I am glad you brought up the subject.

Firstly, photography is first and foremost creative and secondly it is technical. So I think it is eminently worthwhile trying to see if we can attend to the creative side of photography.

Secondly it seems to me that the structure of this site is very well suited to examining the creative aspects of photos. The ability to up-vote/down-vote questions and up-vote comments is exactly what we need for critiquing photos.

Thirdly, the ability to make intelligent critiques of photos is important and should be encouraged.

Here is how I think it could work:

1. We put 'Photos' as a new entry on the top menu, next to 'Meta'.
2. Moderators (or others) create a new photographic subject or 'challenge' as a new question under the 'Photos' entry. The rules, subject and duration will be given here.
3. Individuals post their photos as 'Answers'.
4. Others can up-vote or down-vote the photo.
5. Critiques can be given in the comments to the photo (Answer).
6. Critiques (Comments) can be up-voted.

A person's reputation will become the aggregate of the reputation earned in the Technical section and in the Photo section. This is as it should be as photographers are first and foremost respected for their creative ability.

The up-votes people receive for their critiques should also contribute to their reputation since intelligent critiques are an important aspect of photography.

I think this is eminently possible since it would only require minor changes to the coding (OK, minor is a matter of debate)

And a final note. The person who posted the question (Subject or challenge) will select the photo as a winner. If it is not the photo with the highest number of votes then he must of course give a careful motivation.

I am glad you brought up the subject.

Firstly, photography is first and foremost creative and secondly it is technical. So I think it is eminently worthwhile trying to see if we can attend to the creative side of photography.

Secondly it seems to me that the structure of this site is very well suited to examining the creative aspects of photos. The ability to up-vote/down-vote questions and up-vote comments is exactly what we need for critiquing photos.

Thirdly, the ability to make intelligent critiques of photos is important and should be encouraged.

Here is how I think it could work:

1. We put 'Photos' as a new entry on the top menu, next to 'Meta'.
2. Moderators (or others) create a new photographic subject or 'challenge' as a new question under the 'Photos' entry. The rules, subject and duration will be given here.
3. Individuals post their photos as 'Answers'.
4. Others can up-vote or down-vote the photo.
5. Critiques can be given in the comments to the photo (Answer).
6. Critiques (Comments) can be up-voted.

A person's reputation will become the aggregate of the reputation earned in the Technical section and in the Photo section. This is as it should be as photographers are first and foremost respected for their creative ability.

The up-votes people receive for their critiques should also contribute to their reputation since intelligent critiques are an important aspect of photography.

I think this is eminently possible since it would only require minor changes to the coding (OK, minor is a matter of debate)

And a final note. The person who posted the question (Subject or challenge) will select the winning photo. If it is not the photo with the highest number of votes then he must of course give a careful motivation.