What makes a great picture?

[jwolf6589]

What makes a great picture or a bad picture seem to be entirely subjective. I'd say a bad picture is blurry, out of focus, shows nothing, etc.. A great picture will be colorful, and show lots of detail, but my views are subjective as a hobbyist photographer and far from a pro. In my view my recent frog shot was a great picture, as it was colorful, and showed lots of detail, or as much detail as could be captured considered how far away from the animal I was. Don't you people like frogs 🐸?

So to you what makes a great or a bad picture?

 

[casperes1996]

“Don’t you people like frogs?” - … Have people been rude to you?

Photography is an art form. As with any art there is an inherent level of subjective elements to it. An out of focus and blurry photo can be intentionally taken that way for a special effect.
You also lists “colourful” as being an aspect of a good photo, but by that measure greyscale images cannot be good.

Of course photography is also a craft. Much like playing the guitar, you can be an excellent player but not a writer of music and art, you can still be an excellent photographer as a craftsman rather than an artist, taking photos that are technically good and showing skills with the tools of the trade.
Likewise one can be an excellent artist in mind, thinking up great ideas for photographic expression, but not have the skills to pull it off properly.

A truly great photo carries both technical prowess and artistic intent. It says something, it makes you feel something, it gives you insight into the nature of something you had never otherwise considered.
That’s my take on it at least

 

[jwolf6589]

“Don’t you people like frogs?” - … Have people been rude to you?

Photography is an art form. As with any art there is an inherent level of subjective elements to it. An out of focus and blurry photo can be intentionally taken that way for a special effect.
You also lists “colourful” as being an aspect of a good photo, but by that measure greyscale images cannot be good.

Of course photography is also a craft. Much like playing the guitar, you can be an excellent player but not a writer of music and art, you can still be an excellent photographer as a craftsman rather than an artist, taking photos that are technically good and showing skills with the tools of the trade.
Likewise one can be an excellent artist in mind, thinking up great ideas for photographic expression, but not have the skills to pull it off properly.

A truly great photo carries both technical prowess and artistic intent. It says something, it makes you feel something, it gives you insight into the nature of something you had never otherwise considered.
That’s my take on it at least

You are correct. I misspoke. Greyscale images can also be of high quality.

 

[MacNut]

Composition makes a great photo.

 

[Allyance]

I have 5 Ansel Adams prints from posters and calendars framed (I cheated) and one original 8x10 print on my walls. The only color print is from a dear friend's photo that I used a water color effect to enhance the print. I printed it on a large format HP plotter. All are great photos. My prize photo is also a print that I bought many years ago of a photo by W. Eugene Smith, a world famous photo journalist. It is called "A Walk to Paradise Garden".

Great photos have character as well as technical excellence.

 

[kenoh]

“Don’t you people like frogs?” - … Have people been rude to you?

Photography is an art form. As with any art there is an inherent level of subjective elements to it. An out of focus and blurry photo can be intentionally taken that way for a special effect.
You also lists “colourful” as being an aspect of a good photo, but by that measure greyscale images cannot be good.

Of course photography is also a craft. Much like playing the guitar, you can be an excellent player but not a writer of music and art, you can still be an excellent photographer as a craftsman rather than an artist, taking photos that are technically good and showing skills with the tools of the trade.
Likewise one can be an excellent artist in mind, thinking up great ideas for photographic expression, but not have the skills to pull it off properly.

A truly great photo carries both technical prowess and artistic intent. It says something, it makes you feel something, it gives you insight into the nature of something you had never otherwise considered.
That’s my take on it at least

Nicely put.

 

[bunnspecial]

I think there are two things at play in a "good" photo and good definitions.

First, there are technically good photos. You can evaluate by a couple of criteria, but I'd say in focus, properly exposed, and well lit fall into that category. Color is subjective, and I have situations where I've pulled saturation because it worked for the photo. I've had other situations where I thought upping the saturation added to the photo. For reference, I typically leave my cameras set to "Vivid"(Nikon-other brands call it something different). Since I process from RAW this really doesn't matter a ton, but the initial rendering from Lightroom and a lot of other RAW programs is typically from camera settings.

