Giving criticsm on a work, when not an expert

[Robert Kirkland]

This popped into my head while reading some posts on here.

What's your opinion on someone giving criticism on a work, when they're not even that good/an expert at/on it? For example, if a person posts an art piece, and a person whom is not a "good" (by standards) artist criticizes it, what would your response to that be?

Just wondering.

Edit: Is this even the right forum? If not, please move it. D:

[Aleema]

I don't think it disqualifies their critique as being useful, since "critique" is simply one person's judgement from the beginning, not the facts of life and you lose at art, period. It's an opinion and why that opinion was formed. And everyone, experts or not, have opinions.

I do think that non-experts don't give as good critique. They may not know the proper terminology, and they can't give suggestions on how to improve, and if they do it's probably unreasonable or misguided, making it no help at all.

Dismissing non-experts, I think, is a mistake. And I don't even think a response is even necessary, just hear what they have to say. No one wants to be told "yeah, well, you suck at drawing, so don't tell me how to draw." That just makes you look bad, since they might have had valid things to say. How could you ever say a movie you saw was good/bad if you've never made better movies yourself?

[LVUER]

You don't need to be a good soccer player to know if someone a good soccer player or not (in fact, it's harder to judge yourself than other). Same with art. You know good art even if you can't draw stick figures... though knowing art could make you give better critiques.

So it's alright to give critique even if you're no experts in that fields, as long you genuinely care about that artist development, and didn't bear any ill will when giving the critique.

But just remember that there is a good/useful critique, and there is a bad one (or even useless). Pick the good one and throw away the bad one. Being an expert in a field meaning you indeed could give those needed critiques, not some junk comments.

[machinist]

hey if they can spot things i can't why not lol

[Deji]

Actually there are people with a really critic eye that are able to tell that there is something worn on other people's works but just lack the skills to create that kind of things themselves, so you shouldn't dismiss them just because they can't do what they're judging themselves!

Having a non-expert tell you that something doens't seem right most of the time actually means something is not quite right.
Sure it's way more helpful to have somebody telling you exactly what's wrong and hopefully give you a whole lesson on how to fix it so you never get it wrong again, but sometimes that kind of people is not available and you'll just have to do with people saying "hmm... there's somethign worng with this..." and you'll have to figure out what it is and how to fix it yourself.

[Snowflower]

Actually there are people with a really critic eye that are able to tell that there is something worn on other people's works but just lack the skills to create that kind of things themselves

Agreed,

Some people are grammar nazis. However, they may never have the creativity to write pieces on their own. That doesn't mean they can't give constructive criticism, right?

People who cannot draw to save a life can still tell you which parts of someone else's drawing looks unnatural.

[Loveli]

I think it really doesn't matter every comment is useful in some way, at last that's how I see it.
Also:

I agree whit Deji. That and by having to find it out yourself you also improve way more then when someone teaches you, or that how I see it. I have always liked finding things out on my own and improving on my own, but when I need help... well then I need it, but I won't look for it until I tried it my self and failed. It makes me feel like I really improved... Actually I really hate when people start asking me to tell them how to fix something when they haven't even tried to fix it by themselves.

[Mirage]

You don't have to be a cook to know if the food tastes bad.
You don't have to be a movie maker to know if a movie is terrible.
I can list so many things in a similar vein, but you get my point.

The thing is, by being a good artist, it lends credibility that the person know what they are talking about. Most people would listen to an art teacher's advice than a random person on street.

On the other hand, people who are good at what they are doing are sometimes blinded by experiences and less likely to see things from the other side of the coin. In this area, an innocence eye can provide a completely different outlook.

[kinougames]

Giving advice in something you're experienced in will always top giving advice in something you aren't. While that advice should not necessarily be ignored, it should absolutely be taken less stringently than advice from a professional. At the same time, beware of "personal preference" advice. Some advice is more objective than others, and some advice is highly specific and following or not following the advice will not change the intrinsic value of the picture.

For example, if I draw a red stick figure, and someone says "Mmm, it needs to be a blue stick figure", that's highly likely to be a personal preference that doesn't change the actual value of the art. Very meticulous highly experienced artists might get into details that are too small to necessarily have to worry about.

Honestly, critique is all about knowing how to take it.

[Lekhaka]

Experience is not necessarily related to the validity of a statement, for reasons mentioned in the previous posts. So...judge criticism on an a case-by-case basis? But if you cannot do that for some reason, then I suppose a good heuristic approach would be to give less weight the critiques of the less experienced.

[Greeny]

Just think of it this way:

Whatever you're making, your target audience probably consists of mostly non-experts, and it's those people you want to appeal to.