Whatever the reason, my telephone fell off the wall regularly, and I used tape and gum to effect repairs. When the handset gave up, I used my stereo headphones for the receiver. The phone wouldn’t ring anymore after I hard-wired my cassette player into the thing. I had my reasons. Eventually, there was no other …
It’s summer 1992 and four of my friends are in a band and have just secured a support slot at a local venue, they need someone to come along and photograph their set. Naturally, I volunteered myself, not knowing at the time how much of an influence it would have on my work nearly thirty …
The Roll Of Film That Changed My Photographic Life Read More
This is a story of three dogs, a man, and a camera that’s not even his. First, the background about the camera. I am a Nikon boy through and through, having first shot with a Nikon FG-20 back in the 1980s (after using a Minolta X-700 film camera for my first corporate communications job in …
A Point of Shoot Camera, and an old Roll of Film, Ties Together Canine Companions Read More
In my personal urban dictionary, a “plainclothes angel” is someone whose life crosses yours usually once, and for a short time. But they still have an out-sized impact on your future. One may encounter many such people in life, and some probably go unrecognized. Others might even seem the most unlikely of “angels”– whose impacts are important, though not at first overly angelic.
Such was the case with one guy in this 1967 photo of the American Commons Club fraternity. It was ACC’s 50th anniversary at Denison University, and I’m second from left in the back row. At the time, I had no idea that John Griffin– the laughing fellow to my lower-left in the image (who also seems to be picking the pocket of the poor sod in front of him)– would soon become one of my plainclothes angels.
I was ACC’s newest member, and John was an upper-classman. He hoped to join the U.S. Foreign Service, belonged to the Air Force Reserve Officers’ Training Corps, and had a black belt in karate. I’d soon learn the hard way just how good he was at the latter.
If you’d like to have some fun, go to a photo exhibit when the photographer is there. Find an image that intrigues or puzzles you, and ask if they can tell you more about its context. Was anything of potential interest occurring outside the image frame when they triggered the shutter? Or did a wider context of events occur over days, months or even years before or after the shot?
You may get a blank look. Or you might hear a book. If I’d been exhibiting the above terrible fake photo, you’d get a book.
