Photography through the ages, a blog.

[gredawarha]

Happy new year to you all.

I have recently started blogging and wrote a short blog this evening. If you have a spare few minutes please take a read, leave a comment and let me know what you think.



http://www.darrenjosephgregory.com/b...rough-the-ages

Darren

[Shadowman]

Darren,

Very touching narrative. You should make this particular theme a recurring portion of future blogs.

[gredawarha]

Hi John

Thanks for the comments. I am trying to put down in words things I think about and they tend to come about due to photography. I was thinking about how the younger generation (and I include myself in that) tend to be self concious about having our photo taken.

What I didnt really discuss in the blog is how we are all very happy to take crappy selfies on our camera phones but then when it comes to "proper" photos we all shy away.

[xpatUSA]

Darren,

Thanks for a peek at the Southern England of today. Well written and nice pics, especially.

Ted

[tbob]

Interesting blog and comments.

Maybe part of the difference is a decrease in self criticism as you age. I used to look at photos of me and cringe because I thought I looked terrible. Now I am almost 60, I know I look terrible, and I no longer care. Snap away; because with every year the pictures will be less flattering but a true record.

[Rita]

Your grandmother looks like a wonderful women and I thought your blog was worded very well.

[gredawarha]

Darren,

Thanks for a peek at the Southern England of today. Well written and nice pics, especially.

Ted

Hi Ted

Thanks for the comment glad you enjoyed the blog.

[gredawarha]

Interesting blog and comments.

Maybe part of the difference is a decrease in self criticism as you age. I used to look at photos of me and cringe because I thought I looked terrible. Now I am almost 60, I know I look terrible, and I no longer care. Snap away; because with every year the pictures will be less flattering but a true record.

Hi Trevor. Your view is certainly a different way of examining the same scenario. Thanks.

[gredawarha]

Your grandmother looks like a wonderful women and I thought your blog was worded very well.

Hi Rita thank you for the kind words. Obviously I am biased but she is a wonderful women. Her life is very simple but the love and joy she gives off as part of that simple life is brilliant. She is very much a family lady and I try to ensure that I go see her at least once a month, even if it is just for a few minutes. It means a lot to her.

Thanks again.

Darren

[Mike Buckley]

I had never given the subject any thought until reading your blog. Thanks for making me think about it.

I remember when you posted your photo of your grandmother here at CiC and it's great to learn that she is now the centerpiece of your blog piece.

[gredawarha]

I had never given the subject any thought until reading your blog. Thanks for making me think about it.

I remember when you posted your photo of your grandmother here at CiC and it's great to learn that she is now the centerpiece of your blog piece.

Hi Mike

Thanks for the comment glad the blog made you think about something different for a few minutes.

All the best

Darren

[rpcrowe]

I thought of two things when I read your blog...

Having a good picture of someone you love is a wonderful way to keep those persons close to you when they are no longer with us. This is equally as true regarding our favorite animals...

I also though about the speed of evolution in photography equipment during the latter 20th and early 21st Centuries. As a young Navy Photographer's Mate, I was assigned to record an oral history featuring a retired Navy Photographer who had shot many of the definitive images of the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. I did the interview sometime in 1961, 30-years after the Pearl Harbor attack. This man and his comrades, on Ford Island, had used 4x5 inch Speed Graphic Press cameras with cut film to record the event. The 4x5 inch Speed Graphic using cut film was still the main camera of the Navy in 1961, thirty years later!

These days we record the longevity of camera types virtually in nano-seconds ...

[gredawarha]

I thought of two things when I read your blog...

Having a good picture of someone you love is a wonderful way to keep those persons close to you when they are no longer with us. This is equally as true regarding our favorite animals...

I also though about the speed of evolution in photography equipment during the latter 20th and early 21st Centuries. As a young Navy Photographer's Mate, I was assigned to record an oral history featuring a retired Navy Photographer who had shot many of the definitive images of the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor. I did the interview sometime in 1961, 30-years after the Pearl Harbor attack. This man and his comrades, on Ford Island, had used 4x5 inch Speed Graphic Press cameras with cut film to record the event. The 4x5 inch Speed Graphic using cut film was still the main camera of the Navy in 1961, thirty years later!

These days we record the longevity of camera types virtually in nano-seconds ...

Hi Richard he sounds facinating. I bet he had many interesting stories.