Focus is another interesting one. Sometimes you want a lot in focus. Sometimes you want just your subject in focus and nothing else(this is enough that iPhones now have a mode that emulates it, although the "real" look comes from using large apertures at relatively close distances/high magnification). Sometimes less than perfect focus is desireable. This is an old trick with portrait photographers. A lot of wedding guys use to smear vaseline on a cheap filter or stretch pantyhose over the lens to give a "soft focus" effect. There are purpose made filters to do that, and there are even lenses that do it. For a more subtle effect, you can also "flip" the negative when printing-normally you print emulsion down, but having it project through the base softens the end result a bit. Now you pop into photoshop, mask the area, and hit Gaussian Blur or do some other technique.

Also, what is "good" lighting? Do I want to show all the details or do I want to intentionally obsure or highlight certain details. I've done a lot of what's called "product" type photography in the past and I'd like to think I'm good at it. It's not going to necessarily win a photo competition, although I've given talks on some of my techniques for small subjects.

All of that is different from the artistic impact, which is composition foremost. An image with technical flaws can still draw you in, while a technically perfect image can still be boring. I'm much less an artist than I am a technical photographer, but I like to study and improve and make images that actually interest the viewer...

 

[Allyance]

Being at the right place at the right time!

 

[mollyc]

• Lighting (including the use of shadows)
• Composition (purposeful cropping, ie, not chopping toes/fingers; use of lines, rule of thirds, purposeful centered comps, etc.)
• Story/moment
• Focus (purposeful defocus can be relevant; did the focus fall on the right part of the frame; what role does a shallow or deep depth of field play in a specific image)
• Color or tonality (are colors in gamut; is there color theory involved; if black and white, then is a full range of tonality included)
• Exposure (are there distracting blown out or clipped areas; if the image is not exposed "properly" is it done for a creative purpose)
• Focal length (ties in to depth of field, changes scope and feel of image)
• Depth of field (creative use of aperture--wide open for a storytelling image with blurred backgrounds vs stopped down for sharpness throughout)

Here is a great guide as to some standards from the industry.

 

[OldMacs4Me]

Not sure where you posted your frog, but I really don't follow any of the dozens miscellaneous threads you have launched, nor do I attach likes to photos anyone posts in them.

If it was in 'Photo of the Day' I am pretty generous with my likes. Skewed horizon lines, masks and blown out highlights are the three things that will usually have me withholding a like. Other than that I am appreciative of everyone who takes a few moments to share an image and am happy to take a few seconds of my own time to say so.

OTOH An image has to really reach out and grab me to get a heart.

 

[r.harris1]

There‘s a lot of great advice here. I would add that for me, the opposite of a “great picture” isn’t a “bad“ one but a banal one. A perfectly focused and exposed image without heart, soul and intent leaves me cold. The internet is awash in them. I would rather have a strong negative reaction to an image than no reaction.

All modern cameras can let a person produce focused, reasonably exposed images. It is being able to use focus and use exposure to create a narrative and some sort of emotional impact that makes a difference. I don’t always accomplish this and I have published rubish and my own share of banality. But I know it and try to improve. That’s the fun of it.

 

[Apple fanboy]

What makes a great picture or a bad picture seem to be entirely subjective. I'd say a bad picture is blurry, out of focus, shows nothing, etc.. A great picture will be colorful, and show lots of detail, but my views are subjective as a hobbyist photographer and far from a pro. In my view my recent frog shot was a great picture, as it was colorful, and showed lots of detail, or as much detail as could be captured considered how far away from the animal I was. Don't you people like frogs 🐸?

So to you what makes a great or a bad picture?

So this is a very subjective question! Molly has given a very good answer.
To answer your question about your frog picture.
(re posted for context)

It’s not a great picture, nor a terrible one. I’ve seen better. I’ve seen worse. One suggestion I’d make is try to frame it so it’s swimming into the frame, rather than dead centre.
This generally makes a better composition. Also the highlights are a little blown. Possibly able to fix in post.

Tried to show the effect of the cropping, and editing, but really needed to be done in camera if you know what I mean.
Hope that helps.

