Ten consecutive people walking east
05/19/04
Bighappyfunhouse: found photos.
12:02 AM | Comments (15) | TrackBack (0)
Comments
I really like this. It reminds me of an exhibition I remember seeing a few years back when I was in Paris at the Musée d'Art Moderne I believe of someone trying to document "every living person" with a photograph, mainly on New York's streets I believe. Does anyone know the name of the photographer?
Posted by: andy at May 19, 2004 12:23 AM
It looks like no less than four of those people wanted to fight you. Good work :)
Posted by: nick at May 19, 2004 04:09 AM
Andy, don't know the one you have in mind, but if you ever go to Berne, the historical museum has a display of 19th (?) century paintings of an entire town's residents. In those days, only the rich had their portraits painted, and this was an attempt, prior to photography, to capture the entire town in individual paintings. Very much like a time capsule, it gives you a sense of the breadth of society.
Posted by: Frank at May 19, 2004 10:18 AM
this is good- but it would be better if you only took the shot when a hot girl was in the frame. more boobs!
Posted by: jake at May 19, 2004 12:22 PM
These officially count as dicking around shots. Lame.
Posted by: Photocop at May 20, 2004 02:08 AM
Just be glad I didn't post the companion series, "Ten consecutive people walking west"!
Posted by: Mike at May 20, 2004 01:21 PM
Photocop, STFU! These pictures are just as good as any of the others. You're the lame one, lameass! I enjoyed these pictures because it always brings up the whole taking pictures in public without asking thing.....so good job Mike! Did any of them talk to you or try and grab your camera? hahaha.....did you use a flash?
Posted by: Contron at May 22, 2004 02:04 PM
One person asked something about why I took his picture. I just shrugged, and he walked away.
No flash. I almost never use flash; there are maybe five or ten flash shots on this entire site. Maybe not even that many.
Posted by: Mike at May 22, 2004 06:01 PM
not knowing anything about NYC, i like looking at any photos about NYC. what street is that?
Posted by: tom at May 31, 2004 08:45 AM
Rivington, between Orchard and Ludlow.
Posted by: Mike at May 31, 2004 09:53 AM
i agree with Photocop, even if he does want to be the Image Police. the people are uninteresting and there's no story, despite the catchy title. on the technical side: the exposures are off, the colors are bad, and the images are not really sharp or focused properly. they have that obvious "digital" look. don't get me wrong, two of my three cameras are digital. digital is awesome. but this sort of digital is not so hot. three megapixel boredom.
so, to sum things up: the images fail emotionally and they fail technically. it doesn't mean the site is bad or anything, or that you're a bad photographer. the image quality is just not that great. when there's an interesting composition, or where there's interesting emotional content, the technical aspects can be put aside... but these photos don't even have much technical expertise behind them.
i don't want to be all criticism, though... so i will offer some suggestions on what you could do to record images that match your (admittedly interesting) concept.
- first, use a tripod. the change of perspective and background distracts from what (i think) you're trying to say. i know it's a pain to set up a tripod sometimes, but you can pick up a very small tripod from B+H for under $20. Sony makes one that will literally fit in your pocket when it's folded up. so get rid of the background distraction.
- second, find a background that's more interesting. "but didn't you just say that you don't want to see the background?" yes, but like background music, the background is still important... you just want it to fade into... you know... the background. play with your aperture (if your camera has manual settings) and blur the background a bit... but compose it in a good way so that the photo doesn't simply have the regular-dirty-boring-NYC-street-littered-with-garbage background. for many people living at street level, this is what their view looks like every day. not that great, right?
- third, try an auto-balance with some image-editing software. your camera is already a computer - there's no shame in a little post-production to get true blacks and whites.
all in all, a nice concept, but your execution falls short. better luck next time...
Posted by: thom at June 6, 2004 09:13 PM
I know for photo contest and published photos you need to have signed consent forms for all people that appear in the images, do you know if the same applies to photos posted on the internet?
Posted by: natty at June 6, 2004 09:19 PM
I don't believe consent forms are ever required.
I mostly agree with thom, except about blacks and whites. As far as I can tell, these images have them.
Posted by: Mike at June 6, 2004 11:51 PM
anyone in the neighborhood of 65th.street&17th ave.should take a picture of the note on the door of sbarros deli (the original sbarros)before they became worldwide.it was written by mama sbarro who is retiring and closed the store.
Posted by: george de at June 7, 2004 12:29 PM
I like it!! Good project.