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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
5/10/2005 4:54:24 PM
Carlos,
Many thanks for the positive comments and this picture and others! Yes, Vietnam is great place for pictures. A simple walk down the street presents a wealth of strangeness to shoot away at. It's a bit of a challenge though to get past some of the cliche pictures that are generally taken here, and i suppose that is always the challenge, to present what is obvious in a new light.
As for the romance of Vietnam, that's an interesting question. It's pretty rough here to be honest .... beauty is all about, but it's covered with a bit of dust and smells of urine and motorcyle exhaust .... the new Vietnam. But there optimism in the air, and that counts for something.
Regards,
Casey
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
4/17/2005 4:39:47 PM
Chantal
I've been living here in Vietnam for about 8 years. I think you will find it an interesting country to visit. My best advice is to be patient, to not be demanding, to not expect things to be as they are in the West. I live in Ho CHi Minh City, which is a pretty chaotic place. The North is quite different --- like two different countries really. And the Center different altogether. Anyhow, have a great trip. Let me know if there are any specific questions I can help you with.
Cheers,
Casey
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
12/17/2004 2:55:24 AM
Alx
This shot was fairly straightforward. I took it with a Nikon D70 digital camera. The lighting is enhanced by the fact that sun was coming straight down on his shaved head, and also reflecting off of a copper bowl that he was holding in his hands.
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/26/2004 3:58:07 AM
Nice picture,unusually good black and white from digital--- good luck with your photography Lauren, I will keep an eye out for your pictures!
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| Photo By: Lauren Taylor
(K:332)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/24/2004 5:55:41 PM
The Futile Pursuit of Happiness
(Page 2 of 6)
Gilbert and his collaborator Tim Wilson call the gap between what we predict and what we ultimately experience the ''impact bias'' -- ''impact'' meaning the errors we make in estimating both the intensity and duration of our emotions and ''bias'' our tendency to err. The phrase characterizes how we experience the dimming excitement over not just a BMW but also over any object or event that we presume will make us happy. Would a 20 percent raise or winning the lottery result in a contented life? You may predict it will, but almost surely it won't turn out that way. And a new plasma television? You may have high hopes, but the impact bias suggests that it will almost certainly be less cool, and in a shorter time, than you imagine. Worse, Gilbert has noted that these mistakes of expectation can lead directly to mistakes in choosing what we think will give us pleasure. He calls this ''miswanting.''
''The average person says, 'I know I'll be happier with a Porsche than a Chevy,' '' Gilbert explains. '' 'Or with Linda rather than Rosalyn. Or as a doctor rather than as a plumber.' That seems very clear to people. The problem is, I can't get into medical school or afford the Porsche. So for the average person, the obstacle between them and happiness is actually getting the futures that they desire. But what our research shows -- not just ours, but Loewenstein's and Kahneman's -- is that the real problem is figuring out which of those futures is going to have the high payoff and is really going to make you happy.
''You know, the Stones said, 'You can't always get what you want,' '' Gilbert adds. ''I don't think that's the problem. The problem is you can't always know what you want.''
Gilbert's papers on affective forecasting began to appear in the late 1990's, but the idea to study happiness and emotional prediction actually came to him on a sunny afternoon in October 1992, just as he and his friend Jonathan Jay Koehler sat down for lunch outside the psychology building at the University of Texas at Austin, where both men were teaching at the time. Gilbert was uninspired about his studies and says he felt despair about his failing marriage. And as he launched into a discussion of his personal life, he swerved to ask why economists focus on the financial aspects of decision making rather than the emotional ones. Koehler recalls, ''Gilbert said something like: 'It all seems so small. It isn't really about money; it's about happiness. Isn't that what everybody wants to know when we make a decision?' '' For a moment, Gilbert forgot his troubles, and two more questions came to him. Do we even know what makes us happy? And if it's difficult to figure out what makes us happy in the moment, how can we predict what will make us happy in the future?
In the early 1990's, for an up-and-coming psychology professor like Gilbert to switch his field of inquiry from how we perceive one another to happiness, as he did that day, was just a hairsbreadth short of bizarre. But Gilbert has always liked questions that lead him somewhere new. Now 45, Gilbert dropped out of high school at 15, hooking into what he calls ''the tail end of the hippie movement'' and hitchhiking aimlessly from town to town with his guitar. He met his wife on the road; she was hitching in the other direction. They married at 17, had a son at 18 and settled down in Denver. ''I pulled weeds, I sold rebar, I sold carpet, I installed carpet, I spent a lot of time as a phone solicitor,'' he recalls. During this period he spent several years turning out science-fiction stories for magazines like Amazing Stories. Thus, in addition to being ''one of the most gifted social psychologists of our age,'' as the psychology writer and professor David G. Myers describes him to me, Gilbert is the author of ''The Essence of Grunk,'' a story about an encounter with a creature made of egg salad that jets around the galaxy in a rocket-powered refrigerator.
Psychology was a matter of happenstance. In the midst of his sci-fi career, Gilbert tried to sign up for a writing course at the local community college, but the class was full; he figured that psych, still accepting registrants, would help him with character development in his fiction. It led instead to an undergraduate degree at the University of Colorado at Denver, then a Ph.D. at Princeton, then an appointment at the University of Texas, then the appointment at Harvard. ''People ask why I study happiness,'' Gilbert says, ''and I say, 'Why study anything else?' It's the holy grail. We're studying the thing that all human action is directed toward.''
