As someone who relishes the idea of a more nomadic lifestyle, I totally get Leonie Müller’s taking up residence on trains. Right, she lives on the rails rather than pays rent. She writes about her experiences, […]
Category: Living
Flickr a Day 231: ‘The Courage Wall’
First looking at the photostream of Dan Reed, I puzzled over the perspective and subjects, which are unlike anything else yet featured in this series. He shoots streets, buildings, and such from vantage points that are atypical. Then I read his bio. He’s an architect and city planner. Dan looks at things with a dramatically different eye than I would; he sees things in another context that is refreshing and revealing.
Dan shares his insights at blog “Just Up the Pike“, which refers to Maryland Route 29, or Columbia Pike. Our daughter was born when we lived off 29, just outside Silver Spring, which is Dan’s hometown.
This Is Me Then and Now No. 3
Considering how many people are selfie-obsessed, I really should start a Tumblr around this “Me Then and Now” concept. There has to be a meme here somewhere. I posted the first in October 2014, comparing […]
Flickr a Day 227: ‘Curious Minds’
The photo service now owned by Yahoo shed some early adopters. David Tomic is among them. He joined Flickr in June 2005 but stopped posting the following year, despite clear enthusiasm as a “self-taught photographer”. […]
Protesting Greenpeace?
The weather is perfect here in San Diego—what my wife and I call a Maine Day: 22 degrees Celsius and breezy. We hauled off to Ocean Beach, where navigating people busking or begging for money takes almost as much talent as negotiating a kayak through rocky rapids. Sure enough, I looked left and missed the approaching, friendly fundraiser from the right. Smack!
The singing circle of happy people distracted me. Oh no! Greenpeace? Again? Just cut an artery why don’t they and bleed me? But this dude—the one holding the yellow sign—had a different pitch. Greenpeace hires for two-week jaunts, he claimed, and those who don’t meet their quotas are dismissed from service. There be women with kids about to lose their livelihood. Yikes! The small cadre raised money against Greenpeace.
Flickr a Day 220: Chat
For some people, photography is a way of life. For shooter Erik Hagström, it is a way of living—of expressing himself in ways his body otherwise limits. There is a cool, somber ambiance to his art I could see, before learning his story, that captures more than just images in around the French Alps, but essence.
About himself, Erik explains: “After two cerebral accidents vascular in 2007, making me lose most of the control of my members, reconquered gradually, not being able more to play of musical instruments, or use pencils to draw and paint, I turned to the photograph”.
Flickr a Day 218: ‘Looks’
Somebody is fascinated by owls, for there are plenty of them in the photostream of Riccardo Cupidi. Self-titled “Looks” makes the Day for composition and for being interesting. C`mon, that is one fraking big bird. […]
Flickr a Day 213: ‘Cecil’
There are few events to take the Internet’s attention hostage like this week’s outrage over the death of a 13 year-old Zimbabwean lion. Vince O’Sullivan photographed the proud animal one year ago today—Aug. 1, 2014. He updated the caption to add context better coming from him than me.
“This is, of course, ‘Cecil’—the lion famously shot and wounded by crossbow fired by American dentist Walter Palmer in July 2015 and then shot, killed, skinned, and beheaded for trophies two days later”, Vince explains. “Living in a nature reserve, Cecil was completely inured to people in vehicles that didn’t interfere with him or his prey. So approaching him closely was never difficult, a daily occurrence for him and something he paid no attention to”.
When the Crowd Roars
The Internet backlash against dentist Walter Palmer for killing Cecil the lion is one of the best examples of mob journalism ever. The narrative spreading across the InterWebs is some ways well-meaning but in many more is destructive. Meanwhile, the force of collective-will tempts too many journalists to join the mob opinion, when they should stand aside and offer objective and responsible reporting.
Before writing another word, I must praise National Geographic for the best reporting about this event. The magazine offers broader perspective and, more importantly, puts big game hunting into larger context, while taking an objective tone. The raging mob’s perspective is myopic, and news sites supporting it fail the public good.
Flickr a Day 207: ‘Snapping Turtle’
Film photography is increasingly an art form—throwback to a time when the man or the woman was more in control of the shooting and developing process. There is something oh-so vinyl about print that appeals […]
Cali Caturday
I shot the accompanying photos on July 23rd and saved them for today. Cali played with some dangling thing from her perch and in rare form looked cute rather than ferocious. She’s a huntress that […]
Flickr a Day 204: ‘Planking’
Some fads are short-lived, while others you wish hadn’t been even that long. There is my reaction to planking four years ago. I was oblivious to the thing until someone commented on a pic of our cat Kuma posted to my social network. For fun, and no other reason, we begin three days of selections searched using the “P” word.
First up, from Patricia van Casteren, is the appropriately self-titled “Planking”, which she shot on June 21, 2011, using the Sony Alpha DSLR-A550. Vitals: f/6.3, ISO 200, 1/500 sec, 210mm. “Even the polar bears are totally hooked on planking these days”, she says, providing reference to a Wikipedia article for folks who don’t know what the hell the thing—also known as the “Lying Down Game”. I am surprised to see the origins go back more than three decades, given the sudden surge in popularity four years ago.