NishieGirl - Jonsey Cat

[NishieGirl]

Hello!

I'm new to these forums and a bit new to this site. I'm so intimidated! All of you are amazing, but I'll make an effort!

This is my cat, Jonsey. He has various nicknames like Bitten, and Bit Bit.

[T.Luu]

Nice to meet you Jonsey!

Oh, and you too NishieGirl :P Welcome to our humble forum.

What comes for the photos... they're average. I like the sepia tone on the first but that's it. The second doesn't do even that.
You'll need to capture the essence of the cat, catch him when he's on his cutest, capture the rascal nature of the cat, publish a collage of the cat's awesome skulking powers etc etc. There needs to be more than the cat in the photo.

Hope to see more from you.

Cheers!

[Le Gab]

Ohhh, look it'a a ... cat.

[later edit]: And it's got copyright marks on it.

[samsite999]

ok going to jump in here, im sam, and occasinaly im a little harsh on people, sorry, i have millions of photos of cats as well (no realy, emm my partner has 2 of the little gits) any how, non of you have ever sceen them on here, well apart from 2.

Point is there personal to you, if that makes sence, wile the composure on the second one is ok, and you have made a attempt at a sepia effenct on the last one the only person these photos mean anything to is you. They say nothing to me and dont make me feel or think anytyhing apart from perhaps thats a nice cat.

Every one got to start someware, i understand that and i realy want to see some more of your stuff, but perhaps on a wider subject that isnt so persnal to you?

and before any one shoots me down I know all photos taken are personal to you but they can also mean somthing else to some one else wile still remaing personal to you....

Sam

[alucard]

oh not another : ''here look at my cute pet''

if you have enything else to share please do, but you beter not make a series of that cat.
if you don't know what to shoot, i have a idea ...try to take a photograph, or more, of the street you live on,or the suronding area, in the most artistic sence that can be done (and i don't whana hear that you don't have you'r dream camera)...and don't post here the first pic you got ...
oh, and a tip : ...try take that pic in the morning when the sun is not at the highest point....or even when it's seting down ...

if whant to you'r photography skills to another level, you must pay atention to the guys that know what they are talking about... and not be ofendet ... cuz if you will grow ...you will grow by accepting they'r comments, and learnig from you'r mistakes.
and when the time will come they will look at you'r photo's and have nothing to comment about it, and they will say : ''oh that's a great photo, realy nice'', and that it will mean that you, and the others beginers, tooked a PHOTOGRAPH.

this must be my longest commment here oc CA ... hope i did not wasted my time...and all those ho just started will take a good thinking about what i just said.

all the best.
cheers.

[Le Gab]

yeah, Sam, it's all your fault. You took so many photos of cats that now ppl cant get their own. :P

Shame on you Sam, tsk, tsk, tsk. Shame on you for taking all the cat photos :P

[Mhouse]

Alright, heres what I'm going to do......

Guys, that is so harsh to blast her! She only has three posts.

Don't worry, I got blasted for making a joke of opinions are like assholes so please don't feel bad. You posted cat photos.......and cat photos suck, but I'm going to look past that and tell you what I think of your composition and technical ability.


First off, when I do a sepia photo, I like to darken the edges a bit. In my opinion sepia is used to create the illusion of age on a photo. If its not then whats the point....its ugly. So darken your edges a bit and see what that does.
I would have positioned myself in front of the cat so that the window made up the background instead of the chair. I also would have blurred it alittle so that you know its a window but your eyes draw to the cat.

Third, don't put copyright info on any of your photos, place it on the back or on the border.

The exposure on the second is spot on and the cat is in focus, good job. It looks like you used the flash on your camera. Next time shut it off and light the cat.....oooops.....(don't shoot the cat again) the subject from one side and get some soft shadows in there, not to dark though just light soft shadows. It makes photo more interesting.

For what its worth, I call the shots you have up their pictures, as in "I took a picture of my cat." wereas what Sam is talking about I call photos or photographs. I know their really is no distinction, but it helps me when I am taking shots to decide if its something other people might enjoy or if they should be kept to myself.
If you really wanna take photos of your cat set up a small tudio with some white roll paper or a painters tarp and some pure white lights ( you can get them at a hardware store or walmart or where ever) then snap away.

I hope you post again after this first thread.

[Le Gab]

Guys, that is so harsh to blast her! She only has three posts.



Well, uhm, yeah ok. But still, look it's 2 pictures of a cat. :P

Sorry if i sounded harsh. I didn't mean to sound harsh. Did i sound harsh? Awww. Actually, and i said this before, i'm a puppy. Just that really deep down inside. And i really mean really, really deep down. :)

And well, cant really go for any constructive critique because it's just 2 pix of the same subject. If there is need for constructive critique you will need to post more and varied. And you'll get a lot of crits. Cross my heart :P .

And so, enter, MHouse, knight of the phototable. :P

Yeah

Now that was evil. So, yeah, sorry Mhouse, no Helter Skelter there. Just some internet fun that can always be missinterpreted.

Kudos, guys!

[ShadeOfDawn]

Its funny how anyone with a camera and a cat is drawn to taken multiple pictures of their cat. I know i have been, and i've taken a fair amount of pictures of my cats and the good ones are in my portfolio. Because everyone takes photos of cats they're often not looked highly upon. I know that when i was going to apply to a photography program at a university they said to not submit any pictures of cats with works because basically they get tossed along with the application.

These arent bad efforts at photography, but they are flawed and they're more snapshots of a cute lovable cat than photography.

Personally i agree that you shouldnt put a copyright on your actual photograph you should either put it on the border or forget it. I dont place them on mine at all because its relatively pointless i think, if someone really wants to take it off they can. Also i feel that putting a border on the photograph helps distinguish it from the forum background and makes allows the viewer to focus more on the photograp. I'm not sure if you have Photoshop or any similar program that you could do it with, but if you're interested theres a free program that aims to be like Photoshop and its called gimp. You could probably find it by googleing it.

Theres a lot of things to take into account with a photograph. The most important thing for all starting photographers to think about is composition. There are many effective compositions for a photograph and the first thing you should probably look at is the rule of thirds (you can search it on Wikipedia or google or anything). After composition there are other thinks like colour, exposure and more technical aspects to a photograph. Theres also things like the depth of field in a photograph (how separated the foreground is from the background, having a blurry background really draws out the foreground). And then theres a time as a Photographer where you'll come to struggle with why you take a picture - is it for the effect it has on something? is it simply the beauty of it? is it to convey an idea or a message or to get to a point? Why do you take a photograph? Thats something im currently struggling with and not making much headway.


So theres some things to think about in order to grow in Photography.

For cats you could do pictures of them in several ways (at least i have) such as:

treating it as a portrait photograph as if they were a person
trying to capture a wild side or portray them as a very wild cat
capturing the beauty in a cats eye and their stare

and theres an infinite number of unique ways to approach photographing a cat.

[NishieGirl]

Hey!

It's been a few days, but I'm back to respond. Thank you for all your critiques and comments, you guys! I really appreciate it. It's great to hear what you have to say. Everyone starts somewhere, right? I guess I'll stop putting the copyright marks on there and put it, as several people have said, on the border or the back. As to the sepia affect, I'll maybe blur the background behind the focus and make the edges look "old." I've taken all of your critiques into consideration and will refer to this when taking more photos.
Thanks again!
-Squeak!