Classic Thread REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

[Zuiko]

Following the popularity of the recent REALLY Bad Landscapes Competition Thread, I've been encouraged to start a similar thread based on the Taylor Wessing Portrait Awards.

I must say that I do not think any of the pictures in the above link are bad portraits and most of them I enjoyed, but I do think the winner was far more of a snapshot than the others featured. About a decade ago the annual Kobal Portrait Awards were always controversial and often rewarded some very questionable (in photographic terms) portraits.

But the seed has been sown, I want to see some cliched, snapshot or, preferably, REALLY BAD portraits - all with an Arty B@ll@cks Statement of course!

[Zuiko]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

To get things underway, here is my first entry:-





Teenage Mutant Zero

In this work I wanted to capture a typical teenager engaged in her favourite activity in her natural environment. But I also wanted to go further than this and explore the potential for overlap and cross-over between the arts, combining traditional artistics skills such as photography with modern art and living sculptures. I also wanted to reflect the influences of other artists, synergised with my own talent to produce a truely remarkable fusion of art, craft and etherial imagination, lifting the seemingly banal onto a higher plane that allows an exploration of self-awareness for those liberated enough to embrace the possibility that it is the concept of art and the feelings which the artist experienced in order to conceive it that matters, rather than the finished product. Thus, I have extended the concept of Tracey Emin's Unmade Bed to include a person, in this case a teenager, to make it truely a vision of living art.

[Nick Temple-Fry]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

I do hope you have the models full permission for this photograph John. In writing, and signed in blood over a picture of todays teen superstar (David Cassidy, Jason Donavan, George Osborne, or whoever). Otherwise I predict 15 years of pure hell and recrimination.

Though I've always liked tortoises, can't help feeling that a more colorful shell might be appopriate.

Nick

[David M]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.



The lonely fisherman contemplates the meaning of life (in between bouts of chewing the face off his girlfriend) as the sun rises on a primeval land (apart from the dock he's standing on and the range light behind him).

[Janet]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

This is possibly the worst portrait I've done so far...in my defence, it was totally unposed and unprepared and was simply a quick grab shot with my compact camera...it's such a cliched shot...child, puppy...what's not to love? The llttle guy decided to bring his puppy into the cabin whilst we were on an overnight fishing trip...I'd left my Oly on my peg, so I had to make do with the compact...



Not sure it's allowed into the competition as it was actually taken with my little Samsung compact.

Janet

[shirley]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

Janet, I am sorry but I think that this image has to be disallowed in this competion, not because it's taken on a samsung, but it does have two faces in it, they are looking at the camera, they are in focus, no distracting backgrounds etc... how good can it get.
Now this might be getting closer?



"The objective (of a portrait) is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the subject. Like other types of portraiture, the focus of the photograph is the person's face" Wikipedia,
hence my entry. The absence of a face engages the viewer in a 'what if' or a 'why' scenario, i.e If I could see his face what would I see? Why is he lying on an empty beach? Why is he wearing trousers, shoes and socks but no top? etc. The viewer has to work in order to engage with and interpret the image and goes away with a sense of satisfaction in knowing that he didn't just view an image he/she has interacted with it.

[snaarman]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

The received wisdom is that a classic portrait should:

Involve somone else.
Use a 40 to 50mm "portrait" lens.
Be carefully posed and considered beforehand.



I beg to differ:

[edmund473]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

Hear I have shown my skills in composition and in focus background also in bokeh. please don't disqualify me this time John.

[Pjphoto59]

[Ulfric M Douglas]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

I have to say Janet's photo certainly doesn't belong in this thread.
I'm looking for bad portraits but they're really hard to find or they've been deleted. The easy to find stuff is ... easy to find but wouldn't be appropriate here.
I'll keep looking ...


..Ah found a one.
E-600, out of focus, too-slow shutter, missing head and LOOK AT ALL THAT GRUNGEY NOISE.

[Dewi9]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

This poor German soldier, lost in time, peruses both his surroundings and means of escaping them. As in life, everyone else studiously ignores him, as though he does not exist in their reality.

Is he dreaming ? The off axis verticals combined with the soft focus suggest he may be doing just that.

He gazes longingly at the carriage, seeing it as a doorway back to a life he remembers.

german.jpg

[Janet]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

Pah! I really thought my first entry was a contender! I can't believe now that I was so pleased with it at the time...

Here's a more considered entry, with suitable AB to accompany it...

[Zuiko]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

I do hope you have the models full permission for this photograph John. In writing, and signed in blood over a picture of todays teen superstar (David Cassidy, Jason Donavan, George Osborne, or whoever). Otherwise I predict 15 years of pure hell and recrimination.

Though I've always liked tortoises, can't help feeling that a more colorful shell might be appopriate.

Nick

George Osborne? That's a bit fanciful isn't it? Maybe he'll appear on next years X-Factor under the stage name "Gideon." Talking of 'X' factor, I wonder if he will still have it at the next election?

[Zuiko]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

The lonely fisherman contemplates the meaning of life (in between bouts of chewing the face off his girlfriend) as the sun rises on a primeval land (apart from the dock he's standing on and the range light behind him).

I see the figures you refer to, David, but I think it's pushing things a little far to describe it as a portrait. Beautiful landscape, though - the sort that would sell for $4.3 million if there was any justice in the art world!

[Zuiko]

Re: REALLY Bad Portraits Competition.

This is possibly the worst portrait I've done so far...in my defence, it was totally unposed and unprepared and was simply a quick grab shot with my compact camera...it's such a cliched shot...child, puppy...what's not to love? The llttle guy decided to bring his puppy into the cabin whilst we were on an overnight fishing trip...I'd left my Oly on my peg, so I had to make do with the compact...



Not sure it's allowed into the competition as it was actually taken with my little Samsung compact.

Janet

If you class this as a bad portrait I think viewing one of your better ones would just be too demoralizing for me! This is a great shot, but it aint gonna win this comp!