How To Recognize Great Art Photography Part 2- It is Art

In that first moment when an image causes you to stop and stare, you don't know if that photograph is good or bad. You may not even understand why the image affects you the way it does. It just does.

Art is defined as the use of skill and imagination in the production of things of beauty. Beauty is defined as the qualities that give pleasure to the senses or exalt the mind.

Without knowing anything else about photography, you know when a photograph moves you. You respond to it on an emotional level. You connect with it. It does not need to be pretty, it needs to be emotional.

It may be the WOW factor, or the story it tells or the moodiness that draws you into it. The image haunts your mind and won't let go.

At this point, many people move on to the next image. But, what make you go back to that particular image? What makes you stand and gaze at it in wonderment? What makes you feel it? What makes you say, I just have to have this!

There's more going on there than just the taking of a picture, which I will explore further in my future blog.