As (as I understand) quite often a 'mood' is mentioned as one of the 'essential' 1x photo 'qualies' I though that it may be interesting to try to discuss it...

"A mood is a relatively long lasting emotional state. Moods differ from emotions in that they are less specific, less intense, and less likely to be triggered by a particular stimulus or event." - Wiki

"Moods generally have either a positive or negative valence. In other words, people typically speak of being in a good mood or a bad mood. Unlike acute, emotional feelings like fear and surprise, moods often last for hours or days." - Wiki

"Mood also differs from temperament or personality traits which are even longer lasting. Nevertheless, personality traits such as optimism and neuroticism predispose certain types of moods. Long term disturbances of mood such as depression and bipolar disorder are considered mood disorders. Mood is an internal, subjective state, but it often can be inferred from posture and other behaviours." - Wiki

Not sure three quotes from Wiki give us any real basis for discussion and certain no clues to your personal insight on the subject.

To me a mood is when I give place to the emotions of the moment and take the time and place to digest them and then allow them to take my mind on a bit of a journey. Some moods are fun and should be cherished and some are not but should not be ignored.

One of the great aspects of art is the it's ability to provoke emotion, and if we allow it, mood. When I submit a photograph under the Category of Mood it's an invitation to partake of the emotions that I hope it provokes and allow them to linger for a bit as a mood.

mood is a feeling for my concern, sth that you feel, emotionally when watching sth specific, -here a photograph in this term.

I would suggest that photographs do not bear a mood, but may contain the elements that evoke a certain mood amongst the viewers. Thus the mood is not in the image, but in the viewers mind. Maybe a little like sheet music...

For me it's the 'taste' of the image

Emotional 'taste'...

I would argue that it's the "flavor" of an image. Now, I'm taking a bit of liberty with the language here. But the distinction is that the "taste" is what the photographer puts in there to entice or provoke you. The "flavor" is the way each individual viewer reacts to that provocation. Now the former is definitely variable as we all know, composition, shutter speed, aperture, etc. What I think we need to make sure that we all realize is that the flavor or mood that an image might generate in a viewer is far more variable and it's completely out of our control. AND with photography, maybe more so than other mediums, very different with other photographers vs. a more general public audience.

Reading that put me in a poetic mood. 

Wax on my King, wax on...

I agree. Maybe tell us about how you feel mood should / can be perceived. You brought up the topic, so give us something to discuss from your POV.

Is it assumed that Robert himself did not write those Wiki statements?

I think a mood from a photograph generally lasts for a shorter time that Wikipedia would suggest. So if I am (or you are, or we are, teasing a bit) elegiac or elated after I see a certain picture, how long would that last? Not for days, not with me, for sure. As long as I look it at it, perhaps? In exceptional cases half an hour longer?
I like that.

I also think for a long while that often people like not art per se, but their feelings, their mood that this art invokes. Why some people listen to one and the same song many times? To get themselves in a pretty much the same emotional state, mood that they like, or want, or need...

Robert firstly the clear point to make regarding the word mood is that it is regarded as a psychological state. As you correctly point out a mood can be positive or negative. And the underlying reason behind a mood is that a mood will have been triggered by any number of emotional responses. As Kenp suggests a photograph is a vehicle that can transport us to place where we give fresh vitality to similar emotional responses or reactions that we associate with those past events or experiences. I will be bold & say that in fact you cannot have a mood in a photograph but that photograph can convey something that triggers a mood & clearly this can be positive or negative. Mood is a collective word for a bunch of emotions it describes a state. If you consider also the commonly held misconception that someone can make you feel like such and such it is nonsense as nobody or nothing can MAKE you feel you feel in response or in reaction to something or rather just as a photograph cannot MAKE you feel.

Therefore it follows that all photographs as in fact all art will have the propensity to convey mood to illicit an emotional response which therefore makes a nonsense of having a separate category mood!

