Trippy4U [2018-03-23 15:09:54 +0000 UTC]

Also it would help to preserve the genre if there was a DD moderator for Street.

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jrockar [2018-01-28 19:39:55 +0000 UTC]

Can't agree, or disagree...
The following article touched a similar nerve. Agree with this one:
www.burnmyeye.org/articles/201…

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Lorelei-Photographie [2018-01-25 14:10:38 +0000 UTC]

Nice analysis. Thank you for your thoughts and for sharing beautiful works!

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waitingforlefty [2018-01-19 18:06:13 +0000 UTC]

Thank you so much for including my "Shadow"!

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wilkopicture [2018-01-17 18:32:53 +0000 UTC]

I think I was one of those Street newbies who wandered off to do other things. Part of this is just the natural way we all find new interests but it has to be said that there is something about Street on DA.
Generally, people did not really appreciate my photos. This never bothered me as I do not dedicate a high proportion of my life to Street photography so am not bothered that much if people reckon I am not much good. But similarly, I only really enjoy a small proportion of the photos in the street groups. Similarly, this did not bother me since I was not worried that I was not sufficiently intellectually tuned in appreciate some Street. But, still, this made me suspect that if you see the wrong kind of thing or see it in the wrong kind of way, you do not fit in. For instance, if you do not live in some inner-city then your street might well be a lane and you may observe people doing the typical things of their life on a winter beach. I am not going to try to fit in, not going to see different things or go to a big city - but if it is not street, then what is it?
It did occur to me that the very difficulty in appreciating each others' photos is precisely what makes it worthwhile.

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AfricanObserver [2018-01-14 12:26:43 +0000 UTC]

I follow twitter.com/kennethjarecke on Twitter. He's a professional photojournalist. He is publishing a photography book chapter by chapter on iTunes, and writes in an interesting way.  He has a broad definition of street which I like, but relevant to your title, Inayat, is this quote:
Street photography came along very early in the photographic timeline. It’s a cornerstone of the art. There’s never been a time when photographers, serious and amateurs alike, didn’t do street photography. Today, judging by the many books, blogs and Instagram feeds that are devoted to it, street photography is more popular than it’s ever been.
medium.com/vantage/street-phot…

Between this, and the various comments here and on the street group weekly posts, things might need shaking up, and there is always room for more, but it seems there is life.

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niklin1 [2018-01-12 21:09:45 +0000 UTC]

Thank you for your kind words, Inayat! And also for showing two of my photos here!
It's good to read your journal and also the comments, there is some interest! 

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siddhartha19 [2018-01-12 12:33:47 +0000 UTC]

Thank you for bringing this up , and your attempts at reinvigorating DA-street. Also nice to read the posts by everyone so far, most nuances have been spoken of.


I was sharing my work equally on DA and FB over the last 6-7 years, now I have almost completely stopped posting on FB (due to their disastrous post outreach algorithms, and coerced monetizing which I disagree with). I do regularly post on DA still, and recently started posting on IG as well. Where IG lets new people find your work, there is a LOT of junk to cut through for an audience, and engagement with any work is barely fleeting - so I think it is not the right place for any good criticism/mentoring at all. It is more throwing your stuff at the wall to see what sticks. Although, it does have many excellent photographers operating there who I did not find on DA - so it is good to increase my own intake of photography.

That said, I still like the DA community the most - specially the personal interactions, which have been on a bit of a decline. Kudos to the few who have kept it up, and have almost selflessly kept the groups going with their curation, journals, features and comments. It would be wonderful to revitalize the community with your ideas regarding curation and critiquing. I shall also try to be more active in the groups, though I do make it a point to write to people, or comment on their photographs - I have refrained from critiquing (when the post doesn't ask for it) as I am quite a beginner myself. But more communication is always welcome - specially because we are already a small group (street) within a small community (DA photography).

A minor suggestion - apart from getting critiques on our own work, it may help to have some of the good/iconic/lasting street photographs discussed by the mentors and group members alike - perhaps a sub-gallery or monthly journal etc. This can help by way of educating people starting out why such a photograph 'works' as a street photograph. Also, I personally admire all the 'Featured' or 'Bests' galleries in Street groups on DA which set the bar quite high for what is 'good' photography, the definition of 'street' being variable. It gives me, and I think many photographers, a degree of quality in work to aspire to - which is not imitation. So although generally accepting more submissions will help encourage people and let the community grow, some galleries should remain exclusive to only the best work that comes out.

Let's follow the discussion up with active changes! 
Wish you a wonderful new year ahead, and so to the whole group.

Regards,
Sid

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jennystokes [2018-01-11 08:17:33 +0000 UTC]

I have read this a few times now........well done Inayat.

