An essay on self critique

As I mentioned in an earlier thread, I have always wanted to be an artist and have struggled for a long time to produce works of at least modest merit. One experience I had relatively young was valuable to me. I have drawn since I was a kid. Over the years I manged to develop some competence at it, particularly in drawing the human form. I always wanted to understand it and only hours and hours of live drawing of models and study of anatomy eventually allowed me to get kind of good at it.

I drew hundreds of drawings in college, however, and thought they were rather good, or at least ok. The funny thing is that years later when I actually got somewhat good at it, I looked back at these drawings and cringed that I had ever let anyone see them. They were really quite awful. But this was a good thing to learn. Most of us don't have particularly good BS detectors, particularly concerning our own work, and good self critique is not something that comes any more naturally than artistic ability, at least not for people who are not prodigies.

In the 90s I wrote hundreds of poems, because I do have a certain ability with language, and fancied I might write some acceptable verse. And maybe I did at that. But I eventually quit and haven't written a poem since. There were a couple of reasons for this. First of all poetry is very easy to do. It is very easy to do badly I mean. And every love-sick teenage boy writes poems they really wish they could excise from the record if they have any sense at all. And yet in the poetry forum there was reams and reams of quite execrable poetry and all of it was defended by the authors and other as valid feeling and not subject to the judgment of merit by others.

I lost interest, because I did not have the respect for the form or the passion to work on the skill enough to develop the instincts to be my own BS detector. As a neophyte our own works are always brilliant, because we haven't the necessary skills to tell why they are not, and their connection to our psyche blinds us.

Unfortunately photography is similar to poetry in that it is very easy to produce SOMETHING. Every person on the planet has the motor skills to push a button, or at lest most do. And I think it is easy to fool ourselves. I have stagnated on 3d art and digital painting at least partly because they are so bloody hard to do, so hard to produce anything at all much less something of merit. But photography, you point and click, and there you are: pure brilliance. This does worry me since I at least instinctively pursue it simply because it is easier to produce works than other things that interest me. That sets off my BS detector.

It takes time to develop the BS filter. I think I am starting to, and it does help to subject your work to the opinions of others who are willing to be honest. That is why a forum like this is invaluable for those who are unwilling to subject themselves to the truly harsh views of an actual training program.

Not to invoke Godwin's law, but I remember that Adolf H. (don't want to risk actually using the last name) was an aspiring watercolor artist until the academic community convinced him that he sucked. I remember seeing one of his water colors once and thinking, "Hey that isn't bad." He is merely a notorious example to underline the point that being good at art is actually hard. The experience rather depressed me. The struggle might be hopeless.

But still, I think my BS filter is improving a bit. Over the past five years or so I think I have managed to produce a few shots that are at least not bad. And I have a long list of things that I know I need to work on. I am lazy about the post processing and too willing to totally ignore things like color accuracy. I am way too willing to tart up a weak shot with special effects and say, "What a good boy am I". I am shockingly uniformed and weak on the fundamentals of photography. The danger becomes when one decides that it doesn't matter, that one is only trying to please one's self. I think that for most people with an artistic bent that is a lie. I absolutely want others to like my work, and that requires at least some level of "doing it right." ...again unless one is a prodigy, which I think I have ample evidence that I am not.

It is way to easy to be too kind to ones own output in the analysis of merit. We are all involved in the struggle, so I am sure everyone knows what I mean.

Anyway, just a few thoughts....

Hey, that was a great read. I think almost all go through these sort of feelings. The first time discovering a new hobby and getting in to it, thinking oh wow, this is easy. Then as time goes by you discover how hard it really is, and as one improves you look back at your older work and think, gosh what was i thinking! haha

The trick is to never quit, at the end of every year, look back and you'll see incremental improvement and if you follow that curve upwards, only the sky is the limit :D

I love looking back at my crappy photos, it shows me that my BS detector is constantly improving. I know how you feel. or atleast i've had and have the same feelings.

Thanks for sharing.

As Liban said, this is a natural progression. A year and a half ago I picked up a camera for the first time in nearly 10 years and thought I could just fall back into it WRONG! In the beginning nobody is as impressed with your shots as you are, later on, nobody is as critical. I look back at some of the shots from just that short time ago and cringe :lol: The one thing I have tried to avoid is falling into the trap of shooting to impress other photographers. When I was younger and played guitar, I used to marvel at guys like Yngwie Malmsteen, not because I enjoyed his music, but because he was so damn fast and technically perfect. He was (is) a guitarists guitar player, and yet doesn't really have any widespread notoriety. I will share my photos with others who have more experience, and listen to what they say, trying to keep it all in mind the next time I pick up the camera. My hope is, in another year or two I won't need to be so proficient with photoshop, as I'll be getting more right in the camera, but only time will tell...