However while the latter may be the case in the strictest use of the term mood it is understandable to devise a category that gives carte blanch to photographers to interpret mood outside of the norms & conventions of all the other more rigid categories perhaps enabling a greater freedom around post production manipulation to the use of in camera techniques that distort & twist things so that the results & final image are not so normally tangible & are placing more emphasis or are inviting the viewer to interpret the image through their own experiences & feelings. Thus approach is more arbitrary more flexible less rigid.

So the choice of the word mood in terms of art has come to be understood as more metaphysical. Lets say for example I take a number of images that appear in this category I would describe them as follows;

http://1x.com/photo/46527/category/mood/latest-additions/autumn-symphony

Haunting; delicate; hopeful; certain;

http://1x.com/photo/45313/category/mood/latest-additions/heavy-winter (there is clearly lots of photoshop here)

cold; compassion; fragile; helpless

But coming back to you Robert I like Clive also wonder why you choose to raise this topic since you never added your ideas or thoughts just stating it would be good to start a discussion. Is your mood purely altruistic? Not sure. I suggest more a disgruntled artist concerned at failing to get your work recognised here & disturbed by the poor interpretation of this category mood. But I am certain you can enlighten us.And Anna this is not touche or am I attempting to demolish your statement rather I would challenge this if I understand your jumble of words correctly. If you are correct then I would reckon on seeing more comments here than just one or two or three words statements examples of which might be "I like it" "I love it" "excellent: "great". None of these statements describe a feeling or emotion or a mood! because I think rather than what you suggest few people are able to see any connection between their feelings & their viewing experience with art they struggle to put words to feelings & emotions men in particular! Anna I am interested to read how you can almost contradict yourself in the same post. You use the analogy of listening to music to present an idea that in fact people will hook onto certain songs to continually wrap themselves in a mood to prolong it yet you suggest that a mood in a photograph (I would add painting) disperses fairly quickly. Why then do people buy prints & paintings to hang on their walls is this not a similar mode of permanently capturing the mood evoked by a particular piece as with music? The act of buying the print or the original (lets us discount for this moment the high end transfers & exchanges that are not all about emotion & mood well getting rich I guess is almost a mood) is the same as continually playing a piece of music. 

An interesting adjunct to this discussion would be how words both written & spoken can evoke a mood easier than a painting or a photograph. When someone else attaches words to their feelings or ideas we can become incensed or enraged very quickly perhaps because we can instantly recognise meaning in these words (though how often we are right in this interpretation is up for grabs & a whole new debating point) yet because art is that much more impenetrable often we find it difficult to place meaning on a feeling we have & how it links to what we see. Maybe this is another good reason behind having a category called mood because it may encourage us more to find these associations.

i think every photo has a mood (if i understand the word correctly)... "boring" everyday photos have the "boring everyday mood", holliday photos have the "holliday mood" and so on...

other moods we like, like the "misty morning mood" or the "sad and melancholic mood".... 

important is that the mood gets transported by the photo, but, every viewer has different association to different moods...

Gerry I saw this post earlier and thought oh my  - my field - maybe I can write something relevant. I went to write and had to stop for something...and when I came back I saw your post and thought...

Hi Phyllis,

Generally, I agree with you that you cannot trust Wikipedia 100% (I'd estimate it 95% on non-controversial issues, on average). But in this particular case I am actually interested in your opinion about the OP citations: do you see some mistakes or misinterpretations? Or are these citations just incomplete? They don't talk about art, that is certainly so.

-Anna

So you are saying that a photograph can trigger a mood (via something) but cannot make you feel. Just to understand your thought better: are you saying that a photograph (or any art) is not guaranteed to invoke a feeling, yet can do so? Or do you mean something else?
"commonly held misconception that someone can make you feel like such and such it is nonsense". It happens all the time. For example, if this someone is a manipulator or a bully, and the other person does not understand it or is not able to stand against it.