[drjuice]

Great idea to get the pictures of her for Alex and even better that you even thought of it. Before my Mom passed away at 92, she and I went through all her photographs and labelled them with the names of the people as well as with the approximate date of the pictures (usually just the year or years). The first one of me is taken in my Gran's front yard with her Mom there in a wheelchair and my Mom holding me. Four generations in one picture. I was really surprised to see it because I hadn't ever seen it before.

By the time my Mom passed about 11 years later, we had scanned in her entire set of B/W pictures as well as her slides (all Kodachrome and requiring subsantial color correction). Then, at the reception after her service, we had two computers set up with automatic PPT shows showing all the images with a way for individuals to stop the automatic which would then pop up the left-to-right names of the people in the pictures. It was well-worth the 70+ hours of doing all the scanning and some of the older folks just sat watching the pictures. What a hit!

A slightly different take on taking pictures of our seniors ... My Mom moved to SoCal to live with me about four months before she died. One day shortly after she arrived, we went to the LA County Fair. To this day, one of the best pictures I ever took of her was her sipping her 7-Up at the fair. I included it in the slide show, even though neither she nor my Dad took the picture!

On the subject of different attitudes, in my family we had three kinds of pictures. One was that one of our parents took it and we just needed to look half-way presentable. The other was one where everybody went to the photo studio downtown and we sat in our Tuesday best (or whatever) on very uncomfortable chairs and waited until the photographer said "Smile" or "We're finished". At the end of the session, we kids couldn't wait to get home and back into our jeans and t-shirts! The third kind was taken by that same photographer, but they were all school pictures wherein each class went out and stood on the steps of the high school gym. We were expected to wear "nice" clothes, not really nice clothes like we wore to the photo studio.

Thanks for the memories, Darren. Keep it up! I promise you won't regret it.

I'm jes' sayin'....

virginia

[rpcrowe]

Darren wrote: "Hi Richard he sounds facinating. I bet he had many interesting stories."

Over my Naval career, I have been lucky enough to meet many fascinating people, both famous and relatively unknown. Having a very strong interest in history, I always opted for jobs and assignments which had a historic interest.

Top among my favorite jobs was a doing a film on the history of Navy aircraft carriers... Wheels Up, Hooks Down was the final title and I filmed Navy aviators ranging from some of the original aviators who flew biplane aircraft, through aviators who flew in World War Two and the Korean War (Vietnam was not yet in full swing when I did the film).

I filmed Retired Admiral John Thatch who had developed the "Thatch Weave" maneuver that allowed Navy aviators flying the inferior American Grumman F4F Wildcat fighter to successfully combat the superior Japanese Zero fighter and I also filmed Navy Ace, Eugene Valencia who shot down German, Japanese, Italian and Vichy French aircraft during World War Two.

I was also privileged to be able to ask some of these wonderful men questions. The Japanese left one carrier out of the Midway Battle because, due to the losses incurred by Japan at the Battle of the Coral Sea they did not have the aircrews available to staff that carrier. I asked one prominent aviator what would have happened if the Japanese had manned the extra aircraft carrier with less trained aviators but used them as Kamikaze attackers like they did later on in the war. His answer was that the Japanese very well might have won the Battle of Midway which could have turned the war around or at least delayed the final victory for an amount of time...

The footage shot for this film was very much like the images we shoot and cherish of our loved ones. It will allow us and later generations to get in contact with the persons who have lived before they did...

[Nickding]

Great photo and article. But the I think the layout in firefox is not very well. There is a big blank in the right while the left is slightly crowded.

[gregj1763]

Hey Darren, just looked at your blog and web site.
I think you have done a great job with it and having a narrative to the images really helps you connect with with the people, very moving in parts.
I hope that Tandi Nanny had something else to occupy herself other than watching the Ashes, not much fun from an English perspective. I don't follow cricket myself but a one sided competition is not much fun to watch.
Just tell her how good it will feel the next time the English flog the Aussie side
Cheers mate, Greg

[gredawarha]

Hard times this month. My Nan the subject of my blog had a fall and at 94 years old she was really struggling with her mind, I saw her two weeks ago and it was doubtful that she recognised me. Yesterday it was my intention to go see her, take some photos to her that might help her memory although I was not naive enough to appreciate that at 94 years old it wouldn't do much good.

I was due to collect the photos Friday afternoon and then see her later that day. At lunchtime my father called me to say that she had died earlier in the day.

Make sure that you spend as much time with your loved ones as you can.

[Dave Humphries]

I'm sorry to hear of your loss Darren

[Marie Hass]

Thoughts and prayers, Darren!

I am sorry for your loss! Be grateful that you recognized the need to spend time with her and were able to do so.

Marie