Don't beat yourself up so badly that you stop enjoying the ride, that's what it's really all about :wink5:

I will write some thoughts....though I dont know where or how will they fit in the subject and all are obviously, my personal view...a view of this moment, tomorrow or 10 years later it might change.

Art is a mere way to express what cant be put down in words. I must say that as you guys I have also try poetry, I`m about to take some guitar lessons, and oviously photography....when I analise this I come to the conclusion that all these things that I want to do or experiment with are to express my inner me in some way, is as if I wanted to let some steam out. All artists, well I should not generalize...most artis do what they do to please themselves...if in that road some people like what you do, great if not great also.
No matter what others consider BS, good, bad, average, all that falls in a second plane, what matter is that the person that creates it likes it. When you have deep passion for something you do it no matter what...anything with passion should be entitled for the creator and not for the masses...fulfill the masses expectation is absurd and impossible.
No doubt this sort of forum with open critique, serves to open our inner scope on things.

It's a cycle, the more I learn the more I realise what is still to be learned.
The more I do, the less of my old images I consider "keepers" as my standards increase.

I don't really believe in 'prodigy', people get good from hard work and dedication, from putting huge amounts of time and effort into their work. Nobody has a natural innate talent that makes them immediately good at photography, they can only have developed talents conducive to being a good photographer.

I also find that im usually harsh on my own critique, I find a tiny flaw or imperfection and dwell on it, I usually have to rely on others to find out if the photo is any good. Though I have looked in my archives at some of my 'keepers', shook my head in shame and said 'Why?!', and yet I also find some in the trash can that I retrieve and say 'wait a minute.' Sometimes if I spend too much time examining a single series of shots, I sort of lose objectivity and become excessively critical, and I need to wait some time to look at them again to examine them with a more fresh mind.

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This does worry me since I at least instinctively pursue it simply because it is easier to produce works than other things that interest me.

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I heard a saying that I think applies well to photography, 'If its not hard, its because you aren't trying hard enough'. Pressing the shutter release is only a tiny fraction of the effort required for photography. There are plenty of complexities that all must be mentally calculated with each exposure. Calling photography 'easy' is inaccurate, I would say. Im sure neither I or anyone else will ever stop learning the craft, it is something that can constantly develop and progress over a lifetime.

*edit -

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It is way to easy to be too kind to ones own output in the analysis of merit.

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Fortunately for many professionals, people aren't always interested in a brilliant artistic shot. They want a decent picture of their family members with good expressions. The pictures may mean diddly squat to others, and have no "artistic merit", but it means something to the family members and loved ones.

I didn't say photography was easy to do well. I said it is easy to do badly. Either way it is way easier to make a bad photograph than it is to make a bad 3d rendering with your own content. Either is difficult to do well.

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Nobody has a natural innate talent that makes them immediately good at photography, they can only have developed talents conducive to being a good photographer.

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My feeling has always been that, point blank, some people have more innate potential and facility than others in any given discipline. I've seen too much supporting evidence of this in photography, in music, and elsewhere.

That said, I do think what separates bona fide genius-brand work for non-genius-brand work is the content. Anyone can become a technical ace, but not everyone has the same grade of muse whispering in his or her ear...

Ah that is a very good point daq.

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My feeling has always been that, point blank, some people have more innate potential and facility than others in any given discipline. I've seen too much supporting evidence of this in photography, in music, and elsewhere.

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I think if you scour the world, you wont find anybody who floated effortlessly to being masterful. Nor do I think you can find people who put in heaps of time and effort into something and still 'suck'.

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Originally Posted by Anbesol

Ah that is a very good point daq.


I think if you scour the world, you wont find anybody who floated effortlessly to being masterful. Nor do I think you can find people who put in heaps of time and effort into something and still 'suck'.

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Seen examples of both...

Have to agree with Dray, also seen many examples of both - several in my own family.

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Originally Posted by draymorton

Seen examples of both...

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I've certainly seen the later, but I don't think anyone becomes 'world class' anything without huge sacrifices AND innate talent. - TF

Hmm... Let me put it this way. If there was such a thing as pure innate talent, why don't we have 5 year olds, infants, and toddlers directing a symphony? Seems an obvious answer right, at that age they haven't yet had the time to develop the proper faculties to do such. And thats exactly my point, in the broad scope of things. Of course being heavier, taller and stronger helps when it comes to playing football, and of course having a mathematical aptitude will help someone write computer programs. But - people don't dedicate themselves to something they have no aptitude for. And I seem to think that effort and intelligence are both codependent.

I'm not saying its a rock hard equation either, theres complexities and dynamics that are immeasurable, I mean this all in a practical sense. And every kid I've seen who could be ever labeled as "prodigy", it is never something that just fell onto their laps - they are always in my experience obsessively excessive in practice and study.

