Chopping off heads

[Sirius Glass]

Yes and if done quickly enough, the eyes will follow you around the room for a few moments.

Any advance on this level of black humour?

pentaxuser

Well, back to the reference to Marie Antoinette, during the French Revolution they sang to the tune of "Catch a falling star"

"Catch a falling head and put it in a casket,
Never let it roll away ... "

Steve

[Cheryl Jacobs]

I've always thought this a fine example of creative head-chopping. I called this one "Getting A Head For the Holidays".

[Sirius Glass]

I've always thought this a fine example of creative head-chopping. I called this one "Getting A Head For the Holidays".

Now that is a real classic!

Steve

[TheFlyingCamera]

Yes and if done quickly enough, the eyes will follow you around the room for a few moments.

Any advance on this level of black humour?

pentaxuser

Lettuce not get ahead of ourselves here... then again, a good joke is always disarming. Keep that up and we'll be all running around like chickens with our heads chopped off. Funny how we've got gallows humor, but not guillotine humor. Better not let that idea come to a head.

[Sirius Glass]

Better not let that idea come to a head.

What and not have a popping good time?

Steve

[TheFlyingCamera]

Ack- too corny for words... verbal assault and buttery... don't mince words now... decapitation is after all a dicey situation.

[Lee Shively]

I once had an editor lecture me on a shot I took in which I cropped in tight and clipped off the top of the subject's head. She had gone to an Associated Press workshop and one of the teachers said cropping off the top of someone's head in a newspaper photograph would confuse the viewer. Since I was only a photographer who had made more photographs that week than she had taken in her whole life and she was an assistant managing editor who had gone to a workshop, I was obviously wrong.

[Monophoto]

Chopped off heads (arms, legs, ears, noses, etc) are what critics talk about when they don't have anything else negative to say.

[jnanian]

the best thing to do with rules is break them...

[Charles Webb]

With most everything a photographer can think or dream of having already been done, it makes it tough to be original and creative. I believe in an effort to be creative, different or simply noticed picture makers will do most anything to grab, capture, shock or what ever it takes to catch the viewers eye. I come from a time not so long ago that to chop off a persons head in a picture was considered to be very amateurish and indicated lack of training and was to be avoided at any cost. Like so many things in photography the "head chopping" has now gained a great deal of acceptance by many that never knew in the first place that it was in poor taste.

Today anyone can do anything from allowing tree's or telephone poles to grow out of peoples heads to cutting off the head or other anatomy in the name of creativity. Perhaps they are correct and others of us are incorrect. I do not believe that rules are made to be broken! I believe that if one knows the rules first that he/she is in a position to better interpret the results of what they are trying to achieve. Generally when I see an image with top of the head cut off I either turn the page or go somewhere else.

If you think or believe other wise it is finewith me, I do not wish to change anyones mind however I personally dislike the cutting tops of heads off in portraits or even family photos.
Jus my opinion,
Charlie........................................... .....