I liked a lot your description of the Mood category. Your second mood example, a bird under a winter storm, is one of my favorite pictures on 1X :-) .
-----------------I assume this was in response to my thoughts below (let me know if this is not the case). Well, I think that "I like/love it" or "Great/Excellent" do describe, albeit briefly, one of the following emotions:  interest, attraction, admiration, delight, pleasure, etc.(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_emotions) . As of why comments are so brief? A topic of a new discussion with a poll among members :-) .----------It depends on the context, no contradiction. If you admired a picture never to return to it, or maybe just a couple of times, then the mood is more likely, I think, to disperse quickly. If you return to a picture over and over, or if you buy it for your house as you write later in your post, then yes, probably partially to prolong the mood or to allow yourself a possibility of "re-creating the mood on demand". It's a whole new topic again, though, why people hang pictures on the walls. Certainly, not only mood is involved. I also think that music that we like is a more powerful mood trigger than pictures that we like (yet another topic to ask what people think in this respect). And I agree with you that on average words are even more powerful mood triggers.

P.S. One of the differences between music and photography as mood triggers is the average time people listen to their favorite music or look at their favorite picture. An average modern song is usually longer than 3 minutes. A part of a classical piece with about the same mood is even longer than that. I'd think that on average we look on a picture for a much shorter time, especially in the context of 1X where there are so many pictures to choose from. So the mood has much longer time, strictly on average, to develop, to fully develop, when we listen to music, than when we look at a photograph. You have to dedicate time to your favorite music as long as it lasts, yet you can visually scan a picture in mere seconds....

What they offer is a very basic understanding of what a mood is; which as a result offers us a very limited understanding. So in that sense they will be incomplete.

Anna there are two extremely important words in all our lives the first is choice the second is will. There are very few situations in any of our lives where we are unable to exercise both of these. And specifically in the context of Roberts original post it is entirely feasible that there will be no instances where you will be forced against our will to choose to like or dislike a piece of art. To imagine anything else is frankly why people loose hope & we all can imagine the consequences of total despair can't we?

Nobody can or will MAKE you like or dislike anything; you do so of you own volition to say the opposite is to deny you have free will. Even in the case of bullying or manipulation (I assume I hope correctly you are not talking about photoshop here) you are not being made to do anything you are just succumbing to a greater force & therefore abdicating any responsibility for your actions to another power. It is the mantra of the negative I can just hear it "you have put me in a mood"  "you make me angry" "you always make me feel stupid" followed by stomping feet slammed doors withdrawal prolonged silence disassociation etc etc etc. I can't imagine hearing someone say "you make me love you"....I must state here that I am totally against any form of bullying or manipulation (not photoshop).

By stating that you are being MADE to do something against your will like crying or getting angry or becoming elated you are denying the ability to choose. And here is the rub. This is a common theme in a world that is driven by fault! In other words when you claim that an other MAKE(S) you do something you immediately apportion blame on that person & absolve yourself of any part of that outcome or consequences placing the fault elsewhere. It is a facile notion and frankly the sooner all of us recognise this the better place this world will become. This belief is the belief that fashions wars arguments fights divorce hatred & proliferates many more negative events in our lives. It is the ultimate self fulfilling prophecy!

Once you can take responsibility for your actions then you can take responsibility for doing something about it next time. A painting or a photograph cannot MAKE you like it. A photograph or a painting cannot MAKE you go into a mood.

A photograph or a painting can invite you to regress into an old experience to associate or attach to a deeper emotion but in all of this you can choose to go there or not. You can deny it exists or you can accept it. And if you accept it you can shape it & how you shape it is to put words to this emotion to explain it to give understanding to it so you can share it.

Great & excellent I imagine (I know but have the time to check) are not in the Wiki list of emotions & do not elucidate in any way upon what the emotion is that is stirring inside us. Simply it doesn't say anything about the why yet 9 times in 10 most know why but fail to share it either because they cannot put words to feelings or haven't got time or both.

And yes some understandably find it difficult to place words to feelings & emotions for many it is a cultural thing deep rooted & you know what it is because there are so many cultures in this world that would have us deny our emotions which brings us full circle back to the beginning & your inadvertent choice of the word manipulation. We (I use the word we as a general we because I cannot place a volume on this) have been manipulated into believing it is not the done thing to have emotions. No wonder some can only use high level words such as like/great/excellent which are supposed to convey our reasons for liking.