Just what I think:

a) I sincerely believe Street Photo. IS Photojournalism. What artists show is often everyday life which eventually will be history.
b) When I first came onto d/a and started doing street......I was never accepted or offered help in any of the "Street Groups" at the time (declined.declined..declined).  There is only one Group now that requests my images. Others continually turn them down.

c) I moved to 500px because of this and am doing very well.

d) Mentorship is a good idea BUT we all have our own ideas what 'street' is..........maybe one mentor is not enough?

e) Sometimes street is purely art?

Jenny

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InayatShah [2018-01-11 07:58:35 +0000 UTC]

and

I am really pleased to hear your willingness and of your efforts as mentors.
In my comment to Grant i was just considering planning some sort of revival group with mentorship.
Your experiences are actually very encouraging, perhaps we can find enough like minded and willing participants to start a revival of DA.

 

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eyepilot13 [2018-01-11 00:03:57 +0000 UTC]

I am not a lover of confrontation, and I think given the societal climate people would get all nasty and suspicious. I would love to do more but fret about a nasty scene...A blog-photographer I admire does some great street photography (at least how I'd define it) check out Linh Dinh... he's amazing!

a link linhdinhphotos.blogspot.com/

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burningmonk [2018-01-10 08:55:58 +0000 UTC]

You know a long time ago at The Yard we had a mentor-ship system. I remember I 'mentored' two photographers. I went through their entire galleries and left comments with actual critiques, trying to be constructive regardless if it praise of criticism. Then I had a dialogue for a few weeks after via notes with those two photographers. They have both since seemed to move on from DA (much later after our interactions). But I always though that this was a good idea and we should maybe implement this again. It was quite time consuming for me but I enjoyed it very much because it was a much more deep and rewarding interaction than what is usual in social media (not just DA, and IG and FB are much worse at this).

Anyway, what I wish could have been different though is to make it more public. I feel also that when we reject photos in groups we should provide feedback as to why it was rejected. On a few occasions we did get questions as to why a work was rejected, and in those instances I always responded in detail as to the reasons. I guess my problem is that I am not proactive enough but when I am asked for feedback or any kind of explanation I always go out of my way to explain in detail. I am an educator by trade and experience so it's my pleasure.

In short, I think a more explicit mentoring system would be a welcome sight among the street photography community, not just on DA, but in general.

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AfricanObserver [2018-01-10 07:25:23 +0000 UTC]

Having expressed our various frustrations, what can we do?

I think there are a few different aspects which need to simultaneously come together (Yes, I am a mathematical analyst ). I may not have these aspects right, but I think separating them out may be helpful. Maybe they trigger some thoughts from others. Certainly, it helps me apply lessons from various other groups, to try to get something that can take us forward. I'm working on the assumption that this is centred around a group - an existing one rejuvenated, or a new one. There are other variations, but this is complex enough with this assumption!

There is what the group is - the core 'ethos'; there is how the group(s) engage with members; and how members engage with the group. And then there is dA in its current state and trajectory.

1. The group identity.
There are two major tensions here:
a. What is "street", and how does it relate to photojournalism?
b. Quality vs inclusiveness

I'm not going to re-hash the debate around "What is Street". If you want a group to succeed, people have to stand a decent chance of getting their work accepted. The handling of rejections comes in under 2 & 3, but there has to be a notion that it is possible to get work in on a rational basis. If not, whatever comes out is just another niche personal group, and that's fine, dA has lots, but it won't address this issue.

One possible solution is to let the admins put pictures in folders, not members. I am a member of a group or two that does this. It is work for the admins, but see the points 2 & 3 for how to manage that.
If the group has a set of folders something like:
- Submissions (everything arrives here)
- Classic Street (definitions to be refined, but boundaries will never be perfectly clear!)
- Photojournalism (MUST have some words giving context)
- Pictures with stories (This can mess with submission limits, but pictures + words. Journals can work here)
- News (Image with a time
- Others???
- Comment & Feedback,
one can possibly put every image into a group. One does the 'purist' thing via folders, rather than the whole group. I know you can't just watch a single folder in a group, but one could use features & journals to highlight the work. Whether one votes on groups (slow, painful) or just lets a group of seasoned admins do it (will cause ructions about interpretation, but much faster and efficient) needs to be thrashed out.

Some people will squawk if their beloved work is put into the feedback folder, but one makes it a condition of membership that you want feedback. Squawk, and decline. That said, the admins must also listen, and realise that we all have bad and grumpy days!

There is a lot more to figure out here, but this tries to sketch a goal. Groups like the The-Yard-Collective and  TheYardPlayground have tried this, as did NineMuses and LNA. The difference is I wouldn't create two groups, one for those who can and one for those who can't (I KNOW that was not the idea of the groups mentioned, but think of it from the point of view of someone who has their work consistently rejected by the "purist" group. By having one group, with separate folders, you avoid some of that. Many groups do this with the 'featured' folder, Same idea, but more about  genre than 'quality'.

