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Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

essentialkids.com.au

21–30 of 47 posts

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#21

Being photographed every day just feels like any normal day as I have grown up with it my whole life This is interesting since it feels like there's a clear and deep message in it about what will happen to privacy in the future. "I will continue for next few months, Suman wants to continue, but once she has gone to university, it might be difficult for her, but let's see." Selfies?

The thing about privacy is that it's not a fundamental belief written into our genes, it's a derived believe arising from our social experiences and written into tradition. Our social inclination towards privacy developed because lack of privacy causes problems; social gossip, problems with getting jobs in small towns because everybody "knows" whatever it is, busybodies being able to stick their nose in things, etc.

We're in a weird time right now where there's massive info gathering, but not all that many concrete manifestations going on in our real lives, so of course the young'uns are all like "What's the big deal? So I get some ads for the types of movies I like, so what?" And in a big city, the small-town social pressures don't exist, and the internet brings the "big city" to smaller and smaller locales. But rest assured that once the digital busybodies catch up and we live through some sort of technocratic totalitarian nightmare where grimacing when the picture of $BIG_BROTHER comes on in your private home is grounds for losing your job, once that regime is overthrown, privacy rights will come back with a vengeance.

In the meantime I'm not sure how to avoid some variant on that outcome without simply living through it. I can't tell you how excited I am. I can only hope that we learn our lessons before the full flowering of the words I use actually manifests.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#22

I figure with the first of those years it must have been hard (no digital yet, scanning them afterwards). I also think that the chances are quite large that the measurable fraction of all the kids born in the last 5 years or so will find that at least one picture taken of them every week will survive in digital form for a long time, whether they like it or not. And possibly more frequently than that.

Consumer digital cameras have been around for 20 years:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_QuickTake

A friend of mine had a QuickTake 100 very early on. I got a digital Kodak camera not long after when I went travelling. I seem to remember they took off pretty quickly (amongst nerds at least).

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#23
I used to take photos, a lot, and uploading quite a bit to Flickr and other. But then, I started thinking if my daughter won't want when she grows up. She is an individual and may want something else entirely different. She is not an extension of me. I have reduced my photo/video of her. I do upload for families, relatives but have reduced the frequency and quantity drastically, have completed deleted her Flickr Account too. I want her to be her and let her define her life when she know what's happening around her.

Perhaps, just my thought and way of looking at life and the people around.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#24

People these days are so busy photographing, videoing, posting crap to twitter to see if people approve of what they're doing... They're missing out on actually enjoying and living life. Look at concerts - a sea of idiots holding up their phones, videoing an event, watching through their silly little phone. Enjoy the event! Buy the official DVD later if you want. So IMHO, this seems pretty obsessive and extreme. OK E…

Before visiting the link I thought the guy had his daughter line up in front of a white wall every single day so he could do a dramatic time-lapse sort of thing. Maybe that would have been a bit obsessive. All he did was a regular snapshot wherever it was convenient. This is no more obsessive than brushing your teeth every morning.

In fairness, I stand in front of a white wall every day to brush my teeth. I could easily imagine connected a mounted camera wirelessly to the button on my electric tooth brush and not having to think about it.

Of course, this comes from a person who already has his phone record its gps posistion every 5 minutes.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#25
I find the idea of a detailed 18 year time lapse to be pretty cool. If someone is willing to devote that much effort to the idea then more power to them. They seem like harmless photos to me.

Later on in life even 1 photo a week or 1 a month would be plenty of photos to see a detailed time lapse.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#27

People these days are so busy photographing, videoing, posting crap to twitter to see if people approve of what they're doing... They're missing out on actually enjoying and living life. Look at concerts - a sea of idiots holding up their phones, videoing an event, watching through their silly little phone. Enjoy the event! Buy the official DVD later if you want. So IMHO, this seems pretty obsessive and extreme. OK E…

I suppose there is an optimal ratio. While I agree some people overuse it, I still find it unbelievably awesome the fact that we carry a device in our pocket capable of registering a moment so that we can remember it later or share with others.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with you, he did start this project 18 years ago. 1996. Definitely way before the cellphone generation.

I wonder if he started out on film or digital from the beginning.

Canon introduced its first Powershot in 1996, with 0.5 MPixels.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#29
post #21

Being photographed every day just feels like any normal day as I have grown up with it my whole life This is interesting since it feels like there's a clear and deep message in it about what will happen to privacy in the future. "I will continue for next few months, Suman wants to continue, but once she has gone to university, it might be difficult for her, but let's see." Selfies?

The thing about privacy is that it's not a fundamental belief written into our genes, it's a derived believe arising from our social experiences and written into tradition. Our social inclination towards privacy developed because lack of privacy causes problems; social gossip, problems with getting jobs in small towns because everybody "knows" whatever it is, busybodies being able to stick their nose in things, etc.…

But rest assured that once the digital busybodies catch up and we live through some sort of technocratic totalitarian nightmare where grimacing when the picture of $BIG_BROTHER comes on in your private home is grounds for losing your job, once that regime is overthrown, privacy rights will come back with a vengeance.

My compatriots don't seem more worried about their privacy than the average US citizen, from what I can tell, even though we just celebrated 40 years since we overthrew our fascist dictatorship (which had an active political police and plenty of informants). It seems the effects wear off much too soon.

Re: Dad takes photo of his daughter every day for 18 years

#30

People these days are so busy photographing, videoing, posting crap to twitter to see if people approve of what they're doing... They're missing out on actually enjoying and living life. Look at concerts - a sea of idiots holding up their phones, videoing an event, watching through their silly little phone. Enjoy the event! Buy the official DVD later if you want. So IMHO, this seems pretty obsessive and extreme. OK E…

Phones at concerts aren't so they can re-watch them themselves, but so they can share the pictures / videos with friends. > to see if people approve of what they're doing... So completely disagree that that has anything to do with it. Its inherently social, and imho in a way its enhancing the moment. > a sea of idiots holding up their phones, videoing an event, watching through their silly little phone. Enjoy the eve…

> so they can share the pictures / videos with friends.

And 99% of the time the quality is so awful that nobody cares. It's just to show people they were at that gig or that event.

> imho in a way its enhancing the moment.

I really don't feel like looking at something through a lens or holding your camera is enhancing the moment. The Secret Life of Walter Mitty has a scene like that where the photograph don't take a picture just to appreciate the moment, because it's beautiful.

> wasting their time passing judgement on people.

well you're right on this one, to each their own I guess.

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