View Full Version : Humor in Phography?
Michael Graves
13-Sep-2009, 06:42
I'm sorry. Once again, what was it about the no parking sign that you found confusing?
Toyo 5x7, 210mm Fujinon. Arista Professional film in Rodinal 1:50. Now if I could just type in the heading.
percepts
13-Sep-2009, 07:08
OK so its not large format but for a parking shot it's not bad:D
31063
get out of that...
Michael Graves
13-Sep-2009, 07:57
OK so its not large format but for a parking shot it's not bad:D
31063
get out of that...
That one reminds of a time when I was stationed in Monterrey, CA. I saw a bunch of people crowded around a railing near the wharf, looking down into the water. I sidled on up to see what what was going on, and in about 20 feet of crystal clear water, a pickup truck was sitting on the bottom of the bay, perfectly sitting on all four wheels.
I said, "You know, considering how many empty spots there are in the lot, I don't think I would have chosen to park there."
The guy next to me said something unprintable and anatomically impossible, no matter how hard you try and l looked over at this guy. He was all dripping wet and looked like he was about to kill me. So I decided I'd seen enough.
Richard M. Coda
13-Sep-2009, 08:38
Not LF, but I was always amused by this one... taken while my wife and daughter were attending a performance of "The Phantom of the Opera" in NYC a few years back. I'm not a play person, so I bar hopped and walked around with my DSLR.
John Kasaian
13-Sep-2009, 08:41
Monterey is famous for wet cars. Remember the advertisement for Avis (or was it Hertz?) of Augie Pabst's rental car parked in the bottom of the swimming pool at Casa Munras?
This one by Sternfeld is my all time favorite funny photo. The fact that it's 8x10 makes it even funnier. What was he doing there while all this unfolded?
http://modernartobsession.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/sternfeld_mclean.jpg
Colin Graham
13-Sep-2009, 09:22
Damn, it took me a minute to realize that's a firefighter browsing through the pumpkins. That's just great. And extra points for LF!
This one always gets me.
Daniel Grenier
13-Sep-2009, 10:25
.....What was he doing there while all this unfolded?
http://modernartobsession.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/sternfeld_mclean.jpg
Just so you don't think Sternfeld lit the match to catch the shot, this was actually a pre-planned fire by this particular fire dept for training purposes. Sternfeld got the word, I guess, and he pulled a sensational photograph out of it. Very cool image indeed.
percepts
13-Sep-2009, 13:19
Hmmm,
It's kind of lost it's impact now you tell me it was staged. Until then I thought it was a great capture.
percepts
13-Sep-2009, 13:23
I said, "You know, considering how many empty spots there are in the lot, I don't think I would have chosen to park there."
The guy next to me said something unprintable and anatomically impossible, no matter how hard you try and l looked over at this guy. He was all dripping wet and looked like he was about to kill me.
Sounds like he was having a major sense of humour failure. :D
Light the blue touch paper and stand well back....
Hmmm,
It's kind of lost it's impact now you tell me it was staged. Until then I thought it was a great capture.
Doesn't take anything away from it for me (except for that 'what was he doing there?' part). There's still an amazing confluence of imagination and skill and luck behind the picture. I'm actually relieved to know i haven't been laughing at someone's house burning down all these years ...
benrains
13-Sep-2009, 14:51
For large format, I'd have to suggest some of Weegee's work.
joeyrsmith
13-Sep-2009, 16:04
Heres a link for a very funny "Hitler and his Kodachrome" on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDWeAHd6D6w
Bruce Watson
13-Sep-2009, 16:14
It's kind of lost it's impact now you tell me it was staged. Until then I thought it was a great capture.
It *is* a great capture. Why penalize the guy for doing his homework and being prepared?
The vast majority of art is "staged". Little is spontaneous. Think about all the music, plays, paintings, sculpture, etc. you've seen. Much that looks spontaneous isn't. Duke Ellington's bands played together so well because he rehearsed the fool out of them and eliminated nearly all spontaneity-- he charted out every solo -- those aren't improvisations. Astaire and Rogers made dancing look spontaneous through grueling months of rehearsals and dozens and dozens of takes. I've seen some amazingly excellent sports photographs, but nothing is more staged than a football game.