None of these words offer anything other than yes encouragement. They do not offer growth! & growth is a common human need. I cannot deny that I enjoy & am grateful reading the comments I receive against my images but few tell me anything about the person leaving them few express words that tell me what it is in my work that excites them or affects their mood or persuades in them their taste. To say I like the mood tells me nothing because what is the mood that they see or feel. Of course when it comes to language you could dismiss this debate as meaningless but I do not because it is about gaining understanding it is about learning or growing it is about sharing it is about finding common ground & it is about taking responsibility for and acknowledging our feelings & ultimately our mood as our own not something that is created by others.

Robert although you have disappeared since you launched this pebble in the pond & not come back to add to this debate probably because unlike us you are out with your camera!I hope you sense that this post of mine is not drifting too far off your original theme if it has I apologise.

       

OK, further investigation is required to know either way whether  these citations are accurate.Wikipedia is not, of course, a source of information to actually learn Quantum Mechanics (if you type Quantum Physics it will correctly redirect you to Quantum Mechanics). You need a more detailed textbook for that, as a bare minimum, not to mention all the prerequisite knowledge. But, assuming you do have this prerequisite knowledge, the corresponding article is, not surprisingly for me, very good and thorough. This because such articles, not only in Physics, almost invariably are written by professionals and, very importantly, are watched mostly by professionals. In a particular case of the quantum mechanics article watched by 795 watchers. In such a situation it is very difficult to "vandalize" such an article or write incorrect statements there for any significant period of time. So depending on how much you want to learn about quantum mechanics (I know, it's hypothetical only) Wikipedia just might be your answer, almost guaranteed to be correct within a given level of details. One may try this as well, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introduction_to_quantum_mechanics :-) .

And these thoughts apply to many and many areas of knowledge reflected in Wikipedia. The less hard science it is about, the more controversial issue is, the more probability that a given article may not appear accurate. But Wikipedia is also surprisingly good in presenting different points of view, like a brief article about emotions that I quoted for Gerard, which presents different emotion classifications. I may or may not have time today to answer to Gerard but rest assured I do have what to disagree about and to agree with  ;-) ....

I don't have a clue as to  your point here with this post. We are not discussing Quantum theory are we? I think you understand I used that as an example only.I would say again..don't trust Wikipedia.That is your experience...so trust it. Clearly in this case Wiki does not have an accurate understanding of mood as to how it relates to you.

I have written that "I know, it's hypothetical only", so yes, I understand that you used it as an example. You omitted my point in your quote, so maybe you missed it. In that case, briefly repeating the gist of my point: "And these thoughts apply to many and many areas of knowledge reflected in Wikipedia." In short: Wikipedia is much better and much more accurate in many areas (see details in my previous post) that you seem to think.Well,  it's an introduction only thus says little. However if you start clicking on links in this introduction, for example the "emotional state" one (mood according to this intro is an emotional state), then you see much more information and, of course, there is no need to restrict oneself to an introduction only.Depending on your goal. If the goal is to offer knowledgeable treatment, of course Wikipedia is not enough, for pretty much the same reason Wikipedia is not enough to actually learn Quantum Mechanics (I have mentioned that). But, again, within the given level of details (that is a very important part of my point!), Wikipedia tends to be pretty accurate for the reasons I already mentioned in my previous post.A mood from an art piece is a very specific kind of mood. Unless I missed it, the articles that we discussed just do not talk about it.Me myself is not statistics. Yes, I can glean something within myself, but I am much more interested in what other people collectively and individually feel, think and write about art. Also, I think that pictures much more often trigger short-lived emotions and not longer lived mood. So far I don't see Wikipedia being inaccurate in this particular respect.No. I pretty much already wrote about it: "Wikipedia is not, of course, a source of information to actually learn Quantum Mechanics ... And these thoughts apply to many and many areas of knowledge reflected in Wikipedia. "

Well,I read through all of what you wrote in your last post twice. 