All I can say is that in grade school I could solve logic problems that my dad could not. Even after all of that I am a fourth tier engineer of that. Nature and nurture both matter. I learned to draw and I have no innate talent, but I have seen the work of people who spent lots of time on it and still cannot draw. There is some element of wiring that makes it easier for some than others. But I do think that all people who excel work at it.

Political figures excluded of course.

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Originally Posted by Anbesol

Hmm... Let me put it this way. If there was such a thing as pure innate talent, why don't we have 5 year olds, infants, and toddlers directing a symphony?

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Mozart composed his first sonata at four and wrote his first opera at 12. Granted, that was a long time ago.

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Originally Posted by jetrim

When I was younger and played guitar, I used to marvel at guys like Yngwie Malmsteen, not because I enjoyed his music, but because he was so damn fast and technically perfect.

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Wow. Beyond strange that you mentioned him, as he was one of the first guys who popped into my head as an example of inexplicable skill. He definitely practiced a lot, but he also had a gift. I have a demo he recorded after having played for a mere six months and it is just ridiculous. He sounded pretty much the same then as he did in later years.

Shawn Lane was another one. Bona fide freak of nature who was able to do things he should not have been able to do as a guitar player or composer at such an early age. Something was up with these guys that was beyond dedication. Buddy Rich was another one - seemingly destined to be better than everyone else from the very start. There are just so many examples of this kind of thing.

Practice is, of course, necessary for one to become world class, but in the case of the true greats, you'll find that the latent superability was often there in the first place...

Yeah Dray, I think that what is callously and inelligantly referred to as idiot savant syndrome proves beyond reasonable doubt that some aspects of at least creative execution are clearly wired somehow. Don't know that there are any idiot savant masterpieces, so the creative element is probably somehow more nurtured. But I am telling you I would happily trade my meager ability for creativity for a big bucket of technical skill.

Wow, great wintertime discussion. I could easily spend the next 3 hours commenting on this. I also spent a great part of my childhood drawing.

I think when it comes to becoming good at something that it really helps to like it. That way when you spend a million billion hours practicing - which art normally requires - you don't mind. Do you think Bill Gates would be as successful as he is with computers if he didn't like picking up geeky computer books and reading them just for fun? Unlikely. Sure gave him an edge over people who wouldn't.

I've found that artists almost always have a high degree of self-criticism. By artists I don't just mean drawers or painters, but writers, dancers, quilters ....... and yes photographers. I think this may increase as one gets older, perhaps for the simple reason that we've done so much work at that point, that we know what we're capable of.

As stated, I wasn't always like that as a kid - I heard nothing but praise on how great an artist I was. I sure didn't mind it, but it really didn't matter that much .. I drew because I liked to draw, not for accolades. I think I do photography now for the same reason.

But the fact was, I really wasn't as good as people were saying or, for that matter, what I thought. I was always the best or close to best in my classes through 12th grade, but once you get to college you're now surrounded by all the hot-shots, and suddenly you aren't impressing people as easily as you did. I think this is true for any specialty field - math, languages, art.......... It's easy to impress laymen: impressing experts or at least your peers is a completely different matter.

Back to self-criticality; I have a photographer friend who is quite a good photographer, at least technically. We show each other our work on occasion though he's not so interested in landscapes or such, being 95% a people photographer. Since I'm branching into modeling photography now we have something in common. The problem is, I find him quite stagnant on the creative side and also very sensitive to criticism in most any form. He says he wants feedback, but resents what he hears from me. I try to remember something I learned awhile ago - that some folks have a problem giving criticism in a positive way.

But what shocks me on occasion is how non self-critical he is with his work. I don't think you can ever grow if you're not, esp if you also don't care for others' opinions (unless they're good). I'm also a little disappointed that he tends to tunnel vision on one aspect, say the clothes, and complete forget or blow off other areas such as composition. It's actually gotten to the point where I've decided not to say anything at all.

As for Adolf Hitler, that is funny because I mentioned the same thing to someone just recently. I saw a painting of a house by him and liked it. I don't know what the criteria was for acceptance into that Viennese art school, but often drawing inanimate objects like houses is cake compared to figures and portraits. Or perhaps they were looking for more creative work at that school. vs. representational.

Even if you are self critical, and have a certain amount of skill and/or talent, a reality check by your peers is just so important. I can't count the number of times I thought I had a strong shot but had a slightly unsure feeling on it. Posting it here was great because others point out things I miss or just can't articulate. The reverse was true a few times too - a shot I didn't much care for everyone loved, which really threw me for a spin.

Anyway, that's my wintertime dissertation (Part 1)

Concerning the Dray vs Anbesol debate,

Everything else being equal, there's no question in my mind that people are not born with the same abilities. We're all different, whether in personality, physical ability, or specific talents. Yes, someone can work their tale off and achieve most anything, but they haven't yet been able to teach creativity, to learn perfect pitch, or what not.