I'm just sayin' that just because it was staged doesn't mean it's a bad get.
percepts
13-Sep-2009, 16:38
It *is* a great capture. Why penalize the guy for doing his homework and being prepared?
The vast majority of art is "staged". Little is spontaneous. Think about all the music, plays, paintings, sculpture, etc. you've seen. Much that looks spontaneous isn't. Duke Ellington's bands played together so well because he rehearsed the fool out of them and eliminated nearly all spontaneity-- he charted out every solo -- those aren't improvisations. Astaire and Rogers made dancing look spontaneous through grueling months of rehearsals and dozens and dozens of takes. I've seen some amazingly excellent sports photographs, but nothing is more staged than a football game.
I'm just sayin' that just because it was staged doesn't mean it's a bad get.
look at the title of the thread. "Humour in photography?"
For me the humour in this image was that the fireman is more interested in pumpkins than saving someones house. As a real situation that is pretty sick but funny. When you find out the fire is a training exercise it loses that real humour. Maybe not for those that don't know what the situation is but now for me its not so funny.
Frank Petronio
13-Sep-2009, 18:01
Kinda Dry, all old school 4x5
benrains
13-Sep-2009, 18:16
Diane Arbus should definitely be included. Elliott Erwitt as well. Not LF, but quite funny nonetheless. Check out the 'Phototoons' gallery under the Portfolios section of Erwitt's website- http://www.elliotterwitt.com/lang/en/index.html
John Kasaian
13-Sep-2009, 18:21
Heres a link for a very funny "Hitler and his Kodachrome" on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDWeAHd6D6w
ROFLMAO! Somebody ought to post that over on APUG!
ROFLMAO! Somebody ought to post that over on APUG!
Ages ago ...
Ben Syverson
13-Sep-2009, 20:04
Until then I thought it was a great capture.
It's still a great capture!
Most of your favorite "spontaneous" photographs were staged.
Struan Gray
14-Sep-2009, 00:29
The old Life/Picture Post/Vu etc illustrated magazines used to go in for a lot of humour, often just oddball scenes or juxtapositions, but every now and then real wit would break out - it was the Golden age of illustrators and cartoonists like Saul Steinberg, and the photographers wanted to join in.. René Maltête in one of my wry favourites:
http://rene.maltete.com/main.php?g2_itemId=112
Michal Makowski
14-Sep-2009, 05:02
Extreme LF
Holy god-
Hope there was a reflex viewer involved-
looks a little tricky to compose that one-
How did the picture turn out?
percepts
14-Sep-2009, 06:56
It's still a great capture!
Most of your favorite "spontaneous" photographs were staged.
The camera always lies...
Michael Wynd
14-Sep-2009, 23:52
Michal,
I remember seeing this in an Australian pro photo mag when it first came out. The photographer is Australian and he was perched halfway up the cliffs outside Sydney Harbour shooting rock climbers. One of the comments made was "I hope he doesn't drop a dark slide." I think the magazine ws published in 1985.
Mike
Michael Wynd
14-Sep-2009, 23:54
JB7,
I saw the results in the magazine and they were outstanding. They tempted me to try this sort of thing myself with a 4x5 Nagaoka, but then I realised that I get vertigo.
Mike
No matter how well strapped that thing was,
I think I might have induced some harmonious shake...
Michael Graves
15-Sep-2009, 05:21
The camera always lies...
My camera has never once told a lie. I've used it to tell a few of my own, but the camera was innocent.
percepts
15-Sep-2009, 05:55
My camera has never once told a lie. I've used it to tell a few of my own, but the camera was innocent.
Just like Bill Stickers then. He's innocent.
Michal Makowski
15-Sep-2009, 06:07
Michal,
I remember seeing this in an Australian pro photo mag when it first came out. The photographer is Australian and he was perched halfway up the cliffs outside Sydney Harbour shooting rock climbers. One of the comments made was "I hope he doesn't drop a dark slide." I think the magazine ws published in 1985.
