Thank you for the welcome, Flak! :-) I'm an occasional lurker. I try to stop by when I get a chance. If I were to critique a picture by saying "You didnt do a very good job modeling that" or "the lightings off", they would be looked at as hurtful comments, because I didnt add a compliment. Not all critiques should have a compliments. Sometimes people make bad art, (not any of you of course) and they need to be told it. d_hood: You honestly don't see anything wrong with that statement? (I'm not attacking. This is a serious question.) What is helpful or constructive in those comments? If I leave my statement here, I'll be doing the same thing you just did. But I'm not going to. Here's what you could have done better. You could have given the artist helpful suggestions (rather like I'm doing with you). Instead of saying, "You didnt do a very good job modeling that," say, "have you tried modeling this way?" and explaining how s/he might improve his/her technique. Instead of saying, "the lighting's off," say, "I don't think The mountains should be so brightly lit on the side facing the camera, since the sun is setting behind them." That would be constructive criticism. And why do people "need to be told" that they make bad art? Are you the art police? Are you going to single-handedly track down and slaughter every bad artist in the world? You know what? Here is my favorite example of the subjective nature of art. When I was in high school (1985), I went to the Kennedy Museum in Washington D.C. Hanging on the wall was a huge piece of sheet metal that an artist had blown bumps into using dynamite. Now if you ask me, that is pretty damned bad art. But somebody must have liked it enough to hang it on the wall of a museum, right? So who is to say what is bad art, and why do you feel it is your job to notify the artist that his/her art has failed your approval system? -Heidi

One goes into the house of eleven eleven times, but always comes out one. -River Tam