Besides an obvious reason of answering a post addressed to me, which also included your questions to me? To rephrase my opinion about Wikipedia in general and about mood in Wikipedia (see the OP) because it turned out that there was still some misunderstanding between us in this respect. I agree with you that it's all covered now (as much as we are both willing to cover it in this discussion).Here are I pretty much agree with Ken and Gerard:    So, back to your question, I don't think that a photo has mood. But there are numerous well known and less known elements of a picture, correspondingly less original and more original, that can trigger a certain emotional state, be it a short-lived emotion or a longer lasting mood (deliberately quoting Wikipedia here). Well known are lone trees and lone people, a longing sad expression (especially of a beautiful young girl) etc. Inasmuch that I know that the lone tree is there for the reason to evoke, say, melancholy in me, I am still not immune to its well-proven charms. Less so than before, being a bit jaded in this respect, true. I strongly prefer less defined moods, less tangible ones, or expressed using less common elements. Kaveh's today excellent series come to mind, a mixture of more common and less common elements. But just "mood triggering elements" by themselves is not all. How they are combined, how they are expressed, what else is there, are all important factors as well, in general and for defining an emotion or mood.
     I am fine with pictures with no mood per se, like many nature shots, where I can admire (still an emotion) wildlife's beauty, or the light, or learn something about the animals behavior. No mood in a picture in a sense discussed so far, yet still emotions in me.

Hoping for a reciprocal favor, Phyllis, of you answering your own question :-) . Somebody else as well?

-Anna

Post #2 above, I'm feelin' a bit ignored. Ken said pretty much the same thing I did, but nobody has really responded to me. And I think you girls should schedule a meet up!! Maybe in Annapolis, a beautiful town for a walk around...

Clyde, 7 people liked your post and you feel ignored???? Alrighty, have one more, well deserved :-)

The physicist:  Psychology is easy.  Physics is hard.

Yes, yes, King, I remember your preferences: shorter posts and shorter discussions :-) BTW, I think that both physics and psychology, when studied and applied in earnest, are hard and require a lot of time to learn. Still psychology books "for everyone" are much more popular than physics books "for everyone". Closer to our everyday needs and everyday life, perhaps?

On my bookshelf within easy reach, among others:

All good read :-) . The last one, have to admit, caught most attention ;-)...

Thanks for explaining what you prefer in your mood...Well as you know when we repost from a quote...we get a person who did not make the quote. So yes..that was my question to you....not your question...just in case anyone - not you  of course - is wondering...

I can find that also if they are not focused, and very intellectually bent. This is perhaps why I like Cohen so much his music  can go either way...I have his new CD BTW..Bill bought it...it is brilliant. 

I find this layout very difficult to read, especially long posts. The individual lines are way toooo long. Narrower columns are far easier to read. Newspapers proved that long ago, but hey! You can't tell this new generation anything...

I find that empty lines after quotes visually lengthens a post which is not otherwise that long, especially when double quotes are involved like here, right above. It is, probably, better for the readability purposes though. On my computer I wrote 2 lines in this post but with the double quote and its text it takes 16 lines.

We might need a philosophical definition of "mood" instead of a psychological one. I will try to track one down from one or two of the sacred cows of philosophy and will bring it to the table.  

This is what Heidegger elaborated about mood:

Hegel:

And here is a free read about mood and ethics. Philosophy´s Moods: the affective grounds of thinking   

Let's see.  Thesis...antithesis...........

King I find your humour very enlightening. 

...yeah. Puts me in a strange mood :-)

Hey, I'm serious.

Hi King! Concrete examples may clarify what exactly do you mean. :)

Here is a 1x example (I personally do not like so much, particularly the composition with the legs, etc., also the light, etc.)
http://1x.com/photo/42417

I wonder if the mood in this photo is 'acceptable'...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/alessiacampostrini/4775694578

For me 'the mood' may be that very 'essence' of what I 'like' ('like' in the most complex possible sense) and is probably entirely subjective. It perhaps has to do a lot with the 'meaning' (which is almost impossible to define). Pretty hopeless (I know :) ).

When thinking of women's breasts, the word concrete rarely comes to mind.

I see you really ARE out of touch with life in SoCal...

