hands in plumage this one's been a month in the coming I forget who it was I'm terribly sorry interesting buildings coming right back to buildings we've got this amazing looking construction I don't know what it is it feels like it's a train like a station or something you did tell me in the email but I've totally forgotten I'm terribly sorry I mentioned Ezra Starler and Julius Schulman earlier way back in the beginning and this is kind of one of the things when you photograph buildings that were designed well all buildings are designed like fancy buildings designed by architects I think it's important for you to kind of try and feel what the architect was trying to say and not necessarily that you need to understand oh this is the waves crashing on the shore and the freedom of spirit and the other but what are they trying to make the lay person feel in their images what are the shapes why are they making these shapes what are they doing suck all these things up and if I look at this you've done an obvious thing which is look at the entire building photograph the entire building and that's quite natural see that but looking at this I think I could spend a week here and have a different picture all the time there was so much going on with this that I would love to see you go back to spend a day exploring this photograph it from a distance with the long ends compress the things photograph it from a wide angle photograph it from near a far lying on the floor photograph it's got so much potential to offer you and I think if this is close to you are extremely lucky to try to go back see what you can sort of come up with there's a wonderful playground here in regards to this particular image it feels like you've come out you've walked along this plaza you've gone ah this is really kind of cool I'm just going to take a picture of it and the lawn has kind of fall into that trap and it's unfortunately it's one of those themes we have composition cropping also and it's taking pictures of things that you think are interesting enough to be just a picture of themselves without being given all sorts of by giving the consideration that it deserves so there we go see I say that again so there we go there we go and so we've got here a little American flag and stuff like that so this also feels like a stronghold film it's got that kind of grainy organic sort of film which I quite like there's nothing wrong with these things certainly from that I think you know we talk about contrast with these kind of images it works as a great deal or it needs to be worked on a great deal not specifically you know there's nothing wrong with this but we need to pay attention to it and also composition it's definitely always composition tonight this is one of those images that because of the nature of it you've got a recognizable symbol but then everything else is kind of abstract with the exception of the downlighters you want to make more of it you want to make more of these elements within it that flag is such a recognizable symbol that it is going to draw your attention no matter where it is because our eyes are going to see around and immediately go to the first thing and I know what this is and that's that flag irrespective of where you live so it needs to be somewhere dominant and then from then you need to lead the eye around the frame and right now you're not there's the flag there's some interesting stuff and here's some other interesting stuff and I'm not quite sure how to tie them all together what I'm seeing initially is the flag and then if you look at the pillar that this is on you've got these shadows going and then they dip downwards because of the nature coming on there use those to lead the eye through so really what you want to do is flag lead lead lead lead lead lead back to the flag something like that that cycles the eye through the trick to keeping people to watching your is to keep the eye engaged taking it on a journey that goes around and you're not quite doing that here so think about this next time you're confronted think about the object and how you can lead your eye or lead the viewer's eye around the frame this is a similar a similar issue with this is that you have there's not much going on you've got a street scene there's some Christmas lighting but there's not really anything else going on in the picture the exposure is fine and everything is fine but there's nothing there's nothing in this photograph that is drawing my attention there's the street going down but beyond that there isn't really anything you've got some lovely reflections on the cobbles and stuff like that and all these sort of things but it's not there's nothing focused on here and I would like to see you focus on something take a scene like this you're quite like if the scene is what it tracks you then compose it in a way that makes it a little bit more visually interesting so what I mean by that is that you are standing up you're standing with a camera you've got a whole snap I'll take a picture the bollards in the front so if you don't speak English those are the points I get that stop people on the road get down on it think about how you can compose the image and I don't know why I say that for some reason this makes me feel like Eastern Europe not Eastern Europe, but central Europe and I can't quite see the picture Drogo yes, yeah, yeah, okay so, because I'm throwing because this is Guinness and stuff on the left so I'd be just or maybe it's Dublin or something those we want to make the image layered have a bit more visual interest it can be just a picture of a square but make that picture of a square interesting find a bit of foreground find a bit of background lead the eye through the frame like I was saying with the previous one and you can do that by focusing on the thing at the beginning the bollards or something and take it from there oops, there we go so it's funny, we've been talking about colors and black and whites and stuff like that and I've said a lot of the black and white stuff tonight would probably feel better in color and this one I feel better with black and white probably because I think there would be more depth there would be more scope for some dodging and burning on this which would give it that depth which it is lacking at the moment because the light is quite flat on it it's just, yeah, it's not it's not really doing anything too much it needs to be a little bit more it needs to be a little bit more what's the word that I'm working for organic sorry I'm talking for three hours about what colors would do this it needs to have more depth to it it needs to have more kind of intrigue and mystery you've got this wall, why is there a wall in the middle of a wood? what is this? stuff like that and also it would get rid of that blue thing that it keeps drawing my eye, it's on the wall there at what kind of on a, there was down my third which isn't like, but yeah being black and white you can do a bit more dodging and burning and give it more depth to the image, it would lead our eye in, whereas at the moment because of the coloring and everything is quite this sort of bland grays and browns and stuff it doesn't quite have that depth that it really could have with a dodging with a good black and white processing and some dodging and burning and stuff to really sort of give it some depth and I think that would really make this image come alive now we had some keys and things earlier, and I wonder if this is not part of the same sort of sequence very interesting, this young young lady is not bloody young it's an icon you know, so she's there the thing that bothers me most immediately looking at this are the the two red things are really dominating the frame, if you're going to do this sort of thing and I love the way that she is the only thing in focus, the problem is that the nature of her, she's quite delicate and very interesting and those two red things are just, they are completely dominant, especially given that one of them has got some writing on it it's all I see unfortunately, it's such a shame because I like the way that there's a quietness about this this cut her being down his, this tiny thing I wonder if you could revisit something like this and this is kind of a really good example of I think spending a little bit more time just seeing what's around the frame seeing what's distractin