Mike
Thank you for the info. As a climber, mountain rescue team member and LF shooter I will never took my Toyo on the wall.
Anybody saw his pictures (www)?
For me the humour in this image was that the fireman is more interested in pumpkins than saving someones house. As a real situation that is pretty sick but funny. When you find out the fire is a training exercise it loses that real humour
I don't think so. One of the greatest sources of humor in photography is apparent juxtapositions, coincidences, convergences that are created by the camera ... by it's ability to create a new context for objects and events. Very often there's nothing remarkable going on at all, if you remove the constrictions of the photographic frame and the context it imposes.
Sternfeld's picture works on two levels: as a classical but bold use of color and form, and as a joke. The joke is the image ... the suggestion ... of the fireman who wandered away from the emergency to buy pumpkins. Without having known the back story, I still suspected that there was more to this than what met the eye. I didn't really think that sternfeld had been camped there when a random fire broke out and a firefighter lost his marbles. What was funny is the suggestion, and the peculiarity of the scene. And that's all still funny to me.
For me the humour in this image was that the fireman is more interested in pumpkins than saving someones house. As a real situation that is pretty sick but funny. When you find out the fire is a training exercise it loses that real humour
I don't think so. One of the greatest sources of humor in photography is apparent juxtapositions, coincidences, convergences that are created by the camera ... by it's ability to create a new context for objects and events. Very often there's nothing remarkable going on at all, if you remove the constrictions of the photographic frame and the context it imposes.
Sternfeld's picture works on two levels: as a classical but bold use of color and form, and as a joke. The joke is the image ... the suggestion ... of the fireman who wandered away from the emergency to buy pumpkins. Without having known the back story, I still suspected that there was more to this than what met the eye. I didn't really think that sternfeld had been camped there when a random fire broke out and a firefighter lost his marbles. What was funny is the suggestion, and the peculiarity of the scene. And that's all still funny to me.
percepts
15-Sep-2009, 13:41
just came across this. I suppose the humour doesn't exist without the title.
http://moonhead.blogtog.com/archives/6165_1595744791/276415
sun of sand
15-Sep-2009, 14:56
I think the fireman photo is more good photograph than humorous
It's not THAT funny ..especially after the first couple looks. I think it has a certain dull American for cheap laughs appeal
I think you have to be easily entertained if that makes you burst out -even on the inside- every time you see it
You have to know it's not real
Like a one-liner ..without any creativity in its telling it becomes plain not funny in its tiredness
Is the comedians joke funny or is it the way he performs the joke
usually a mix of both
Often a retelling by your coworker just aint got it
To me if it makes you think there HAS TO BE MORE TO IT THAN THIS ..it loses comedic value.
8x10 being used makes me chuckle no more
I don't care if Jay Leno uses a bullhorn to deliver his monologue
Doesn't really matter how its said if the joke isn't funny even IF the bullhorn IS the joke
Maltete is always funny. You can just accept it. Fireman you're constantly asking WHAT?
sun of sand
15-Sep-2009, 15:05
just reading through here
How is a football game staged? ..in the way it provides moments for great photographs
I don't think so.
percepts
15-Sep-2009, 18:06
I don't think so. One of the greatest sources of humor in photography is apparent juxtapositions, coincidences, convergences that are created by the camera ... by it's ability to create a new context for objects and events. Very often there's nothing remarkable going on at all, if you remove the constrictions of the photographic frame and the context it imposes.
Sternfeld's picture works on two levels: as a classical but bold use of color and form, and as a joke. The joke is the image ... the suggestion ... of the fireman who wandered away from the emergency to buy pumpkins. Without having known the back story, I still suspected that there was more to this than what met the eye. I didn't really think that sternfeld had been camped there when a random fire broke out and a firefighter lost his marbles. What was funny is the suggestion, and the peculiarity of the scene. And that's all still funny to me.
I'll put it another way. I'm disappointed to find that the fireman hasn't lost his marbles...
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