=middeneaht

In Russia, sometimes I encounter a really, really strange behaviour of people related to music journalism and / or photography. Just to share with you the most amusing opinion of one russian girl. She claims that she works sometimes for russian ed of Rolling stone. Yet she published in her blog a pretty crappy pics of some band, where everything and everyone is dark and completely out of focus except these lights in the very back. I suggested her some tips to get better angles. She went upset, checked my blog and told me in return - "your photo [link] is a complete shit, it's not art. Learn color correction first, then advise someone else. I work for respectful journals and my work is OK for them! And I stayed in a crowd and do not want to bother others to move in order to shoot nicer pic, I respect the listeners." OK, I respect them too, but if I got a bad shot from a crowd, I do not make people view it as very good. It's still bad, right?

I suggested to critique all my set of Misfits, she boldly told that "she's gonna do it later". I am awaiting more of her best-of-class criticism, though, I doubt that she will make it at all. She is of that type of girls, that are really good to get backstage, close to someone famous. But yet, music photography is not about (only) being nice and having connections.

So, Moscow is actually got a certain reputation of being a city full of cynical and hypocritic people. I was contacting a journal in order to take on Tuska job. I got the job, but the attitude was like "bow and be thankful that we accept your free work". They do not bother even say official phrases like "Hello" and "Goodbye". I shoot the most famous band for them, I use my equipment worth few thousands, and I shall bow.

So - is it like so elsewhere in the showbiz publishing industry, or people are more respectful?