TPE Friday Feedback

 I've been spending a lot of time at The Photographic Eye website.  Lots of good stuff.  On eof the things they host does is a weekly feedback video.  So here's one of my photos which was selected for comment:

The comment was: 

I love the little angular table stuff for the diner. This again is like up my street. Super, but this is the thought process that goes through my head with this… OK, dig the chairs, the sort of wonky, half-cut table.  The bankette things are really cool.  What I’m not digging in the background is the service station, or whatever it is there.  It doesn’t contribute to the image.  So maybe I would kind of either drop the horizon down a little bit…  or if I wanted to keep this background thing is kind of move around a little bit.  Just something to say “what’s in the image, what works, really?”. Which is 99% of this.  It’s just that stuff at the back.  It’s not like it ruins the picture, but I think it detracts again from what you’re focusing on, which is the shape and the color and the textures and that kind of stuff. And just elbows its way in.  It's about as welcome as a pork chop to a bar mitzvah.

He's not wrong.  And I struggled at the time to minimize the impact of the drink station.  Next time, I'll try a couple of variations.

Another ChatGPT Experiment

 I can't decide if AI is an evil treat to mankind, a useful tool, or just a silly toy.  I suspect it is a bit of all 3, though it seems to be advancing at a frightening pace.

Anyway, for a giggle (and based on some recent discussions in a photo group) I decided to ask ChatGPT to analyse one of my photos.  My actual prompt was "Is this photo any good?"

And the ChatGPT response, do you agree/disagree?

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This photo is quite compelling — especially from an artistic and documentary perspective. Here’s a breakdown of its strengths and suggestions for improvement depending on your goal:

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✅ What's Working:

1. Strong Concept / Storytelling:

• The contrast between the natural cornfield in the foreground and the rising suburban development behind it is visually and thematically powerful.

• It evokes commentary on land use, urban sprawl, or the changing American landscape — almost like a modern-day "manifest destiny" in reverse.

2. Black & White Choice:

• Stripping color out enhances the contrast and texture, and pushes the viewer to focus on form, light, and subject.

• It also gives the image a timeless or slightly documentary feel, reminiscent of photojournalism.

3. Composition:

• Nice horizontal balance — the horizon line and cloud-filled sky provide depth, while the rows of corn act as a textured lead-in to the homes.

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🔧 Suggestions for Improvement (Optional):

1. Stronger Subject Isolation or Focus:

• You might consider experimenting with deeper contrast or selective sharpening to emphasize the tension between nature and construction more clearly.

• A version with selective color (e.g., green field + B&W homes) could also be striking if done tastefully.

2. Crop or Alignment:

• If you're aiming for symmetry or impact, a slight crop to center the most unfinished or prominent house might tighten the composition.

3. Contextual Caption:

• This photo begs for a caption or title — it could turn it from a simple landscape into a narrative image. Something like:

  "Where the cornfield ends."
  or
  "Growth or erasure?"

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📷 Is It “Good”?

If your aim is fine art, social commentary, or environmental storytelling — this is absolutely a strong photo.
If you're aiming for traditional landscape beauty, it may come across as too stark — but that's a matter of taste, not quality.

Fake News #45857

When I open my Edge browser, it starts with an msn "news" page (that's a story for another day), with aggregated stores from various sources.  I've noticed lately that every day it seems to be highlighting negative economic news.  Usually company closures, layoffs and the sort.  Occasionally I bite on the clickbait, and find it's either overstated, or downright lying. Today, for instance:

Yikes, sound ominous, huh.  Popular store "closing all locations"!  So I bit, to see who, and why.  The answer:  The "popular" convenience store is "Kum and Go".  They are being rebranded as Maverik after being bought in August 2023. The actual linked article makes no mention of any location closing.  So 2 years ago, one C-Store company bought out another, and they are now rebranding those stores to the new corporate image.  

The question is: why do "news" outlets outright lie in their headlines?  I understand click-bait, and wanting to draw eyes.  But there's a big difference between hyperbole and outright lying.  I guess they won, they got me to click through.  But it really ticks me off.

Album Cover Challenge #160

 Wow, it's been a while since I posted one of these; the last I see is ACC-124, which dates from 3/2021, but was just posted here a couple of months ago. .  I'm going to have to look back and see how many I missed.  I did quit entering for a while, so maybe not many.  Anyway, the game is to take a semi-randomly selected album name and band name, and come up with a hypothetical album cover.

