I am really surprised that two committed and experienced photographers are dismissing landscape in this case in terms of 'if you screw up you can just go back and reshoot'. I'm stunned to see a comment along the lines of no-one gives a shit about landscape. A second or two makes no difference. Yes it does. It's an area where it's all about the light and that is never the same twice.
I took a shot in my garden of some weeds growing in some paving slabs. The light was just right. That photograph wasn't there a minute before or after. Because of the time of year that light will almost certainly never fall on the weeds in the same way again and of course the weeds change as they grow or die. You cannot reshoot - and I did screw up. Scale it up and you have landscape.
Architecture - once again surely the light is key and I have missed shots by being too slow changing lenses.
I don't accept any photograph of any person as any form of truth. We will all have our own interpretation of what we see when we look at a person. My wife and I can look at the same photograph and draw radically different conclusions. We did this as family once as I found an amazing photograph of some guys in a Siberian hut. We each of us took something different from the image, we each created our own back story. This is in part I think what Russ refers to as ambiguity.
Regarding that quote about stepping into the same river twice - sure you may not be able to see the difference, but it is different, you know it's different and what's more that river doesn't give a shit if you have the keenness of observation to see that difference or not. And of course it has nothing to do with rivers.
Finally, and I despair of this, I really do not look at an image of many women and think what it would be like to up close and personal and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone like this. I have no doubt of my masculinity, I meet women I do wonder about but I don't usually fantasise about women in photographs. Maybe I'm odd but I don't think so.
I really must learn to let this just wash past me but I'm just stunned at the comments about landscape, just simply stunned and uncomfortable so I shall probably bow out now to the relief of one and all I expect 
1. I am really surprised that two committed and experienced photographers are dismissing landscape in this case in terms of 'if you screw up you can just go back and reshoot'. I'm stunned to see a comment along the lines of no-one gives a shit about landscape. A second or two makes no difference. Yes it does. It's an area where it's all about the light and that is never the same twice.
2. I took a shot in my garden of some weeds growing in some paving slabs. The light was just right. That photograph wasn't there a minute before or after. Because of the time of year that light will almost certainly never fall on the weeds in the same way again and of course the weeds change as they grow or die. You cannot reshoot - and I did screw up. Scale it up and you have landscape.
3. Architecture - once again surely the light is key and I have missed shots by being too slow changing lenses.
4. I don't accept any photograph of any person as any form of truth. We will all have our own interpretation of what we see when we look at a person. My wife and I can look at the same photograph and draw radically different conclusions. We did this as family once as I found an amazing photograph of some guys in a Siberian hut. We each of us took something different from the image, we each created our own back story. This is in part I think what Russ refers to as ambiguity.
5. Regarding that quote about stepping into the same river twice - sure you may not be able to see the difference, but it is different, you know it's different and what's more that river doesn't give a shit if you have the keenness of observation to see that difference or not. And of course it has nothing to do with rivers.
6. Finally, and I despair of this, I really do not look at an image of many women and think what it would be like to up close and personal and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone like this. I have no doubt of my masculinity, I meet women I do wonder about but I don't usually fantasise about women in photographs. Maybe I'm odd but I don't think so.
7. I really must learn to let this just wash past me but I'm just stunned at the comments about landscape, just simply stunned and uncomfortable so I shall probably bow out now to the relief of one and all I expect
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1. I live beside the sea. I can go to the same spot every day of summer and see exactly the same totally blue sky and placid water. The only changes are in the boats. If I were obsessive, I suppose I could stick on a pola and shoot at every little variation in its trip around itself and claim that the vital, critical difference is a miracle of nature and witness to my keen, observational prowess. Bullshit. It would be nothing but an affectation, a con, a simple self-deception at the most generous.
2. Exactly. And who gives that proverbial shit about your weeds? Scaling up, as concept, is an error: that was the problem with Pentax's 6x7; it doesn't translate.
3. The Empire State, terrorists aside, will still be there tomorrow. And one cloud is pretty much as valid as any other in the greater scheme of things. Contrails, I admit, could cause one to return at a later time, which kinda proves my point, if you think about it.
4. That's not a point. Truth isn't about personal, viewer interpretation, which is ever present after the fact; it's about (truth) what the camera catches, despite the shooter, and being inanimate it has neither opinion nor bias. All that it can do is tell the truth of what exists before it.
5. Then you have no argument, as you have just shown.
6. Maybe so, maybe not. I refer to the instant judgement as to whether, given the chance, you (one) would or would not. I believe it works in reverse, too, only far more quickly and efficiently and
accurately. For the record: most of my observations have made me very grateful for the hand that I was dealt. I do not suggest that one thinks about it for more than that split second of recognition. Anything longer would indeed be worrying. I'm not suggesting that we all go around mentally sniffing one another's tails à la pooch. Dogs take their time; we are far more rapid, time-efficient and easily satisfied with our deductions.
7. I hope that you do
not bow out; a little bit of actual involvement, of being committed to this forum and adding some life to it beyond bland nods of approval to every bit of equally bland stuff that gets posted. That has to be better than just closing down the eyes and mind because one might not feel comfortable with them open.
Rob C
