Cameras Never Lie
Who uses cameras anymore?
When I was young I was into photography. I had a darkroom and bought my film in 100 foot rolls. I first became inspired to buy a camera by my amazement of the visual geometry of the forms I was working with as a laborer down in the pit.
I had a good time as a laborer - but that was distinct from the beauty of the forms that drew my attention.
After my first summer at work I used my savings to buy a Pentax SV - a very nice SLR camera. Dad was personnel manager at the site (why I got the laborer's job) and he got me access to the site with my new camera
Sigh - it didn't really turn up many good pictures. The scenes that inspired me were hundreds of feet down dark passages on ladders - I didn't really want to go back down there again. I was not encouraged to do it by my escort.
But I had caught the photography bug by then.
Mostly - I wasn't interested in propaganda. But that was also the era of Alan Funt and Candid camera where the camera would capture embarrassing moments. I wasn't interested in that either - never brought my camera out at parties
I worked in a camera store. One day I handed over a pack of photos to a guy and he opened them and yelled 'praise the lord'. There, in the picture, was the face of Jesus superimposed on a stormy sky. He claimed to have seen it and here was the proof
I gave him his change without telling him that I knew how to do double exposures too.
These days I think that the norm is for pictures in ads and on the news are manipulated - by photoshop if not made by ai systems
It's said that a picture says a thousand words - and it's hard to call those words false
But really - these days - who can take vids of trump being alive and vigorous seriously?
What do you think?
I present regular philosophy discussions in a virtual reality called Second Life.
I set a topic and people come as avatars and sit around a virtual table to discuss it.
Each week I write a short essay to set the topic.
I show a selection of them here.