Disappointed and confused-How to get feedback and opinions ?

[rglenn6245]

I am in my mid 40's, and have never been able to draw a straight line with a ruler, let alone be creative in anything other than work.
With that in mind, I picked up a Canon digital rebel eos in early last year. Long story short, I love being behind my camera, and have worked on my own to understand lighting and composition by shooting and reading.
On a suggestion, I signed up with Pbase in October in an effort to display some of what I thought were decent at least. I have had a lot of fun shooting nature, sports at whatever else that is around me.
The reason for disappointed is I have had NO FEEDBACK from anyone, such as nice try, looks good but..., it sucks or "sell your camera".
My understanding of PBase was to post pics for others to see, enjoy and critique. It seems that in 5 months, no suggestions or quality comments have been made - Which leads me to the assumption that I really suck at this, and should contain my pics to birthdays and other family shots.

[jypsee]

if you comment on other galleries/photos it generally leads to reciprocity....

[2000hoo]

As jypsee mentioned, probably the best way to get some quality feedback is to leave some yourself. There is a thread on this board specifically about recipricol feedback. I was shocked at how many comments I received in just a couple of days time. You might try it yourself.

http://forum.pbase.com/viewtopic.php?t=9328

Ryan
http://www.pbase.com/2000hoo/

[scatts]

Hi Robert,

I'm similar age and situation as yourself. My reason for setting up here was not primarily for feedback but it's always welcome of course. I'll follow the advice of those who obviously know thier way around and see if that works.

I scanned your galleries and will go back for a better look when I have more time. My initial feedback would be that you should certainly not hang up your camera but keep going. You have some good shots in the bunch, they all have something to say but, as with mine and everyone elses, there are some better than others. I find it difficult giving feedback because I'm not at all qualified to do so except in that I also take photographs and I know what I like and what I think could be improved / I would have done (tried to do) differently.

Good luck,
Ian

http://www.pbase.com/scatts

[darter02]

Not to say anything negative about this site or anything, I love Pbase... but a better site to use if it's pure critical comments you want is http://www.photosig.com/go/main.

[thejaybird]

PBase is not the best site for comment & critique. I consider it more for sharing with friends and family. Consider Photosig (for more serious critiques), or one of the well-known photography forums (dpreview.com, fredmiranda.com, etc).

[gillettecraig]

This isn't a real critique oriented board, but you can leave a note in this forum and that might attract some comments. Otherwise, the number of gallery updates that occur will push changes down of the "current" pge or so pretty quickly.

[markcas]

rglenn,
Begging for comments sort of defeats the purpose of this site don't you think?

If you get comments don't you want it to be because people to see your picture and have it speak to them so that they are compelled to make comments? If you ask for it, it cheapens it.

As for reciprical comments, I wish people wouldn't do that to me. If I a make a comment it is becaues I really think a photo is unique, or at least is speaks to me, a thank you is plenty. I don't want someone feeling compelled to say "Your photos are good to" If they don't like them, or don't think they are anything special, I would rather they not comment on them.

I am sure I am even more of a noob than you are. Your equipment is certainly thought of as much better than mine, so all of the above is just my oppinion, so feel free to take it all with a grain of salt!

Not trying to offend, just putting in my two cents!

[ccraft]

I started posting a collection of my work in August and didn't get any comments. I was primarily just trying to be found on search engines and wasn't too worried about it at the time.

In January, I started posting a picture of teh day gallery. I began looking at other people's work and leaving comments adn others would leave comments about mine. I now have met "virtually" lots of other photographers on PBASE. I've gotten to know their styles, interests, etc. and they've gotten to know mine - I also sometimes get helpful advice from them. It's great!

Here's what I suggest: Maybe take one of your galleries (even if it's not a picture a day), open the gallery to the "edit gallery" page. There is a blue highlighted link at the very bottom of each gallery that says "make this my picture a day gallery." Any time you post anything new to this gallery, the image will appear in the following place:

http://www.pbase.com/pad/

People on PBase pay a lot of attention to this and I guarantee you'll start to get random comments on your images. The gallery will only show one of your uploaded pictures a day - adn it will show up on the "PAD" gallery page about 10 minutes after you put it in your gallery.

Best of luck!!

[ddolga]

It looks like you are getting a lot of positive comments now. So see, you really are a great photographer.