After a year and a half back into film photography, I figured the day would come when I buy a camera with a roll of film in it. This day came in June, when I bought a Minolta Freedom Zoom 160 Date (also known as Riva Zoom 160) off of eBay. When I received it, I noticed the green of Fuji C200 in the little window on the back. The roll was about half exposed. I rewound it, and after determining that yes, the camera does work, I sent off the roll to be developed and waited in anticipation. The Freedom Zoom 160 was released around 2002, so the film could very well be nearing twenty years old. Will there be anything on it? And what will these images hold?
I admit that it’s a bit voyeuristic to do this. I don’t know who owned this camera before me. I don’t know what these photos could be. It could be very personal. It could even be pornographic. Or maybe I’ll be seeing things I shouldn’t see, like evidence of a crime. Now twenty years later someone will be coming after me, because I know too much. Or maybe it will just be random shots of this mystery person’s life, a collection of the mundane. Images that would only mean something to the person taking them and the people in the photos. It would be fun to try to piece together a story with only photos providing clues.
I got it back, and yes, there were pictures! I was surprised how well they came out, most everything looked correctly exposed and colors good. And yep, it was no amateur porn or photos of a gruesome murder, just photos from someone’s day-to-day life.
I don’t know who took these photos, nor the people in them. I can just take educated guesses. The photos look like sometime from 2002 to maybe 2006. In my own life I’d be in my late twenties going on thirty. It looks like the people in the photos are around the same age too. They’re people who are at least a few years past college and living adult lives.
There’s three distinct settings in these photos: someone’s apartment, another person’s house or (most likely) apartment where a small party or dinner is happening, and at the office. These are the types of casual snapshots that these cameras were made for. And while the early aughts don’t seem that long ago to me, it was definitely a different era of photography, the pre-phone era when most folks would only break out cameras for special occasions or travel.
The roll opens with a shot of the apartment.
Then, the dinner.
Ah, cordless phone, and orange sponge paint. Very early aughts.
More cordless phones.
It’s been a bit since I’ve seen someone wear a hat like that.
Studying a pack of Export “A” Cigarettes. Someone must have recently gone to Canada, or is visiting from there.
There was something about being a male in their twenties during this era that made us give the finger when a camera was pointed at us. I should know, I was definitely not a stranger to this phenomenon. Thankfully I have grown out of it. Also note what appears to be a hacky-sack.
The next two shots are possibly from later at the dinner (or possibly afterward), as more wine and Corona was consumed. Corded phone! These two shots were on the underexposed side, which makes me think the flash was turned off (though there looks like a little bit of red-eye):
We now move to the workplace. Most of the shots are of people at their cubicle. This one below was significant because it unlocked the secret of “Where were these photos taken?”
Now check out what’s on the cubicle wall:
It’s faint, but that flyer reads “Safety at 45 Fremont”. A quick google search shows that 45 Fremont is a skyscraper on 45 Fremont Street in the Financial District of San Francisco. So the work shots are definitely SF while the dinner shots could be either in The City or somewhere else in the Bay Area. Or maybe it was from an out-of-town visit to friends?
The last shot on the roll appears to be in the photographer’s apartment. And I must admit, it’s a pretty random shot for a film camera, showing the photographer’s partner or maybe roommate…vacuuming a sofa? Either before or after a bike ride. Why did they take this shot?
And that ends my window into someone else’s life.
Why did they never develop the roll? Perhaps when they were taking pictures at the office, someone noticed they were using a film camera. Perhaps they poked fun at this, then pulled out their brand-new circa 2003 digital camera. Why are you still spending money to get film developed, brah? The floppy disc on this top-o-the-line Olymolta can hold up to 50 photos at a time, and each photo has a resolution of 3 megapixels! So they march on down to Best Buy after work, buy a new digital camera, and stuff the Minolta Freedom Zoom 160 in the junk drawer. Then they move out of their apartment and the Minolta and that roll end up heading to Goodwill…
I developed this roll of film out of idle curiosity and a sense of duty: If there are photos on the roll, they should be preserved. But I must admit that this has affected me more than I thought. Maybe because it’s a glimpse to a yesterday that didn’t seem so long ago. Adult life tends to blur after you get out of school unless you have some significant milestones like a big move, traumatic event, or children. I don’t know these people, but I could have. It looks like I’d be the right age. Heck, I lived in the Bay Area for a year from 2000-2001, so there’s a chance I could have crossed paths with at least one person in these photos. If anything, these photos made me think back to a certain era of my life, one that seems like yesterday, one that in retrospect feels more care-free, but there was a lot of stress and angst about whether my life was on the right path. Did these folks have similar thoughts and feelings?