Here's my entry to Album Cover Challenge #160, way back in mid March 2021:

Check the TAG for all related blog posts.

An Experiment in ChatGPT

I was in a zoom meeting yesterday for one of my photo sites, and the moderator mentioned he had earlier been using chatGPT to come up with hashtags for an instagram post.  So I figured I'd give it a try.  Because I hate coming up with hashtags and keywords and such.

Here's the photo, just something from a few days ago I hadn't posted to IG:

 IG cropped it square, which is a lot better (there's a lesson here):

So, from the prompt "what are best hashtags for instagram for this photo?"   I received a list of 24 hashtags, in 5 categories.  I decided to pick one from each group and give them a try.  I highlighted the ones used:

• General Photography:  #UrbanPhotography #StreetPhotography #ReflectionPhotography #WindowReflections #ArchitectureLovers
• Urban & City Vibes:  #CityVibes #PatioViews #UrbanJungle #CityDetails #EverydayUrban
• Aesthetic & Color:  #ColorPop #RedUmbrella #VibrantColors #AestheticCapture #VisualMood
• Dining & Lifestyle:  #PatioSeason #OutdoorDining #CafeVibes #CoffeeAndViews #AlFrescoDining
• Location-Based (customize if you want to target local viewers): #YourCityName (e.g., #DallasEats, #AustinVibes) #TexasFoodie (if you're in Texas) #LocalEats #SupportLocal

I ended up with #PatioVibes, I guess IG autocorrected #PatioViews, or I just mistyped.  I did NOT use any other hashtags, except my #lsquaredimaging, which is sort of pointless.

After, ChatGPT asked "Would you like a caption idea too?"...  Hey, why not?  It gave me 2 choices, and I selected one:  Red umbrellas, warm reflections, and patio season in full swing. Sometimes the best view is right in the glass. ☀️🍷.

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So now to see if I get any more engagement.  It's not like I get a lot of traffic anyway, the average views of my past 10 posts is 2.8, with a whopping 276 followers.  It's not like I'm an influencer or anything.

Some People Walk In The Rain, Others Just Get Wet

 We had a pretty solid, soaking rain the other day, and I noticed this Red Shouldered Hawk, hanging out on the back fence.  I managed several photos, and hit paydirt when it turned its head with a water drop at the end of its beak.  I'm quite pleased with how this turned out:

Meanwhile, one of my photo sites does a challenge that involves putting a quote with a photo, and this fit the bill.  So here's the version with quote:  "Some People Walk In The Rain, Others Just Get Wet_ - Roger Miller

My Favorite Youtube Music Videos (Pt 1)

I decided that I should make a list of YouTube music videos that I especially like, that I come back to again and again.  So here ya go, I'll probably add to this all along:

• Peter Gabriel - In Your Eyes (Secret World Live)  just a wonderful version of a wonderful song
• And for pure fun it's hard to beat Get Offa My Car - The Flashcats.  A local Pittsburgh band from "the day".  I just love this one.  Aside:  I bought my favorite bass guitar from the drummer.....  in 1979.
• Wet Willie That's All Right 09/10/1973 - yeah, I saw these guys once in the late 70's, this captures the energy of that show.
• The Charlie Daniels Band - Birmingham Blues - another video that takes me back to my high school days, I saw these guys several times.
• The Who, Michael Lindsay-Hogg - A Quick One (While He's Away) - I remember seeing this in The Who's movie (The Kids Are Alright), and being blown away.  Decades later, I'm still blown away.

There's a quick 5, hope you enjoy.  Maybe I'll add a video or two all along.

ChatGPT - Watercolor

 So, recently I posted a photo I had taken for my photo cohort, a photo of a hot, hazy day at Watershed. Last week during a discussion at the photo site, we talked a lot about ChatGPT, and what it could do.  I got the idea to see if it could make a decent watercolor of the photo.  As a reminder, here's the photo:

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I uploaded it, and entered "Turn this into a watercolor painting".  And here's what it came up with:

It did surprisingly well, though I don't really like the re-crop, maybe I should've started with a 4x6 ratio photo.  And it turned the bird's head.  And the overall size is smaller.  Then I asked (told):  Make the bird more detailed", and here's the 2nd version"

It is interesting that the filter pulled more detail out of the 1st version, except for the bird.  And that the bird gests bigger in each version.  But the results are pretty cool.  I may have to keep playing with this, wee what I can come up with.  I still prefer the "real" photo.

