8 Of The Biggest Photographic Clichés

[ApolloLXII]

My apologies to everybody and I'm sorry that I raised this topic in the first place.

[ricktas]

My apologies to everybody and I'm sorry that I raised this topic in the first place.

Don't be sorry you raised it. you created a thread that had lots of views, opinions, ideas and motivation in it, and THAT is a positive thing

[ApolloLXII]

That's got to be one of the most extreme back flips I've ever read on AP .. ever!

Firstly, you posted the 8 cliché topics as direct text, not linked to the any of original author's of those 8 topics.

You hadn't had the foresight to add an addendum anywhere in the original post to alert anyone to the fact that these topics were other than your own thoughts in any way.

Read that OP a zillion times over and any sensible AP member would simply assume that ideas and topics in that body of text were the author's own!

Read the original post and you will see where YOU said and implied, in a strangely formatted type, all of those topics were cliché.
Without referring material and sources we can only assume that the person posting the text in their own posts is the originator of those ideas.
There is simply no other way to read the posts.
That is, I'm not posting these words on behalf of my son, or my daughter, who have a pretty limited grasp of the English language. It's pretty good considering their age, but they'd have no idea what this thread is about!

But, now you've opened up the opportunity for me to cop out or wriggle my way out of any situation, and I can declare that the thoughts and ideas in my post here are not my own, but my parent's .. or my children's .. or even my (as yet to be born) grandchildren!!

If you are going to post in this manner, then you need to provide reference material, and if you don't agree with the sentiments of the text you write in your posts.. make it clear with some additional comments.

As it stands, the text in the OP seems to reflect your point of view on the subject, there's simply no other way to read the post.

For it to be a backflip would imply that I had a position to backflip from. I refrained from expressing any opinion of agreement or otherwise about the original post. My opinon came later on after other people had commented because I was attempting to prevent being labelled as having a 100% agreement with what was contained in the original post and be thus exposed to attack from those who would much prefer to indulge in a witch hunt in preference to engaging in meaningful debate (and that, quite obviously, was a dismal failure). There was nothing stopping you or anybody else from asking if I was in agreeance about the original post but neither yourself or anybody did. You never should assume anything or go off half cocked until you have ALL the facts. While I agree that reference material should always be supplied, I didn't think it was necessary as the intention was to generate new debate about the topic rather than going over ground already covered by other people.
( I refer you to the list of references -:Photographic Clichés | Martin Parr www.martinparr.com/blog/?p=282

Flickr: Discussing Photography Cliches in I Shoot Film http://www.flickr.com/groups/ishootf...7622958578714/

www.cliche-photography.com

Photo Clichés www.photocliches.com/

Top 10 Photography Clichés | Casey Mac Photo www.caseymacphoto.com/top-ten-photography-cliches

Photography Clichés » Expert Photography www.expertphotography.com/tag/photography-cliches

The 101 Cliches of Photography http://www.luminous-landscape.com/fo...hp?topic=12710

Travel Photography Cliches - Photo Essay - JPG jpgmag.com/stories/16088 that were given earlier that illustrate that the topic has been widely discussed by others.) however, in future, I will make sure that I include every scrap of reference relevant to any other subject or topic that I raise in the future so you may pore over it in minute detail at your leisure.

[Kym]

For it to be a backflip would imply that I had a position to backflip from.

The OP stands as is. When first posted it is seen as your opinion (later found to be a cut/paste). I.e. you said these 8 things are cliched.

[Xenedis]

You never should assume anything or go off half cocked until you have ALL the facts.

Conversely, you should not assume that what you post will be interpreted by others as you intended it to be interpreted.

[Chris C]

Cliches are great - almost by definition.


A cliche is just something that's been 'over-used' (in somebody's opinion) and the reason anything gets used a lot is because it was liked by enough people to become popular in the first place.


My other hobby is music, and that has its 'cliches' too. Anyone for another three chord love song? Well, just about everyone it seems. They'll never ever go out of fashion because they work and audiences can easily relate to them. Same with popular phrases, they may be described as cliches but when you use one then the widest possible number of people know exactly what you mean. A better trick though is to take a cliche and twist it a little by coming at it from a slightly unusual angle (or to use a cliche appropriate to photography: "throw a different light on it"). People know just what you're getting at, but still think you're 'creative' if you bend it a bit - win, win.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with using so-called cliches in any medium, but it's certainly good to try and use them well. Some shots are bad, not because they're cliches but because they're just bad shots by any criteria. And what's worse - doing your own version of something that's been done many times before or being deliberately different just for the sake of it? Sometimes 'pushing the boundaries' is worthwhile, and sometimes it results in the most pretentious rubbish imaginable.

I say, it's all good, Give everything a go without fear or shame.

I'l get off my soap-box now.

(If anyone is confused, I wasn't really standing on a box of soap. It's a cliche. One that's lasted for well over a hundred years and has comfortably outlasted the time when soap actually was packed in a wooden box that was strong enough to stand on when empty. They could be used to improvise a platform for your oratory. Standing on plastic shrink wrap doesn't cut it, so the cliche survives long after any of us ever saw anybody standing on an original wooden soap box.)

Cheers,

Chris

Here's my most recent cliche. It really should be on the list. There are a million moon shots just like it, most of them better. I was still pleased to get it. AND I've added another cliche to make it a Double Cliche. I even went for Triple Cliche by telling a friend who is a professional photographer that I'd missed a great shot (ten seconds after I put the camera down a plane flew slap bang across the middle of the moon..aaaarghh....true...) but that I did get one of "My Neighbour Going Off to Work". She laughed, and said she had a very similar neighbour. So it did the job.