And what happened to these folks? I’m sure some relationships soured, while maybe some got married and had kids. Possibly some folks moved out of the Bay Area due to spiraling housing costs, a new job, a desire to return to the old hometown, family responsibilities, or a change of scenery. There’s the possibility that some of these folks may no longer be with us. Perhaps one of the folks depicted here will stumble across this post someday and be reunited with their past. That would be the best case scenario!
Thanks for reading! -Shawn
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Randy on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
John Bennett on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Phil Snaps on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
With help from a german friend, we identified the city of Trier, and we think the pictures were taken in the 90s.
The pictures are nothing spectacular, but here are two of them if you are curious:
http://elv.free.fr/pub/photos/film/street.jpg
http://elv.free.fr/pub/photos/film/church.jpg
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Lilianna Elrod on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Fred Nelson on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Eduard on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
AlistairH on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
https://www.macfilos.com/2020/12/22/swiss-roll-the-facts-of-the-70-year-old-photo-mystery-as-we-now-know-them/
Comment posted: 10/10/2021
Markus Larjomaa on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
b) the phone in "More cordless phones" surely isn't a "cordless landline", it looks like a Nokia 5110 to me :)
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Jimbo Batzke on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
Bruce Chappell on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 11/10/2021
I made the assumption that the owner either lived in my parents' home town or was visiting family or friends there and so I posted a selection of the photographs in which people could be clearly identified on a local Facebook group. Within three days the camera was back with its original owner and nobody had any complaints about the photographs being displayed in a public forum. I guess if they had shown someone with somebody with whom they were having an affair then things might have been different but as I only used images that showed group shots I imagine there was little risk of this.
David Hume on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 12/10/2021
I'll start off by saying that I would not publish these, but that I'm not outraged and really, who cares. The reasons I would not publish are that the photos are not interesting for any reason other than that they were found. We're not learning anything technical or social or historic from them. In my opinion the chance that the people in them would be pissed off is greater than they would be pleased, and with the possible harm and no great good to balance it, why do it? (except to give a concrete example to the debate I guess)
Okay - Here's my Story; it may be compared with this.
The Sureshot Supreme I bought from an op shop and wrote about here on 35mmc had a roll in it. The roll showed a family at Christmas and a wedding. By looking at the shots I found a street sign and worked out where they were taken. I checked Real Estate records and fund out when the house was last sold, and that helped me date the photos to within a year.
My best guess was that the camera belonged to a man whose wife was in some of the shots, and that as well as a Christmas there was the wedding of a daughter.
In some cases I'd be going OMG I have to find these people and get these to them... But in this case, I figured - They were not important enough to be processed immediately. The camera probably went to the op shop when the guy died. From my guess his wife would be dead or close to it when I got the shots. The daughters and grandkids are way more likely to be creeped out than grateful if all this appeared, so let's just leave it. So I left it.
I think - on consideration - that in the instance published here it might have been better as an hypothetical - "Hey I found the film" and then that could be linked to a reference to where it's been done before in fine art that's now in the public domain. There's an excellent work by Christian Boltanski (1990) in the collection of the Tate Modern. Check out "The Reserve of Dead Swiss"
But yeah, case-by-case I'd say.
Comment posted: 12/10/2021
Jerker Andersson on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 12/10/2021
Kodachromeguy on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 12/10/2021
Also note it looks like he has two keyboards on his desk.
And the gent is wearing brown checked trousers? Now that might suggest the 1970s.....
JC on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 13/10/2021
Comment posted: 13/10/2021
JC on Found Film: A Peek into Someone Else’s Past – By Shawn Granton
Comment posted: 13/10/2021
Comment posted: 13/10/2021