Following on from my post about found negatives the other day: The Joy of Found Photographs I thought I would follow it up with some more found things!

This time it is from my periodic bin diving! At the end of each college day, I pack up and clear up the darkrooms from their heavy day of student led abuse. There are the inevitable discarded prints and abandoned photographs strewn in sinks, floors, bins & crevices.  Most of them are not worth a second look, but occasionally, lurking beneath the trash is a thing of pure beauty.

Something I love about the analogue process is its ability to produce a completely unexpected result.  A combination of events take place that merge mistake, chemical reaction, light and a myriad of other possibilities and produce something that would have been nigh on impossible to conceive of and create deliberately.

Out of chaos comes beauty – a happy accident.

When I come across such gems, I rescue them from the wilderness and enjoy their random aesthetic.  I thought I would share three of these recent finds with you reader – so you too can bask in the glory of the unexpected!

Sometimes you can’t beat the unexpected.

A few weeks ago I was sorting through a very old cupboard of equipment at VC and found a stash of old and antiquated camera’s.

Most of which where not much interest – the sort of thing you can pick up at any car boot for pence.  However, amongst the hoard, I spotted a particularly fine Box Brownie – not the usual really old type either, but an all together snazzier more beautiful version. The Brownie F to be exact.

Kodak Brownie F

This golden beauty stared up at me and begged to be freed from her prison and I was happy to oblige.  However, this was only part of the treat, inside, lay the ultimate gift – a film!  I love it when I find an old camera that still has a film in it – in fact, you can often find me riffling through the camera’s in charity shops – just in case one contains the golden nugget of an undeveloped film.  Rarely, however, do I come up with the goods.

This find was especially exciting because it was a Medium Format film and I had literally no idea where it had come from, who had donated it to the college or when the film was taken…so I developed it.

The film was starting to degrade quite badly and there were only 3 exposures that actually were images – after that, it is like the camera died.

FOUND IMAGES & UNEXPOSED NEGATIVES

What I love about a find like this is that all you have of the person whose camera and film it was – are the images you develop from the negatives.  The only information and insight into their lives are contained here in a chemical reaction with light. A fragment of their time is given in those negatives for someone like me to look at, make judgements from and share a very small part of their life.  No doubt at the time of taking the photo’s, the photographer would not have considered a stranger would be developing them years in the future, most probably they were private images for a private audience.

I particularly love this set of images because it is almost as if they are the lust mutterings of a dying camera.  It degrades as the images progress – finishing with a cough of light and marks as though it were the last breath it had left.

What we can get about the owner from the images on the negatives I do not know – but I thought I would share them with you along with my thoughts.

This find has inspired me to dig out my other found negative collection and see what treats they have in store.

THREE GLIMPSES AT ANOTHER LIFE

BOY (2011) I love this image - a young spectacled boy in what looks like school uniform stands holding a tortoise. In the background it looks like there are houses and shrubs, suggesting this is in the setting of a garden. Then emerging from the black is an old gent to the bottom right of the photo. A grandad perhaps?	OLD COUPLE (2011) Another tortoise picture and perhaps the grand parents of the small boy. Is this their tortoise and he is visiting them - or perhaps vice versa.
COUNTRY HOUSE (2011) This is the third picture on the film and shows a rather grand looking estate. I wonder if the visit to the house followed the tortoise admiring and whether this was part of a family day out? The building looks almost like a castle, but with the body of water in front of it, my suspicion is that it is taken at Sheffield Park.	DEATH (2011) The last splutterings of a dying camera - desperately attempting to make one final mark before it passes.

I wonder what conclusions people might draw about my life based on a small selection of photo’s they may one day come across.

I also wonder why it is so interesting to peer into other people’s lives we don’t know and never will.

Chinese Fags (2009)

Chinese Fags – an interesting language difference.  Google indexing – a perplexing language difference.

I find these cigarettes interesting – mainly because they have amazing writing on the packet, which I have no comprehension of.

