ADVANCED section!

[brandon skyy]

I think it would be great to split the showcasing into Newbie (or Novice) and Advanced. In FACT, it might just be great to have an entire Newbie section, and an entire Advanced section. The skill level of all noobs and all, more experienced designers is difficult ONLY because sometimes I want to go and look at some advanced work, but takes a while to weed through the less experienced photoshoppers. I love helping less experienced designers become better, but sometimes you just want to critique more advanced work.

MAYBE, there could even be a section to post your work to be determined whether advanced or novice. I dont know how far the capabilities of a forum is, but if we could have under our profile pics whether we are Advanced or Novice would be great.

I really think this would be a great idea.

 

[Zeealex]

i like the idea allot i think it would be great to sort stuff out, but i wouldn't call myself a newbie or advanced i would be of a more intermediate level. so perhaps newbie, intermediate and advanced sections?

 

[brandon skyy]

That actually sounds like a nice idea. Three different skill levels. I like it. Thanks for the support of this. I hope we can get the Mods to hook it up for us.

 

[Zeealex]

yeah so do i, it would be great.

 

[ibclare]

I find this idea interesting but also have misgivings. Forum are pretty open platforms, though of course they have their rules and limitations. Must! If admin decides this fits the tenor of PS Gurus, I hope they'll consider a trial period of letting people "police" their own categorization, gently telling a novice he/she should not post in Advanced. I don't care for the idea of assigning classes, judging who is at what level. OTOH, with 3 levels, maybe it is fairly obvious. :-] And I admit that there is a practicality to the idea.

(I think it's the libra rising and all the air in my horoscope that has me wobbling from side to side ROFL)

 

[brandon skyy]

I find this idea interesting but also have misgivings. Forum are pretty open platforms, though of course they have their rules and limitations. Must! If admin decides this fits the tenor of PS Gurus, I hope they'll consider a trial period of letting people "police" their own categorization, gently telling a novice he/she should not post in Advanced. I don't care for the idea of assigning classes, judging who is at what level. OTOH, with 3 levels, maybe it is fairly obvious. :-] And I admit that there is a practicality to the idea.

(I think it's the libra rising and all the air in my horoscope that has me wobbling from side to side ROFL)

Its bound to happen. Someone who has too much ego or incredibly high self esteem decides to post in the advanced section, he's going to be told by, particularly me if I see it, what his skill level is. It's not to cripple his ego, but the sections are made for a purpose. To be able to critique the level of skill you want, I mean its frustrating trying to find a legit design to critique sometimes. Like I said, I have no problem giving advice to less experienced, but sometimes you want to actually criticize something advanced.

 

[Paul]

Then just say what you see, why bother putting people into boxes. And who are you or i or anyone here to be the ones to say yes or no to someones level of ability and then say to them, you can only post in this section because you are not as good as others. Theres no sense of community or friendship with your idea.
A lot of 'noobs' your wording, would not bother to post here if they actually noticed they are going to post into a self proclaimed 'idiot' box, because thats what people will think, it's human nature.
I came here and joined because of the close contact with members who are obviously more talented than i am, and after a little while i realised with time and patience anyone can become half decent at this lovely addiction.
If admin see fit to promote such areas then so be it, but me for one see it as a step back, the name here says what it says Photoshop Gurus Community Forum.

 

[siodre]

i like this idea. it'd be easier to know what level of advice to give when replying to questions based on what section they were posted under. i don't think it's so much labeling people as much as people labeling their own abilities. for example, i'd post in the advanced section for selections and masking, but wouldn't be at all ashamed to post in the beginner section my questions about hdr.

 

[Hoogle]

I have to agree with Belial on this 1 mainly on the point photoshop is such a wide based piece of software that can be used in numerous ways I doubt there are many users that are advanced in every category would you break it down to Advance photo touch up, advanced beauty makeovers advanced graphic design, advanced layering and advanced 3d + another 100 categories. I am in no means an advanced user I am confident in the way photoshop works and I like to play around. I have a friend that can paint amazing pictures play with shapes and have amazing outcomes he is excellent at what he does but put a raw format photo in front of him and ask him to touch it up and he would not know where to start. There is a big difference between banter and yes maybe there is competitiveness but at the end of the day we are here to all work together. I have seen some really Noobish work as you would put it but has incorporated some really good ideas and has made me go away and see how to incorporate it into 1 of my pieces. I hope we Dont go down the line of titles per skill of the program because what seems easy to you will be really hard to someone else and vice versa.

 

[Paul]

Great point H, 'even noobs' come up with ideas that 'pros' use (borrow/nick) if they was to be honest with themselves and everyone else.
I run the internal contest here, just a bit of fun aiming to get ALL levels to post and have a go, encouraging others to talk about them in good and bad ways, but always positive remarks, and it was in that very thread that i was doing something else and my prayers got answered someone posted something and it was that which gave me the new seeds to go grow into what i could not get my head around.

 

[Paul]

Just to add, i made the griffin image a while ago now, but because of new threads it gave me this idea.
Goes a long with the current thread i suppose, not brilliant but an idea all the same.

 

[brandon skyy]

i like this idea. it'd be easier to know what level of advice to give when replying to questions based on what section they were posted under. i don't think it's so much labeling people as much as people labeling their own abilities. for example, i'd post in the advanced section for selections and masking, but wouldn't be at all ashamed to post in the beginner section my questions about hdr.

Exactly my thinking. Forget the idea of just being labeled advanced, it makes sense that some are advanced in some things and not in others. Like I would make a post in the advanced section on say, retouching, but probably a beginner or intermediate with logos.

 

[admin]

Hey Brandon, thanks for the suggestion.

We definitely do read all the site suggestions and consider them carefully.

I think the only reason we may not want to do this at the present time is that we think there are already too many forums. It's a bit overwhelming for some new users.

We have been slowly moving posts and trimming back the number of forums over the past few months and we still want to shrink the total number of forums a bit more.

I'll talk to the other staff about this idea and let you know. It might be a better idea to do things by skill level rather than by having so many topic-specific forums.

Feel free to continue making any other suggestions you think might improve the forums for the community.

 

[brandon skyy]

Administrator thinks its a good idea! Hell yea.