King so was I!But marble (marvel) does!

The concept of mood in fact can be associated with the wonderment at the thought for (some) men & (perhaps some) women of breasts. But without words associating the mood to a sensation we are none the wiser. The mood has to be guessed at to dimension it.

In a philosophical sense then the mood has a cause or as the Greeks called it an "aition" hence sensation. A mood is or could be a melange of sensations known or unknown by the person experiencing the mood. What we (I imagine that others do) want in the ideal as artists (I consider myself one simply because others do also) is for viewers to dimension this mood.

Here is where the debate gets from philosophical to scientific & that is what begets the mood. Well I suggest that the mood is arrived at by a series of thoughts. Thoughts that at times come to us faster than a bullet ideas connections associations notions that we derive from the experience of viewing.

And yes as you say the mood could easily be dynamic in that it could change across the the front page to encompass so many sensations as we bombard our senses with the viewing experience.Yes Robert the very essence of what you like but what is this essence is essential for understanding. And the meaning will be variable & perhaps irrelevant to the artist but relevant to the viewer. Though as is the case in understanding our experiences & response or reaction to so much in life may so often be an illusion & hence fabricated though nonetheless real for being so because a sensation is real we feel it and so it must be real. But the thought that got us to the sensation may be patently false!

However the prolongation of this sensation comes about by our propensity to cogitate upon an idea linked to a sensation. We will want to proliferate those sensations that are positive but limit those sensations that are negative. Yet we still are capable of becoming overpowered by a depression which after all is a prolonged negative mood!

There are some psychologists at present who would have you believe that depression however debilitating it appears to us to be in is worst case is in fact nurtured in some as it provides certainty it provides succour & comfort. But thats another story.

I still think having a category for mood is pointless because is not all art about mood?

As I said King your humour is enlightening. I still have no better idea of what you are thinking when you view "Pretty photo of womens breasts..." because what for you is a good mood & why do seeing womens breasts put you there? The phrase pandoras box comes to mind!

As in seeking pleasure and avoiding pain?Are you saying that some people aren't happy unless they're miserable?My point, exactly.

Exactly!Exactly

Perhaps a simpler explanation (not so philosophically deep and for people who are interested in what I guess they would believe is a 'common sense' view of the things) we could say that the mood in photography is  the ability to convey other deeper than 'pure visual' meaning (well, of course, I know, one should define what is 'pure visual', what is meaning, etc., but let us for now confine ourselves to the 'common sense' understanding of these).

(now follow my personal views on concrete 1x photos and I do apologize to the authors if I offended them in any way)

Example 1:

http://1x.com/photo/36625

It's a photo of miners, or course you will say, well it is not, it's a photo about happiness in life, about that sphere of our existence we may well not be aware of, but which probably matters immensely to us, even when looking at the life from a 'practical' stand point. :) well that is how I saw it once ;) and as being purely subjective an volatile it may be plain 'wrong'.

Example 2:

http://1x.com/photo/27734

This photo is perhaps not merely a photo of an old man, it could refer to mortality of humans, to external sources of goodness and happiness, a compassion, etc.

Examples of the photos of women (from my 1x favourites) which (for me personally at the moment :) ) have fair 'amount' of 'mood':

http://1x.com/photo/46023
http://1x.com/photo/44104
http://1x.com/photo/43692
http://1x.com/photo/39749
http://1x.com/photo/40646
http://1x.com/photo/39012
http://1x.com/photo/39873
http://1x.com/photo/38844
http://1x.com/photo/30038
http://1x.com/photo/38546
http://1x.com/photo/37766
http://1x.com/photo/37165
http://1x.com/photo/36060
http://1x.com/photo/18686
http://1x.com/photo/34039
http://1x.com/photo/33996
http://1x.com/photo/33420
http://1x.com/photo/32356
http://1x.com/photo/31803
http://1x.com/photo/30249
http://1x.com/photo/29816
http://1x.com/photo/23659
http://1x.com/photo/25945
http://1x.com/photo/27236
http://1x.com/photo/27360
http://1x.com/photo/14581
http://1x.com/photo/25323
http://1x.com/photo/19514
http://1x.com/photo/26413

