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Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Say Cheese!

So with the invention of the internet, comes all sorts of promising things for humanity.  We are able to research important topics like cures for diseases or poverty outreach with a few clicks of the mouse.  We can communicate with loved ones who are thousands of miles away using an app.  We can receive breaking news the second it hits.  However, my personal favorite of the millions of uses for the internet is photo stalking. Oh come on, like it's just me!  I'm sure we all do it, I'm just the nerd who's admitting to it.  We all like to check in on friends we haven't seen or talked to in years on Facebook and rate their lives based on their profile pics.  We all check out Instagram feeds multiple times a day. We all peruse those emails each day that have seemingly visited the entire Northern Hemisphere before it's reached us.  That, my friend, is photstalking and personally, I'm ok with it.

As somone who cannot seem to take a good picture to save my life, (I'm sure it has something to do with the fact that I'm using a point and shoot instead of a DSLR but that's beside the point...) I love that others in the online universe can.  It gives me hope that one day I will actually produce an amazing shot like these amateur photographers.

Just for the record, there is a point behind this weird confession. 

This week I've stumbled upon 2 amazing examples why photostalking is so much fun.  The first is Dear Photograph.  Dear Photograph is a Tumblr account run by Taylor Jones that has a very simple premise at its heart, but has produced some of the most heart warming, beautiful pictures I've seen. He "was inspired to start his website Dear Photograph as he flipped through old family photos at his parents' kitchen table. When he came across an image of his brother sitting at that very same table, he lifted it up and snapped a picture of the picture. In a moment, the idea for DearPhotograph.com was born."  The entire site (and book as well) contains photos of photos in the same place they were originally taken.  Okay, maybe the "simple" premise isn't so simple to explain but just check the site to see how touching some of the scenarios are.  Add to the photos, letters from the photographers about each picture, and the site has turned me into a blubbering mess.  Dear Photograph has inspired me to add an adendum to my 29th year list, I am now determined to take one of these pics and upload it to the site.  Of course, I'm a little OCD so it might take me a while to find the perfect picture but at least I have until next April...

The second nifty set I happened upon originally in  Wired Magazine but I found out later the photographer also has a blog: Bent Objects. (Thanks Aunt M!)  After you've teared up from Dear Photograph, you'll need something to lighten the mood and these will do just that.  Not much to say other than they are super clever and super cute! 

Enjoy!

1 comments:

Classic NYer said...

You know, I thought of a similar thing some time ago when I was looking at pictures of me and my siblings outside my parents' house. I was like "It still looks like that... but we don't." It wouldn't have occured to me to take a picture of that picture though.

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