Percentage of keepers/surprise good shots

[Tim Meisburger]

I have a lot of old 35mm images that are good, but the LF process is completely different (usually) in that it is very deliberate. My 35mm is mostly reportage, an image captured in a fleeting instant that portrays a place and time, but in LF we build an image from the ground up and at every stage can fail. We know what we want and it is often difficult to create the image we envisioned and so are disappointed. Exposure errors that would be annoying but not disastrous in 35mm consign an LF negative to the trash. Errors in framing, development, etc. ruin the image we were trying to build. So often I have images that others think are nice, but all I see are the mistakes; a portrait with a hand misplaces, or hair falling in the wrong place, or un unwanted shadow in the background.

Its like Kirk says, when he is working he gets the professional shot, the shot that meets the need and satisfies the client, but when he is making for himself, adequate is not sufficient. And thats why six or twelve or even one a year that really satisfies is enough, at least for me.

[Greg Miller]

My question is what kind of success rate should in be aiming for realistically.

My opinion is that if your success rate is high, then something is wrong. I don't want to keep taking the same photos over and over. That would bore me and my viewers. I'm always trying to better my skills, learn, and create something new. That's a recipe for a bad success rate, but also for a recipe for pushing your boundaries, learning, and creating images that are fresh and new. There's nothing wrong or bad about that.

[jnantz]

i've been making workplace portraits since the 1980s
sometimes the ones i discarded/ passed over are the ones i look at now
30 years later and think they are THE photograph from the session.
when winogrand died he left thousands ( 10 thousand ) rolls of films unprocessed
because he knew it take distance to realize which exposures are the best ones ...
granted, death is the ultimate distance, but he used to wait a long while before he processed his film
and edited out ones he wanted from the rest ...

[RodinalDuchamp]

I really can't thank all of you enough for being so honest. When I started I did think it would be hard I really did but I had no idea how deep this goes. This forum is really full of amazing people always willing to help. From the bottom of my heart thank you. @labblack @corran @stonenyc @kirkgittings you guys especially.

[Alan Gales]

My opinion is that if your success rate is high, then something is wrong. I don't want to keep taking the same photos over and over. That would bore me and my viewers. I'm always trying to better my skills, learn, and create something new. That's a recipe for a bad success rate, but also for a recipe for pushing your boundaries, learning, and creating images that are fresh and new. There's nothing wrong or bad about that.

+1

I couldn't have said it better.

[ic-racer]

If I'm lucky I'll get one to five good ones each year.

[Lenny Eiger]

I think there are a few factors here. If we separate things out between technological success and aesthetic success, we should see that technological success should increase with practice until it is almost 100%.

Aesthetic success is another matter. Factors include:
Amount of time one is able to devote to photography
Understanding of one's own aesthetic, study of History and context of one's work
Shooting style - fast or slow. How many negs do you produce in a day's worth of shooting?
Ability to shift one's awareness from day to day to the hyper-awareness of photographing, where things are noticed.
I think it depends highly on were one is in their lives, their emotional state, etc. There appear to be "rich" periods.

In my early years, as I was developing my portfolio, if I took something I like very much, it often replaced another in the portfolio that was a bit weaker. The size of the case remained the same. It is different now, I showed my work to a gallery last year and they didn't want to see 25, they wanted to see 300.

There are all sorts of people doing the ubiquitous "site studies" where the concept is thing thing vs the image, it definitely needs more than one image to cover something, and they aren't all as strong, most can't stand by themselves, or without the text, etc.

Lastly, I think that AA had about 12 great images. Weston maybe 100. That's just my opinion and not meant to start anything... There is a huge difference between an image we sincerely like and one that will stand the test of time. Those are quite few, one doesn't know until they've been around for a few years.

Lenny

[bob carnie]

August Sander would be IMO one of the greatest photographers of all time... I never get bored looking at his amazing bodies of work, and there were quite a few keepers.

[Lenny Eiger]

August Sander would be IMO one of the greatest photographers of all time... I never get bored looking at his amazing bodies of work, and there were quite a few keepers.

I agree, on both counts.

One has to look at what a photographer (and their publisher) was willing to put into a book, then maybe double or triple that. How many of those would any one of us consider "undeniable"? I'm sure its quite a moving target. Often depending on one's own interest.


Lenny

[Alan Gales]

August Sander would be IMO one of the greatest photographers of all time... I never get bored looking at his amazing bodies of work, and there were quite a few keepers.

I agree. His portrait of the Pastry Chef is one of my all time favorite images by anyone.