Tron

Rather 70s-ish. Very interesting technically, but perhaps a bit too 'abstract'? I think viewers should have some inkling of what they are looking at. Is there a point beyond which an image ceases to be of 'photographic' interest — with all that implies in terms of material and aesthetics, and so on — and the subject becomes simply decorative? Without your notes, it would be perhaps somewhat perplexing. Opinions surely differ... Whatever the case, interesting work.
ps: All my remarks are speculative and are meant positively.
Cheers.

Original...almost a trip inside the future...E=MC2...this could be right title

Very happy to have your thoughts Grodgeman. Though I cannot agree with your assertion/question that an image can be too abstract. I feel lucky not feeling bound by any such constraints. It is after all as other photographs a capturing of light and dark of a moment past. The picture is my view so to speak. Others who photograph Christmas lights will have different photographs to show.
This debate and many close to it have rumbled on in the art world for many decades and will continue to do so.
It is a pleasure to have a thought provoking comment on a piece of my work.

Straight out of TRON!

regards
Mike

Hello.
I noticed that you gave your photo a title — as we all do.
This focuses the viewers' perception and influences their interpretation.
"Tron" — and the photo becomes meaningful because there is, in the background, a whole set of shared references.
You found Tron in the view before your eyes.
Your 'art' becomes a personal representation of reality.
'Abstract' art is commonly supposed by its partisans to express the 'essence' of things.
I can go with only to the extent where I can detect some link — however tenuous — with 'reality.
When this link does not exist there is no meaning, unless it be the desire of the creator to provoke, etc.
I do not find Picasso at all interesting, but he is not totally abstract.
There is a vision of and reaction to 'reality'.
If you take Jackson Pollock and his dribble of pain you do not even have essential abstraction, but total arbitrary and gratuitous rubbish.
He mus have had an 'intention', but iI defy anyone detect it and define it meaningfully.
There thus is a degree of abstraction beyond which all sense disappears.
I am a believer in 'sense' and its 'necessity.
For millenia art was attached to the real world.
Then came photography and art could no longer be representational, but could still be symbolic, but even for that a degree of representation is necessary.
By giving titles to our photos, we are expressing our own uncertainty by imposing a reading and a sense.
It would be interesting to have a month of photography when all titles would be forbidden.
How often would we wonder why the photo was taken?
What would we make of the lines if we had not been "guided"?
Pretty lines?
Sorry to ramble, but there are so many things involved...
And I did like the film, and your photos is good in the sense that it does provoke a reaction by eluding any direct and open expression of sense.
But....




I think that

Love it. Takes me back in time.

Shots like that don't half drain your battery.

Actually I hadn't noticed the title but TRON jumped into my mind as soon as I saw the image!

Regards
Mike

Very effective..

Hits all the creative high notes for me! 😄

I won't quote your whole post Grodgeman interesting though it is. I make no claims as to what my picture is, as in art or graphic or what other words one might use to describe it. It comes from experimentation and one should never fear experimentation, it is how we learn and move forward. I totally agree it would be interesting to have a period of no titles, it could make for some interesting comments.

Waypoint, funny you should say that! While I was photographing this series I did indeed run out of battery and I had no spare. Amazingly I bumped into another Pentax shooter who kindly lent me his spare battery from his back pack. How lucky was that!

Dear Nigelk,
None of what I said was meant negatively. Your photo did make me reflect. You are right about the need for experimentation, and its stimulation. But I've always been concerend azbout sense and definitions and abstract "art" has always annoyed me as a rip-off, as phoney, gratuitous and mainly meaningless — though it might have some decorative value. Your photo (Pentax, to boot), is indeed interesting — aesthetically and technically. My questions was where to situate it if it had no title. Let's think about a month without titles? And see what emerges. But we would have to express our reactions. Cheers.
And Merry Xmas to all !

Grodgeman,
I was very happy to have your thought provoking responses. Most welcome on my part.
I will not give my next 30 days of photographs any titles.

Have a great Christmas.
Nigel

The depth of my own analysis - like it/don't like it! Like it!

Top experimenting... look forward to more of it... and enjoyed the debate on this one also...

Best

Brilliant, it would have been abstract except for Tron!

It works well as the lines are straight.