Battle Star Gallactica, RFF & Street Photography

R

ruben

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Ho folks this is going to be from he most erratic I ever posted, showing there is always a place for self improvement :D So better spare your time and go elsewhere .:D :D

Battle Star Gallactica is a TV series relating the stories of some 50 thousand refuggees in their armoured space ships, after our planet was destroyed by an alien attack.

The last episode I have seen called my attention as usual, but this time I have found something there relating to Street Photography and RFF too.

The story dealt with one of the big battle ships of the Gallactica fleet, being lured to an alien trap, which hardly manages to survive. Before the trap a strong discussion aroused between the ship commander and his deputy, his deputy claiming beforehand it is going to be a trap and the commander putting his deputy under custody, showing a great doze of untolerance in listening to other's opinions.

When the ship falls into the trap, the nuke battle starts. The commander quickly acknowledges his mistake, recalls his youg deputy into formal and actual command of the whole ship, and goes to heroically die in a crucial attempt to fix a gas leak somewhere at the ship, upon which much of the survival depends.

After the happy end, the young deputy is appointed as formal commander of the ship, by the Gallactica Chief Commander, in an informal and prived meeting. There the chief asks the younger, what in his opinion was the ex-commander mistake. The younger answers: he was best in dealing with machines, not good in dealing whith human beings.

I must say this sentence continues to wrinkle in my mind, in connection to our most recent thread about street photography, and in the general context of RFF.

Cheers,
Ruben
 
I saw this episode a few days ago (I'm going through the first 3 seasons).

This may sound sarcastic or downright dumb but people photography is about people. As with other subjects, you must know your subject and be comfortable with it. If you shoot a football game, kowing the game will help a lot. Following the action too.

If you shoot people from a close distance (not 600mm voyeurism), you must interact with them, at least to get permission. You must understand the situation they are in and most of all, you need empathy. You need a form of connection with their emotions. Either sharing them or at least, understanding them. If you don't you'll end up with boring pictures with the occasional lucky one where the camera got it without your help.

Am I making sense? It's too frackin' early! ;)
 
Hi Marc,
I do agree with your view a hundred percent, and of course other people may add different views and interpretations, from which I may learn too.

Concerning RFF, in the context of this TV series, i find some funny parallels too. But the most important for me now is to remark that all of us here at RFF, are a kind of micro cosmos too, in which human interaction also takes place.

We can use, or even abuse, or take advantage of, or have a basic negative attitude towards this virtual space, and there will be nothing new in terms of human behaviour for the last milleniums.

But we can also see ourselves as passangers of an unprecedented ship, and try our best to interact with each other with the sight of giving to it the best within ourselves, overcomming the negative. This is a worth target, I would like to remind myself, unusual in terms of human behaviour, and this concerns very much for its symbolic implications regarding the future of the human race.

Creating a highly positive interaction is not simple at all. It is not just behaving. It is a very complex stuff. Not by chance humans are still slaugthering themselves as at tribal times.

Cheers,
Ruben
 
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Hi Ruben, Hi Marc

Good thoughts. I had about 4 cameras arriving one after another and I caught myself thinking "Am I just handkling and using cameras or do I take pictures?"
Yes taking pictures is the important thing and when taking them to forget for a moment what you are using.
A photographer must have social skills. I think of Clint EastwoodS portrait by Annie Leibowitz. "I could do that" maybe the first thought....but would I be able to persuade him to be tied up like in that portrait?
Best wishes from tropical Vienna!
 
that was a good episode, I love that show, its so photographic, the gf and I watch it and study the camera angles, lighting, and depth of field shots sometimes when we are not poking through my movies or snapping photos. She is not the most mechnically minded and definatly the artist of the two of us but its all good, I can still hold my own when it comes to scifi ;)
 
You should add a spoiler warning to this. I haven't yet watched this far in the series and now a major event is spoiled for me.
Kind of like walking out of the theatre after Empire Strikes Back exclaiming "I can't believe Darth Vader was..." :mad:
 
Battlestar Galactica, best frakking drama on Television, not that I turn on the tube... ;)

I'm close to being done with Season three, and am quite sad that it'll end after four.
 
But it has a twist:

<spoiler>
This time it is the Ceylons escaping from the humans.

And Starbuck is a (robotic) woman.
</spoiler>
 
Funny. Never thought I'd see a spoiler alert on RFF. :D

At least it's a good enough show that having a hint of the ending really doesn't ruin it for me. There's plenty of other stuff going on.

I don't think I'd call it "re-imagining" of the original series, though. I hated the original series. Seemed totally stupid. This one seems way better and much more grown-up. :D

So say we all.
 
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