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/24/2004 5:50:45 PM
Oh yeah, the dog and the slide thing really does it for me, and the green bush really adds a bit of strength as well. All of them put together pack a load of photographic dynamite that just blast the viewer sky high. Great job.
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| Photo By: Cheryl W.
(K:1209)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/24/2004 5:48:39 PM
I love the pier thing, or maybe even a nice dock, or better yet a jetty or a boardwalk. I am so envious of people who have nice piers to take sentimental picture of. One day I will get my own picture of a boardwalk or a jetty, streching out into the distance and offering a sort of primal journey into nothingness.
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| Photo By: Luis Diogo
(K:6019)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/24/2004 5:44:42 PM
I especially like the name here --- it is just as strong as the shot itself. And the two of them present to viewer with a double barrel shotgun blast to the sense. The secret polaroid and the mysterious name take aim at the super cool building, blasting a visual load of buckshot right into the brain of the innocent viewer. It is sheer madness and pleasure. I could look at pictures of ugly apartment buildings all day, especially when they are shot with a super secret camera and have a super cool name. So blast on my photgraphic friend, blast on!
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| Photo By: Stephen Laszlo
(K:2086)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/24/2004 5:34:02 PM
Oh yes, this one has that real "mall" dynamic. I can just feel the mall, taste it and smell it just by looking at this picture ---- the stale popcorn, the water fountain with little coins in it, the nice new clothes. There is tension here too, a kind of "mall" tension, which rolls over the viewer like a wayward hurricane with 10,000 kilometer an hour winds and stray sea birds that migh just hit you in the face. So yes, go with the mall thing, run with it, the mall is the place to shoot.
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| Photo By: Ferdinand
(K:3516)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/11/2004 5:44:49 PM
Thanks for your comment Giuliano ---- you've got a great picture here, absolutely bizarre --- something about the serious faces combined with the ridiculous masks ----leads to a kind of comedy.It's a photo that you actually want to look at for more than a few seconds, which is rare.
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Photo By: Giuliano Guarnieri
(K:35466)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/11/2004 5:27:18 PM
Great lines, great picture --- the woman seems a little too ordinary for some reason though, compared to the strength of the lines --- I'm not sure what would "cement" the picture and make it feel just right.
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| Photo By: Oistein Thomassen
(K:46)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/11/2004 5:22:53 PM
Strange and beautiful for some reason, perhaps the expression,perhaps the lighting --- nice photograph!
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| Photo By: Pat Fruen
(K:12073)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/10/2004 6:33:23 PM
Thanks for the kind feedback Hugo, your comments are always much appreciated!
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/8/2004 6:39:07 PM
Thanks Giuliano. I've had a look at your work --- creative, eclectic, off-beat, good stuff.
Regards
C. Scholz
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/7/2004 6:15:09 PM
Wonderful picture ---- a bit eerie to me for some reason, though it seems others are reacting to it as sweet and tender.
Regards
C. Scholz
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| Photo By: Pat Fruen
(K:12073)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/5/2004 4:45:32 PM
Great picture, moving.
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| Photo By: SeeN
(K:97)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/4/2004 6:42:18 PM
Thanks for the comment Loyce --- yes, it's a bit of a problem here in Vietnam, with these big hats that keep all the light away from the face!
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/4/2004 6:05:20 PM
Fine and strange, good shot!
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| Photo By: Aykan OZENER
(K:5996)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/2/2004 10:08:53 PM
Great shot! What is this guy eating and how many weasels have been chewing on his hat!! Fun picture!
Regards
Casey Scholz
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| Photo By: Michael Sean Fleming
(K:2267)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/2/2004 10:15:18 AM
Great expression, nice moment to capture --- good to see a photo to gives an emotional reaction to the viewer.
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| Photo By: Maciek Olechnowicz
(K:84)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
10/2/2004 9:54:01 AM
Thanks for the reply Gayle, and yes I agree the title was a bit insulting, so I've changed it to something more mundane ---- just poking fun at the tendency, on this site, for flesh to get more looks than flowers. I looked at the photos you have posted--- very nice!
Regards,
Casey Scholz
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
9/28/2004 6:27:01 AM
Hugo
Thanks for the reply on the wedding picture. I took the picture slanted, just shooting from the hip and not actually framing the picture. I then tried to straighten it out using photoshop, and it came out as you saw it.
Regards
Thomas
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
9/23/2004 5:14:31 AM
John, Thanks for the reply on my photo --- took a look at your online portfolio ---- inspiring work!
Regards
Thomas Scholz
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| Photo By: Casey Scholz
(K:293)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
9/9/2004 6:08:18 PM
great moment to capture ---- unplanned,and nice when luck gives a good photo
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| Photo By: ABBA RICHMAN
(K:220)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
9/9/2004 5:21:22 PM
Hey, thats a bee on a flower. I like pictures like this, they remind me of my grandmother and how she used to put honey on my forehead and let flies land on me and then takes polaroids. I don't know why.
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| Photo By: Ferdinand
(K:3516)
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Critique By:
Casey Scholz (K:293)
9/9/2004 5:18:16 PM
Thanks for the flower picture. I like flowers and these are flowers. What I really like about them is that they are white. Except for the green part of course. I guess I really like the green and the white. These are not just ordinary flowers. That I do know. These are special. I can see why you took this photo.
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| Photo By: Albert Clair
(K:445)
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