Pictures with a story, post yours

[cz23]

I never ask folks if I can take their photo. But I met this street harmonic player last fall and couldn't resist.

He was in a wheelchair at the end of a long tunnel under Chicago's Lake Shore Drive, using the tunnel as his amplifier. I entered from the opposite end and found his playing haunting. I stopped and chatted.

He explained how pre-911 he made a good living from street music, often receiving $5 and $10 tips. Post-911, he said, it's all nickels, dimes, and quarters. "That event changed people," he said. "Made everyone suspicious."

John

 

[micromontenegro]

Same camera, same lens... 50-something years apart

 

[NY_Dan]

Two plumbers go into a bar for a beer. One plumber says to the other, "so you come here often?" The second plumber replies, "only when I have a crack in my schedule." To which the first plumber says, "same here."

 

[stompyq]

Same camera, same lens... 50-something years apart

Oh that's wonderful!!!

 

[airfrogusmc]

My divorce and demons, new relationship and doubts in words and pictures.

This was very personal and a very hard time in my life. The ending of something and the beginning of something else.

Well here it is.
Heres the book the images and words are in

This represents how out of place I felt for a while. I felt like I was on a trip and couldn't find my way home.

Who am I? Feeling so misplaced.

Trying to deal with the demons. My mom was an alcoholic and died one. When I was younger I hated her for it. Odd how we sometimes become what we tried so hard not to be.

 

[micromontenegro]

Oh that's wonderful!!!

Thanks! 🙂

 

[lamefrog]

(This thread should be a book)

This photograph was taken in February 2013 in a remote village in Kratie province, eastern Cambodia.

This woman is now about 90 years old. She lives alone in a traditional khmer stilt house that is raised about 2 meters above the ground. This requires her to climb a ladder several times a day. She goes to the market, prepares and cooks her own food and for the most part leads an entirely autonomous life. Some of her children, grand-children and great grand-children live in the village and check up on her regularly.

She remembered the French in Cambodia. As a young girl, she liked to go watch the raising of the colors at the small French garrison.

Her husband and several of her relatives were killed by local khmer rouge partisans in the 70s. They also gouged out her right eye. About 20% of Cambodia's population was eliminated under the red khmers.

Philippe

 

[Andrea Taurisano]

Wow, I knew this would be a great post if only a sufficient number of you had contributed. And you did make it great.

I don't know you, but I feel more motivated to keep this kind of threads going on eternally than those about what to buy or sell next.. So here I go with another little story from Afghanistan.

We were driving in the Kotcha river valley, in the very northeastern corner of the country. A huge debris flow had buried the road, so our Land Cruiser stopped. We spotted a man and two children apparently working on something in the middle of the landslide deposit so we went to speak to them. The man explained that they were picking stones, breaking them with huge hammers, loading as many of them as possible on their backs, and then would be walking 10 miles back to the nearest village. Why? They hoped to sell them as building materials. As I wrote in the opening post, this is one of the world's poorest regions, which forces people to see opportunities even in the natural disasters..

 

[TennesseJones]

Lovely.
I want to know the in-between...

Same camera, same lens... 50-something years apart

 

[OurManInTangier]

Same camera, same lens... 50-something years apart

It seems this has won over the romantics amongst us. Myself very much included.

 

[p.giannakis]

This picture was taken in August 2009 in a small village on the North west of Poland called Huta Szklana. This is the birth place of my wife who spent all her childhood there. My father in law was a farmer and in August he was harvesting wheat to feed the cows during winter. That summer he manage to harvest 5 tonnes of wheat. This is the medium container holding 2 tonnes. Me and my wife (pictured here) were working all day under the hot sun to unload the wheat and store it in a shed.
Next year, my father in law retired and he sold the farm and house. The new owner wasn't able to keep up with the hard work and the farm and house were run down. He eventually sold the house and the farm and moved out. We have never visited this place again, my wife finds it very difficult...

 

[raid]

Wonderful!
Now show us the other 48 photos. 🙂

Same camera, same lens... 50-something years apart

 

[p.giannakis]

I took the following picture in 2008 during the Fringe festival in Edinburgh. I didn't consider it any good so I forgot to scan it. Later that year (in December) I bought a calendar from a mental health charity and going through the pictures, I noticed that in August there is a picture taken seconds after I took mine (look at the bottom right). Had the photographer zoomed out a bit, I would have been included in the picture 🙂 How cool is that....
Here are the two pictures....

and the calendar..

 

[micromontenegro]

Thanks for the interest, folks!

Lovely.
I want to know the in-between...

Well, the year was 1953. My parents went to live in Europe to pursue higher studies, and they got a Contax. The first pic comes from its first roll ever. Dad used the camera extensively- during all his life. The model always remained the same.

Fast forward to 1966. They had a kid who became infatuated with photography, the Contax, and later with all rangefinders. When he was six, dad started letting him use the Contax. He was happy. When he was twelve he got his first Canonet and was very happy.

Fast forward again to 2001. Kid had lost all interest in photography for about ten years, until he had a kid of his own in 1996. He had resurrected the old Canonet, and was using it just fine. But then dad was told he needed to make an early exit, leaving the kid to take care of the Contax, and to some extent, of the model. Cancer is a bitch.

Around 2005, the kid decided that wanted badly to pay homage to dad, model and camera by replicating his picture. The model didn't want to hear about it. Time flew, and in 2009 while nobody was looking, the kid got his picture (one you didn't see). Only then he told the model what he was doing... and the model adopted that melancholy expression you see in the second pic, as she remembered the original photog of 1953.

Since then, the Contax slowly started getting used less and less. Still a lot, but now it is not the kid's primary camera. Seems like its real mission was accomplished at last.

 

[Rangefinder 35]

In September 2007 I went solo for a 3-day photo immersion to catch some fall colors in Mt. Baker Wilderness, in Washington State. It started to snow on first night, and the light covering of blueberry bushes and mountain ash added surreal touch to the scene next day. I was blissed out. On second night the blizzard struck, pinning me down in small tent for the next 4 days. The wind blew the falling snow diagonally. There was nothing to do but lie on my back and stare at the tent's ceiling. I' d leave the tent only to pee and cook some ramen. From time to time I'd hear the explosions of the trees breaking under the weight of snow. On the fifth day couple of Forest Rangers came looking for me. On the way back we crossd multiple avalanche chutes...This picture is from the second day out, before the blizzard struck.

 

[p.giannakis]

The moment my oldest daughter was born. This is the midwife holding her in the air with one hand. I the background is the bed and a sink. I took the picture and I ran to hug her.