2.The group -> member interaction
Batsceba is right that the The Yard and co have really tried. I got some really good feedback from some of the guys. The problem was that my work wasn't street. See point 1 to solve that class of problem - accept it to an appropriate group.

An admin does need to be able to express why they made a decision in a non-hurtful way. "This image sucks, and I suggest you give your camera to the homeless people you are photographing" will not encourage people to get better! It doesn't have to be a wordy essay - just a few key thoughts/ impressions.
No image should just expire because no one has the courage to decline it. That merely encourages 'submit and ignore/ forget'  or "watch and unfollow" behaviour from members, which is essentially spamming. That one doesn't want.
There are a handful of groups out there that still manage to post a message on every submission, and that certainly builds member loyalty! And preferably one can find it an appropriate home.

The willingness to mentor members, and discuss work, run features from different perspectives, with different focusses, will generate interest.
Features don't have to be 'the best' - they can pick up images that have an idea or feature that really works, and one can focus on that. If one can run short regular features with some commentary on the images, it will also boost interest.

3. The member -> group interaction
Here it gets trickier, because one cannot directly control this! It's a culture that one builds, and, having built, needs to maintain. Remember that new members will hopefully be joining regularly, and they won't know all the rules - written and unwritten - and will need help & guidance. There are a number of groups with various rules for members.

Things that come to mind:
1. Don't auto accept members. Set it so that in the application, you must link to a gallery folder where you have your street/ PJ/ news/ ... images that you are thinking of submitting. If it's your whole gallery, fine, but then it must be a high percentage of the appropriate stuff. I don't know if admins can vote on membership, but this part should be pretty straightforward.
2. Getting feedback, and engaging positively with it is part of the deal. (It must be given positively, see 2 above). Query anything, but politely. Admins must be willing to answer meaningfully. If you are a brilliant street photog, but really grumpy , maybe admin isn't the space for you?
3. Encourage members to do features, and then promote them. ProjectEducate is very good at this. Hey, one can even bribe members to run features with points, etc?
4. Make it clear that wanting to be a member of the group implies choosing to interact the way the group wants to. If you don't like it, feel free to form your own group that works the way you want. If you join just to get an extra view on every submission, which you spam to every group of which you are a member, then your membership may be terminated.


4. The dA state and trajectory
There are a lot of people feeling that dA is "in decline". Maybe. Also, it's 14 years old. On the internet, that's forever. But more importantly, any organisation at that point will go through a change. We call it adolescence in humans! The early people have grown up, matured, moved away. New people have arrived who are making the mistakes we made a decade ago. (BTW Just rolling your eyes like some exasperated and incompetent parent is not helpful).

So what can we do.
Firstly, for me, it's to remember that we are an art community. These have existed for millenia, from the time people got together to paint images in caves. Whether the community meets in that cave, in a coffee shop, in a rich person's salon, in a frigid garret, monthly in a library room, or online is transitory. The constant is the art, the discussion, the debate, the learning, the affirmation.

Art is bigger than the social media thing.

Yes, dA has many aspects of a social media network, and the people who run an (used to) own it need to make enough money to keep the servers running and the dev's paid. But the core content was there before, and will outlive dA and the internet.

We can make a little corner work if we choose - we could even spin it off onto our own server really, but would lose a lot of the goodness that is dA, both in terms of community and technology. But we could. There are many photographic societies out on the web, but they don't have the reach and vibe of dA. So it's worth putting in a little effort here.
Run more features, invite people to join. The T&C's are still more reasonable that most of the other big sites, who essentially want the right to harvest and resell you work.


So?
I hope these ideas are helpful to stimulate thinking about  a way forward. The whole thing needs much kicking around. If you feel someone should comment on a bit, or be aware, please put their names into a comment below - I didn't want to spam everybody with this!

I know this was a very long post. (The good news is I go back to work next week).

My (inflated) R0.03
Grant H

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tolgatacmahal [2018-01-09 21:26:14 +0000 UTC]

thanks  

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slownumbers [2018-01-09 17:43:14 +0000 UTC]

great article ! 
... and thank you for including my photo  

I have to add to your observations that it's very noticeable that street photography (and not just here on DA) gets so much less attention than other kinds of photography. My heart hurts when I see so many beautiful street photos with just a few favs while at the same time all kinds of stupid portraits and shitty "wanna be art" pics get so much attention ! I wonder why is that so ...!? For someone like me, who thinks street photography is the most strongest , most meaningful and most "close to life" photography,  that is surely ununderstandable .  Are most of people generally stupid and superficial or is it maybe hard for them to enjoy something that is "mundane" and so close to life ? Is it possible they cannot see the beauty of street photography ?

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