In 2019, Tamara Lanier sued Harvard University claiming that she was the rightful owner of daguerreotypes of an enslaved father and daughter. A Massachusetts judge has dismissed her claim, ruling that it’s Harvard that should own the images after all.
The camera history, as told by North Korea
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If you’ve always wanted to watch a cartoon about camera history, you’ve come to the right place: here’s a North Korean cartoon that teaches children camera history. It’s actually a combination of cartoon and studio footage, and it’s is cute, encouraging, and informative. But at the same time, it’s odd and full of moments that will make you scratch your head – and this is why you won’t be able to stop watching.
Who should own photos of slaves?
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In 1976 while rummaging through an attic of Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology in search of old museum publications, editorial assistant Lorna Condon opened a drawer in a wooden cabinet. Inside, she found a number of flat leather cases which contained a series of daguerreotypes of partially and fully nude Black people. Names were handwritten on paper labels identifying 7 individuals: Alfred, Delia, Drama, Fassena, Jack, Jem, and Renty with assumed ethnicities and occupations. The daguerreotypes represented some of the earliest known images of slaves in the U.S.
Was this iconic war photo staged?
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There are some iconic photos taken through history that turned out to be staged or altered. The example that first comes to mind for me is Dorothea Lange’s Migrant Mother, which was both.
In this video, Vox brings another example of a historic image that was most likely staged. It’s Roger Fenton’s Valley of the Shadow of Death taken in 1855 during the Crimean War. Two versions of the image caused a lot of questions and controversy, and film director Errol Morris was determined to figure it out.
If you ever wondered where the phrase “Watch the birdie!” came from, here you go
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“Watch the Birdie” – that’s what my parents told me, to make sure I look into the camera before they took a photo of me. I guess lots of you guys remember this saying. With the renovation of a 140-year-old historic brass birdie, I show you the origin of this phrase.
This photo book shows male couples between 1850s and 1950s, when it was illegal
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I may be naive and a hopeless romantic, but I firmly believe that love conquers all. In their photo book Loving: A Photographic History of Men in Love 1850s-1950s, Hugh Nini and Neal Treadwell prove me right. They have collected a series of photos of male couples from back in the day when it was still illegal to engage in same-sex relationships. They prove that love is stronger than the law, and in case you stopped believing in love, these could make you change your mind.
This is why Adobe’s called Adobe and how one of its founders was kidnapped for $650,000 ransom
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For anybody working in the photography or video industries today, it’s difficult to escape from the behemoth that is Adobe. Whether you use their software or not, they’re still everywhere you look and if you don’t use their software yourself, you still often have to deal with people that do, and wanting to know how they can make their workflow fit with yours.
But how did Adobe’s rise to fame happen? Where did it all begin? And why was one of is founders kidnapped at gunpoint and held for ransom to the tune of $600,000? This video from ColdFusion takes a look at Adobe’s history and some of the controversy along its journey.
Historians upset over upscaling of old footage
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Recently, we’ve seen a bunch of upscaled and colorized historic footage: from 1911 New York to 1972 Apollo 16 Lunar Rover ride. Even videos as old as the iconic 1896 The Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat Station are possible to upscale to 4K and get a splash of color. While many of us find them inspiring and exciting, historians don’t seem to share the opinion. In fact, they argue that the whole process is “nonsense” and they’d like YouTubers to stop doing it.
Move over selfies – Cartes de Visites were the first great photography craze
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Before Instagram, selfie sticks, disposable cameras, Polaroids, and box brownies, there were carte de visites – small photographic albumen prints, mounted on card, which were wildly popular during the Victorian era.
Also known as CdV, carte de visites followed the early pioneering photographic techniques such as daguerreotype and ambrotype, which were expensive and difficult to reproduce. Cartes de visites were born from calling cards, which bore the owner’s name and usually an emblem, and were presented to the host during a social visit. Homes often had a tray near the door for collecting calling cards.
This “flying train” film footage shows a fascinating look into 1902 Germany with incredible detail
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In Wuppertal, Germany in 1902 the “flying train” was about to open. Of course, the train didn’t really fly, it is suspended from above. construction of the Wuppertaler Schwebebahn began in 1898 but it didn’t begin to open until in 1901. It’s actually still in operation today, despite having shut down briefly after damage during World War II.
This video was shot during 1902 and shows an incredibly high level of detail and quality, even by relatively recent standards. According to the Museum of Modern Art, the film was shot on Biograph 68mm film stock, which offers up a huge frame for capturing a lot of detail.
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