Examples of the photos of women (from my 1x favourites) which (for me personally at the moment :) ) have less, little or no 'mood':

http://1x.com/photo/42624
http://1x.com/photo/39182
http://1x.com/photo/43056
http://1x.com/photo/42220
http://1x.com/photo/41835
http://1x.com/photo/30160
http://1x.com/photo/39497
http://1x.com/photo/39292
http://1x.com/photo/39255
http://1x.com/photo/39326
http://1x.com/photo/39008
http://1x.com/photo/37532
http://1x.com/photo/37375
http://1x.com/photo/37308
http://1x.com/photo/35312
http://1x.com/photo/35746
http://1x.com/photo/35080
http://1x.com/photo/34762
http://1x.com/photo/33609
http://1x.com/photo/31810
http://1x.com/photo/31098
http://1x.com/photo/30271
http://1x.com/photo/29663
http://1x.com/photo/28946
http://1x.com/photo/9522
http://1x.com/photo/25813
http://1x.com/photo/16981
http://1x.com/photo/27864
http://1x.com/photo/27717
http://1x.com/photo/27714
http://1x.com/photo/27607
http://1x.com/photo/26021
http://1x.com/photo/27511
http://1x.com/photo/27219
http://1x.com/photo/27274
http://1x.com/photo/27089
http://1x.com/photo/27083
http://1x.com/photo/24658
http://1x.com/photo/26815
http://1x.com/photo/14835
http://1x.com/photo/25194

But then!

One may argue then aren't all (at least non-begginer) photographers after something 'more substantial' in photography?

My mood on looking at a straightforward, technical photograph of a spider will depend on whether or not I am afraid of spiders or like them.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/robert-jurjevic/4679168026

Yikes!  Run away!  Run away!

I am sorry King! :)

what about your mood when looking at a spider walking over a womans breast? 

Psychologists call that "cognitive dissonance."  Works like this:

in not so long past if somebody would put me in a lift full of beautiful girls, women, ladies, all well dressed, full of life, etc., the first though on my mind would be... pleeeease let me ooout! pleeeease let me ooout! ...now some other thoughts slowly spring into my mind... arachnophobia is 'nothing' when compared to claustrophobia ;)

Surely this off topic should be in bugs the strict master thread!

Forget about Hegel and Co. . BTW Hegel was a bore.

What is mood? I don't know. I just know "good" and "bad" mood are both good.

I'm pretty sure that was 2 points.

No, I'm pretty sure that what they call around these parts "story".

Mood. Hmm Some times when submitting I find the word mood something like thin ice.. I wonder who is in the mood. After awhile  I discover many have mood.  Which is a good thing .. I guess.  Is mood a loaded question:)

Not a single masculine mood? Mountain mood? Kiddy mood? CE mood? You are easy to please:) True words. I find that my appreciation of mood correlates with the mood I'm in. 

Well if you are talking about women, which maybe what  some know more about than others. then whats the point.

You must know how to set a mood.
I bought my wife an ironing-board for her birthday. She was so touched that she burst into tears. That's how you create a 'mood'.

And it seems that you were touched by her appreciation. Which created a mood in yourself, never mind whether you 'set the mood'. Indeed not a concept that can be wrapped in a box and labelled. I think that 'mood' is the prevailing requirement when it comes to appreciation of an image. I think that it applies across all genre's. Which is actually a strange realisation for me personally, for I never thought that some images can do that for me. Take Sven's series of Paris as a recent example where mood manages to ooze from architecture. 

Or with another wife, she might hit you over the head with it - creating a hole in your head - and you might burst into tears.  And if you lived in the US you would then get a few thousand dollars bill from the Emergency Room Visit - and you would both burst into tears... so the mood would even be more intense. 

Some woman just don't know how lucky they are!

Hi Andre, I have chosen the same 'subject' (which I admit is of interest to me :) ) perhaps with a wish to eliminate other differences (i.e., they are all more or less similar photos 'subject-wise'). Regards, Robert