It is almost scary though.

Just a little slice-of-life from a recent fast-food breakfast with the grandkids.  I guess you would call it documentary photography?

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Cohort - Assignment 2

* In educational settings, a cohort can describe a group of students working through the same academic curriculum

I recently completed a cohort at one of my photo sites, 12 photographers, 8 sessions over 10 weeks.  It was a valuable experience, as much for seeing/discussing the other students' work, as for listening to the instructor.  

We had 2 assignments through the class, the last one was:

• Shoot a 3–5 image series
• Choose a single emotion to convey
• Apply at least one technique from sessions
• Present images + brief reflection at the last session

This turned out to be a very hard assignment for me.  To start, it was hazy, hot, humid during the assignment, and my photo-mojo was pretty much burned out.  Finally, I decided to lean into it and try to document the hot, still, maybe oppressive summer.  Here's the photos I came up with, tweaked after comments in the class.  Taken over 2 visits to Watershed Nature Center, the heat index was 100+ but bays.

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Overall, the set is just ok....  I think I was trying to hard.

That said, I very much like the first photo, and I posted it previously.   It is subtle, but speaks to me in ways I can't quite explain.  It makes me think of the Sam Abell quote:  “When I look at my work, I see myself” 

Throwback Thursday - Heritage Trail

Throwback Thursday - July 2004. 21 years ago! Back in the early days digital, my pretty basic Kodak LS-443 compact digital.  That was a pretty decent camera from an early compact digital.  A whopping 4MP. By contrast, my current phone has 48MP, and the camera is just an extra function!.

Photo is along the Ron Foster Heritage Trail.  The trail still exists, the spot isn't a lot different.  It's blacktop now, though.

Cohort - Assignment 1

 * In educational settings, a cohort can describe a group of students working through the same academic curriculum

I recently completed a cohort at one of my photo sites, 12 photographers, 8 sessions over 10 weeks.  It was a valuable experience, as much for seeing/discussing the other students' work, as for listening to the instructor.  

We had 2 assignments through the class, the first one was:

• Photograph what you didn't notice before
• Submit 5 images. With each one, include:
•  Where you were
•  Why you usually wouldn’t have noticed this
•  How it felt to stop and really see it

This was an interesting assignment, and I was pretty pleased with my photos.  Here's my 5:

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The phone photo actually got used is some other discussions in the TPE group, so that was cool.  I especially like the 1st three.  Anyway, it was a valuable session, I'll plan to do another sometime.

Bummer....

 I saw this State Troop pull this woman over, I believe she must've been speeding.  Not gonna guess/judge, but I'm sure it's not how she wanted to spend her morning...

Throwback Thursday - Re-Tired

13 years ago this week, I was driving across the southwest US, helping one of my daughters relocate to Flagstaff, Arizona. This is from a quick stop in Continental Divide, New Mexico. I re-processed this from the original file yesterday...

Looking at Google Maps, they have a more recent photo...  the building is there (a little worse for wear and tear).  But the tire is gone.  ;-(

Spotify Wins - Pure Prairie League

I made a post recently about my frustration over them not having one J.J. Cale album.  Shockingly, they haven't rectified that failure.   Anyway, listing to some tunes today, I pulled up Pure Prairie Leage and lo-and-behold, they now have PPL's debut album, which they didn't have the last time I looked.  Bravo!

PPL's first album didn't make much splash, didn't chart at all upon it's release in March of 1972.  Seven Months later (and with new plays on bass, drums and steel guitar) they were back with Bustin' Out, which made #34 on the album charts, and gave us the song Amie which is a classic rock staple.

I didn't discover PPL until '75 or so, when Amie was re-released as a single.  Checking my vinyl of their debut album, it is a re-release from 1975, I presume as a result of the song Amie.  Anyway, I really like the debut album and the band in general. The entire first side is stellar, with Tears, Take It Before You Go, You're Between Me and Woman.  I always liked PPL, but they never really had a consistent line-up, which (I think) hurt their ability to generate any sort of inertia.  They had 14 different members over 7 albums in the '70s, and nobody played on all of them.  But I own 4 of those 7, and like them all.  And have seen them 3 or 4 times through the years.

Anyway, THANKS Spotify for having this one!