Flickr, SmugMug, Picasa or any other photo website. Why do you do it? Kudos from strangers, friends etc. To learn?

I was asked yesterday why I post photos on Flickr and photo forums? It is a good question. Like most people, I like having others say positive things about my photos, but I think there is more to it than that. By posting my photos, I think I have improved as a photographer. I have learnt a lot. My views have changed. All by getting feedback to my photos. Flickr is probably not the best place to go to get constructive criticism, but some of the photography forums I visit certainly are. To have someone point out small details in an image that could have been done better is a great way to learn, but it isn’t for those with fragile egos. There are plenty of things that others would like me to change in a photo that I am not willing to. This shot for example.

Although I posted it on Flickr and asked people to refrain from asking me to clone out the power lines, plenty of people on photography forums who didn’t see that request told me the shot would be improved by cloning out the power lines. One person even did it for me and I agree, the image did look better, but I am a bit of a stickler for not manipulating my images, so they stayed in. Had I not posted it, I would never had seen the result of the image with out the power lines.

Its the same with numerous images I have put on Flickr. People have suggested crops, levels changes, saturation changes etc etc, all of which I probably wouldn’t have even considered unless some new eyes had seen the image. It is a fantastic way of learning. Whether you take on board all the suggestions, it does give you a new perspective on a given image.

So I suppose the main reason I make public the photos I take is for the kudos, but the constructive criticisms I have received have made me a better photographer. And that on its own is worth the time to upload my photos to a public place.

What drives you to place your photos in the public eye?