I think it's less looking for approval, at least in cases where you've put hours worth of work into something it's more like you lose the ability to see it fresh. After a while, all you see are the tiny parts you worked on. This can last a long time too, it can take a while to be able to see something you put a lot of work into with fresh eyes, so I can understand seeking a third party's opinion, especially someone who has experience doing the same thing.
Yeah, as a total newbie the "hey it doesn't matter it's all subjective" is actually super unhelpful.
It's like asking for feedback on a meal you've cooked, or a song you've written and just getting "hey, so long as you and/or your spouse enjoy it who cares!"
It's like, sure, but I actually do value the opinion of people who have spent a lot of time developing good taste and have a good eye for what is generally accepted as "good", and are positioned to give valuable and helpful, especially technical feedback.
A spouse may say they like it or not, but will not be able to articulate why in the same way that a professional would be able to give pointers on specific elements of colour correction or mask use.
The same way someone may say they don't like a meal, but a professional would be able to articulate why there needs to be a tad more salt, or a touch more acid to balance out the flavours etc.
It's all subjective - but there are some people better able to feedback than others, and that's incredibly useful for learning.
Thank you for the well reasoned response – yes I was being a little bit too flip. Will attempt to give honest and constructive feedback and just ignore use of my personal unfavorite word: “overcooked“
Yeah, these things are encouraging, but they are not useful ways to advance as an artist...
But advancing as an artist, especially a self-taught one, with this patchwork network of instructions from subreddits, youtube videos, and random tutorial websites can be tricky... Oftentimes, as beginners, we ourselves lack the language, technical knowledge, or understanding of nuance to articulate what we want to know.
There's definitely some unfortunate elements of capitalism at play here too, you are essentially asking professionals how they got to a professional level, and asking for specific guidance about how you yourself can get to that level for free. I personally don't see it that way at all, but there are definitely going to be people that do.
I can also say, there are elements of mentorship within art that can be philosophically tricky, because the case with a lot of art is that an artist can still succeed in doing something the complete "wrong" way. So the struggle is more helping people efficiently find their way, and as strangers on the internet, that can be nearly impossible.
no, every photo based sub loves to push people towards "no processing == best". I've seen people post, and posted myself, almost SooC shots with very minimal editing and people will still blast you for too much colour or over processing.
Most photo subs are just amateurs displaying dunning krueger effect or pushing personal taste over technical proficiency.
My standard response is always been: “Do you like it? Does your client/spouse/contest judge like it? Then who cares what we think?”
Honestly, then why even respond? This sub is to discuss post processing and you are saying your standard response is to provide absolutely no feedback to the person inquiring?
Most people can gather on their own that if they like it "who cares what other people think"... and most people dont come here to post because they dont want outside opinion.
It doesnt seem remotely productive to regress a standard response to what is effectively a non-response...
In my opinion, that works for seasoned shooters who know what they're doing, and have achieved what they were going for with the edit.
But in a group like this, there are plenty of people who just downloaded some random editing software and are basically winging it. Their eye haven't been trained, and they honestly can't tell a tasteful edit from just moving all the sliders somewhere to the right.
These are the people who will benefit from honest, basic advice.
And the LAST thing they need is everyone trying to be "nice" and shower them with compliments.
Just tell them what they did wrong and send them back to the tools. It's the best gift you can give them at this stage .
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u/[deleted] Jun 22 '25
I’m new to post processing. What does this mean?