 

[jwolf6589]

So this is a very subjective question! Molly has given a very good answer.
To answer your question about your frog picture.
(re posted for context) View attachment 1822824
It’s not a great picture, nor a terrible one. I’ve seen better. I’ve seen worse. One suggestion I’d make is try to frame it so it’s swimming into the frame, rather than dead centre.
This generally makes a better composition. Also the highlights are a little blown. Possibly able to fix in post. View attachment 1822827
Tried to show the effect of the cropping, and editing, but really needed to be done in camera if you know what I mean.
Hope that helps.

Edit and crop in the camera? Hmm I think that can be done with my Powershot.

 

[Apple fanboy]

Edit and crop in the camera? Hmm I think that can be done with my Powershot.

You misunderstand. I mean in camera shoot a better composition. I tried to do it by cropping your image, but it just ended up being to tight. You just need to frame the subject in the shot to the right swimming into the empty space on the left.
Editing is done on a computer. But I just did the editing on my iPhone. With a RAW image you could achieve better results of course.

 

[kenoh]

Being at the right place at the right time!

"f/8 and be there" - Arthur Fellig

 

[kenoh]

Edit and crop in the camera? Hmm I think that can be done with my Powershot.

When a photographer says "in camera" they mean get it right at the time of taking the image stage rather than later in the editing stage of their workflow.

 

[polyphenol]

A great beholder.

I've come to realise that differences in how we see (in the technical light reception sense), interpret and react to photographs are huge.

I went through a patch of life in which it felt as if chrominance had been turned down a bit. Partner got to the point of B&W vision for a while. And 3D perception fell to about 2.5D. (Among the many wonderful impacts of hypothyroidism. The ones the medics never mention or recognise.)

That experience can have a profound effect on how we think about things like images.

 

[Apple fanboy]

When a photographer says "in camera" they mean get it right at the time of taking the image stage rather than later in the editing stage of their workflow.

Always aim to get it right in camera is how I try to shoot. Cuts down on the editing time.

 

[casperes1996]

Always aim to get it right in camera is how I try to shoot. Cuts down on the editing time.

That's my aspiration too... For me there's typically quite a gap from that aspiration to the reality of what I capture though, haha. Fortunately I can often fix it with a not-very-cut-down editing time, haha. (One time I had the sky so blown out that I legit just removed the whole sky and replaced it entirely with the sky from a separate shot. It wound up looking completely natural, but yeah)

 

[MacNut]

The only reason to crop is when you made a mistake or find something after the fact that you didn't like. The goal is to frame the shot properly when taking the picture.

 

[Apple fanboy]

The only reason to crop is when you made a mistake or find something after the fact that you didn't like. The goal is to frame the shot properly when taking the picture.

Exactly. Why throw away pixels? Cropping is like buying a 4K monitor and running it at 1080p.

 

[mollyc]

Exactly. Why throw away pixels? Cropping is like buying a 4K monitor and running it at 1080p.

because i can't shoot a straight horizon line to save my life.

 

[polyphenol]

The only reason to crop is when you made a mistake or find something after the fact that you didn't like. The goal is to frame the shot properly when taking the picture.

Or to change format?

No matter the care you take in framing, if the image is too high/wide you have the choice of accepting the less than optimum aspect ratio. Or cropping.

Or when you cannot get any closer while retaining good focus?

 

[Apple fanboy]

because i can't shoot a straight horizon line to save my life.

Straightening a horizon isn’t quite the same thing. Plus that’s what the spirit level on your tripod is for!

 

[panjandrum]

I have 5 Ansel Adams prints from posters and calendars framed (I cheated) and one original 8x10 print on my walls. The only color print is from a dear friend's photo that I used a water color effect to enhance the print. I printed it on a large format HP plotter. All are great photos. My prize photo is also a print that I bought many years ago of a photo by W. Eugene Smith, a world famous photo journalist. It is called "A Walk to Paradise Garden". View attachment 1822261
Great photos have character as well as technical excellence.

OMG, that is so, so perfect. First, of course, is the subject matter itself. Beyond that, just look at that lighting and composition. It's stunning! Love the way the primary focus of the composition is just off center, walking out of frame. It's that kind of thing that makes the difference between a great, artistic, photography like this, and just a picture of some kids.