At the same time, there's many examples of folks with barrels of talent throwing it all away via lack of work ethic. What do the coaches say about what it takes to be a great athlete - a little bit of talent, and a lot of hard work?

Yeah GB1, I think that work and motivation can make genius. There is little question of it. But there is little doubt at all that it comes easier for some than others. I have watched people who put in as much time as I do draw far worse, and I cringe in awe at the works I could not do if I slaved at them until I collapsed into a pile of dust.

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Originally Posted by draymorton

Mozart composed his first sonata at four and wrote his first opera at 12. Granted, that was a long time ago.

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You completely skimmed over my point and seem to argue just for the sake of arguing. Let me ask you this then - did Mozart become a good musician in spite of his conditioning, or because of them? Do you think he learned what he learned because everybody around him was musically brain-dead? Do you think nobody around him cared about music? Do you think that sonata he wrote came solely from the mind of mozart, as if it fell into his lap by virtue only of his biology and regardless of the people and habitat surrounding him? Of course not, his surroundings, his environment, and the way he grew up was conducive towards him becoming a good musician. His talent didn't fall on his lap, he had to *develop* it.

It seems everybody wants to raise the individual to the highest echelon while completely forgetting the fact that the individual isn't locked up isolated in a dark room their whole life, their creative talent doesn't fall to them from the sky by virtue of their biology. The individual still has people and community, parents, family, friends, a social environment that shapes who they become. Imagine that you were the only person who has ever done photography, how good do you think you would be, in contrast to how good you are right now?

I'm not saying that people don't have talents that are helped by their biology and individual merit, but my point is that the meaning of 'prodigy' as someone who magically gained talent and skill out of nowhere is simply not true. Reiterating the fact that any 'prodigy' you find will have got to where they are largely through social conditions, environment, and obsessive practice and study.

GB1 - yeah! Remember Einsteins saying, something like 'intelligence is 10% inspiration, 90% perspiration'.

There is a book out there that covers this exact debate: called 'outliers', a very good read. It talks about the individual and community, and has compelling arguments that demonstrate that the individual is more connected with the community then we usually give credit for.

Anbesol. I don't disagree with you violently, but I do still wonder what causes idiot savant syndrome. That seems to indicate for me that at least in music, there is something innately biological about vast skill in at least its technical aspects.

I draw somewhat competently but really had to struggle to get there. And I have watched people work quite hard and never really quite get it.

I do think that it is VASTLY easier for some than others. I also believe that almost anybody can learn to be creative. It is a gray area.

As I believe Freud said, nature is polymorphously perverse. Hey, another good company name.

Hey GB, I missed your longer post earlier. Well written. Yeah, I drew when I did, because there is almost a narcotic sensation of high when you really get the ability to draw the human form live. It is very cool.

But with me, lurking in the background, there was some form of the thought train, "maybe I can get chicks if I get good at this." Eventually of course you realize that is rather absurd, but then the thought has mutated into something even more subversive.

Anyway. I get real down about creative output no doubt about it.

But I just got two new speedlites and a manfroto tripod, so I can go do all kinds of new crap.

Yeah, I know, you can all hardly wait....

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Originally Posted by Anbesol

You completely skimmed over my point and seem to argue just for the sake of arguing.

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Not to fuel the fire, but I'm wondering if you're arguing just to argue...

The term "prodigy" was mentioned exactly 1 time before your second post - it was in your first post. Everyone else has been talking about innate ability, not super-stardom.

My dad decided he'd like to learn a musical instrument in his mid 40s. He went out a bought a guitar and was able to play along with the music on TV commercials within 4 or 5 months. Seemed too easy so he traded it in on a banjo, learned that in similar time, then on to a 5 string banjo, dulcimer, 12 string guitar, and eventually a few years later, the chromatic harmonica (split scale w/ the button). He became proficient with 7 instruments in just over 5 years, not bad for a computer geek with no mechanical ability. He is NOT a prodigy, but it's pretty hard to argue that he didn't have any more innate ability than all the other computer geeks out there.

Jet - yeah, I am dragging this argument out longer than need be. I simply have a lot of passion on the subject, because I think that far too often people give way too much credit to the individual and too easily forget that the individual is also a product of culture, time, occurances, and a huge number of things that all play into success and talent.

I keep mentioning prodigy because it was the reason I first responded, and a good reference for drawing the points I am at least trying to make.

Well anyway this argument has a lot of gray area so I'll just stop, hard to argue about so many shades of gray.

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He is NOT a prodigy, but it's pretty hard to argue that he didn't have any more innate ability than all the other computer geeks out there.

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This is not what I'm arguing, but reading over my posts I don't think I've made it very clear.