Man Buys 10.000 Undeveloped Negatives and Discovers Invaluable Treasure

This may be old news to some. As for the photographs? No words will do them justice.

www.webburgr.com/vivian_maier/

Exposing more than 10,000 negs and never processing them is more than a little weird.

Yahtzee! It's like winning the proverbial photography lottery!

That's neat! Won't lie, I'd probably cry

Is the woman "Vivian" famous or something. I mean these are cool and all, but... why is it so special? (genuine question).

I see, she's "turned the art world upside down". So they "Art world" has discovered her... that'll make that dude pretty darned rich. Pity the photographer will never see any of it. Honestly if it weren't for this "amazing discovery" and perhaps the fact she's dead, these photos wouldn't be turning "the art world upside down".

Stealthy Ninja wrote: Is the woman "Vivian" famous or something. I mean these are cool and all, but... why is it so special? (genuine question).

Well, she's famous now. While alive, she was unknown. It's the story that's done it … the discovery of so many thousands of photos just stashed away and forgotten. Now there's a book, a documentary film, and exhibits all over the place. The photos are OK … just OK, IMO … without the story, they'd be nothing special.

Aha! A ninja edit. You got it!

hghlndr6 wrote:

Stealthy Ninja wrote: Is the woman "Vivian" famous or something. I mean these are cool and all, but... why is it so special? (genuine question).

Well, she's famous now. While alive, she was unknown. It's the story that's done it … the discovery of so many thousands of photos just stashed away and forgotten. Now there's a book, a documentary film, and exhibits all over the place. The photos are OK … just OK, IMO … without the story, they'd be nothing special.

Aha! A ninja edit. You got it!

LOL yeh I got it. I also agree with you. They're just OK. Typical art though. Make up some BS (or have a cool story) and you can make almost anything "Art".

Maybe one day I will have an exhibition of my posts on PT. Call it a journey through the binary world of photographic imagery and philosophy of metaphysical oneness.

It is risky buying old film, exposed or unexposed, because film deteriorates over the years of which natural radiation and heat are the biggest culprits.

Developing old film, you can not stick to the recommendations. You need to develop longer to make up for loss.
I'm glad to see these were okay.

I agree with hghlndr6 (nice nickname) and the Ninja: Photos ok, but nothing breathtaking.

However, a good story, showing that becoming known, rich and famous, mostly is not a question
of a good job but a good marketing.

Ulrich Brodde wrote: I agree with hghlndr6 (nice nickname) and the Ninja: Photos ok, but nothing breathtaking.

However, a good story, showing that becoming known, rich and famous, mostly is not a question
of a good job but a good marketing.

good points

Ulrich Brodde wrote: I agree with hghlndr6 (nice nickname) and the Ninja: Photos ok, but nothing breathtaking.

However, a good story, showing that becoming known, rich and famous, mostly is not a question
of a good job but a good marketing.

I agree to some extent... Becoming known is ALL about marketing and networking, and I've seen mediocre photographers gain local popularity this way many times, some who have improved and some who have not. There is a limit to getting your name out there though; those people who didn't improve will stop at the point they're at and never progress.

As for the photo "quality", I've never seen technicality to play a huge role in street photography. To me, street photography is like photojournalism: the value isn't in how the image is composed (yeah sometimes they can look awesome and achieve the goal of being visually appealing but I find that to be rare. Let's face it, street photography is ugly. It's busy and messy and relies on spontaneity). The value in street photography is the story the images tell, and I thought these were interesting.

This story is quite old by now. I think the fascination with these images is the look into a previous time in history. Most of the images are just snapshots of daily life but there are some very good ones in the bunch that I have seen. They are not fine art as I see fine art, but a very interesting look back in time.

I think this is awesome for the Time Capsule value. It's a glimpse at a specific place with no steps in between. These weren't developed, framed, and reflected on for years. It is literally one step from that point in history to our time. To me that's incredibly awesome. The photos themselves can be analyzed in a different way, but from a historical perspective it's pretty darn awesome.

Stealthy Ninja wrote:

hghlndr6 wrote:

Stealthy Ninja wrote: Is the woman "Vivian" famous or something. I mean these are cool and all, but... why is it so special? (genuine question).

Well, she's famous now. While alive, she was unknown. It's the story that's done it … the discovery of so many thousands of photos just stashed away and forgotten. Now there's a book, a documentary film, and exhibits all over the place. The photos are OK … just OK, IMO … without the story, they'd be nothing special.

Aha! A ninja edit. You got it!

LOL yeh I got it. I also agree with you. They're just OK. Typical art though. Make up some BS (or have a cool story) and you can make almost anything "Art".

Maybe one day I will have an exhibition of my posts on PT. Call it a journey through the binary world of photographic imagery and philosophy of metaphysical oneness.

Yeah pretty much. Nothing spectacular. And I thought I was a real procrastinator when it came to developing film in the old days.
This is all marketing, and now that the trendy artsy fartsy dealers are involved the guy will make a bagillion dollars for snaps. Got to love it.

Yeah, I saw some of the images when the story first broke. Meh.