Also because they are different from the packets I am used to seeing.  Somehow, even though they are very similar, they are more exciting because of their minor differences!

So perhaps anything that is in a different language is more interesting to behold than that which is in your own language.

This is probably true for many things.  It is not true for computers.  I hate computer language – it is foreign that is for sure, but more interesting it is not.

This is my first post in a long while.  As you may recall, I have had computer and camera related issues which put a bit of a stop to posting for some time.  The digital camera is still out of action, but the computer working fine again now.

I was all set to begin a new regime of regular posts when I had the genius idea of changing my web hosting company.

In my ignorant fashion, I assumed this would be an easy thing to do.  Get a new host, move everything over, bobs your uncle.

In reality – the foreign language that is computer code and the Internet pissed all over that premise.  Moving the site was a bitch and whilst that has now been achieved – it has destroyed my Google rank!  Why I am not sure, but Google will no longer recognise my humble blog and so I am again stuck head first, trying to decipher a language invented for those more technologically gifted…and perhaps more dedicated than myself!

The saga will never end!

Update your RSS…

By the way – since the domain for this blog has slightly changed (behind the scenes only…not from a readers perspective…you may want to update your RSS feed, if you have one pointing at the site.
(cti9q4m26n)

Chubby Checker's Dancin' Party

I have multiple locations where I hoard the vast quantity of crap I find in the street.

I am a compulsive looker at any piece of paper or such like that I see on the floor – always worth a look in case its a forgotten gem.

Anyway, I figure the blog is an ideal way to share these finds with the general populous and so started the immense task of going through said found objects to put them in one place and see what I have actually got!

Whilst going through one drawer of stuff – this caught my eye.

Can’t remember exactly when or where I found it…and sadly there was no 7″ inside.  However, I strongly suspect that the cover art is better than any music that could have been contained inside!

However, I did take the liberty of checking out the tune itself, found a clip on YouTube of the Mr Checker performing this little number.  Click here to see Chubby Checker perform Dancin’ Party on YouTube

After listening, I still think the artwork is better than the track!  In three simple images they manage to portray the true genius of his dancin’ style and I can only imagine that any Dancin’ Party was improved by the his moves.

I particularly like his facial expressions…starting from the left:

1. Extreme concentration – Chubby is obviously aware that by putting his left leg and left arm forward at the same time, he is opening himself up for potential disaster.  He must use all his Dancin’ Party knowledge to pull off the move.
2. Smug and proud – His face and body language say it all.  Having pulled off the tricky dance move as described above – he knows he can do no wrong.  We see a more relaxed Chubby.
3. Pure ecstasy – It looks like he is doing a Cossack dance, which would bring joy to anyone’s face.  Either that or he has just ripped the seam of his trousers.

Thanks Chubby!

By the way, is it just me or was Chubby Checker not-so-chubby?

Kinswood Egg Man - protects you from salmonella

Bought some eggs the other day at a car boot sale – local and free range.  Nice.

They came from someone who had a small holding, so obviously collected and kept egg boxes so they could sell them at boot sales and alike.

After finished with said eggs, I was about to put the box in the compost heap when,  the incredible egg man that was featured on the front of the box caught my attention.

Check him out – he’s amazing!

However, what really struck me was what the point of the egg man was – what are Kinswood trying to reveal?

A muscle-man, athletic egg man is not the way I would choose to sell eggs!  I can’t work out whether his purpose is to show he is strong and fit and therefore salmonella free…or if by eating the eggs, you will become a athletic, salmonella free egg man!

If the thinking was the latter, then this raises a new problem – I am not sure I want to eat an egg that has bigger muscles than me and wears snazzy red trainers!

God bless designers!

Also reminded me of a comic book Hannah gave me at Christmas called ‘Egg Story’.  The simple tale of a simple egg that becomes a ninja.

Perhaps Eggs are an unexploited form of creativity.