Kate Burt, writing for The Independent on Sunday, has written a nice piece on the current state of photobooths in the UK, and around the world, titled “Camera obscurer: Meet the enthusiasts that are determined to keep photo booths alive.” She was kind enough to contact us for the piece, and includes some of our thoughts on photochemical booths. Also featured are digital entrepreneurs The Mighty Booth and The Expressive Booth, as well as our fellow photochemical enthusiasts Carole and Siobhan of Photomovette, Alex of Photoautomat, and Steve “Mixup” Howard.

Burt provides a brief history of the booth as well as a look at the current state of the photochemical machine, attempting to survive in a digital world:

However, enthusiasts argue, digital booths just don’t have the same appeal. Tim Garrett, who, with his friend Brian Meacham, co-founded the appreciation site Photobooth.net in the US, believes that “Digital ‘enhancing’ of the experience with cheesy voiceovers and graphics has taken away from the beautiful simplicity of the vintage booths.” The charm of the old-school booths, he continues, is “a special sauce of ingredients: the tiny precious images, beautifully lit and exposed; the instant gratification; the cramped space of the seating area that inspires intimate photos; the anticipation as you wait for the strip to pop out, unsure exactly how they will look; the pungent smell of the chemicals and the low whirr of the machine…” 

Thanks to Kate for a great piece, which you can also find archived on our site.

If you’re a Photobooth.net reader, then perhaps you dream about owning your own vintage photobooth some day. Since this might not be the easiest dream to fulfill, we’re pleased to announce the arrival of the world’s smallest — and least expensive — photobooth: Pocketbooth, a vintage photobooth simulator for your iPhone or iPod touch.

Now, you may ask why we’re mentioning a digital photobooth app on our site. While we don’t typically post about digital photobooths, this app is special for two reasons: 1) we had a hand in designing it and 2) all of the elements in the app are based on actual design elements of vintage photobooths.

While the overall look of Pocketbooth was inspired by the Model 11, much of the woodgrain textures and the delivery chute are from a Model 17 booth. Great care was taken to ensure that the booth is true to the look and feel of its analog counterpart. From the woodgrain-surrounded delivery chute to the red and green lights behind the reflective glass, right down to the size, proportions, and texture of the resulting photostrip, it feels like the real deal.

You might recognize the Autophoto Model 11 photobooth from the splash screen: it is none other than the beautifully-restored booth that belongs to Peter and Ina in the Netherlands, a booth we posted about last April.

The app is available on the iTunes store and is currently discounted to 99 cents. It will be returning to its normal price in early October.

If you don’t have an iPhone or iPod Touch, or feel it somehow unfaithful to use this app, please continue to use our Photobooth Locator and find an actual photobooth near you.

Our friend Scot Phillips, whom we met at last year’s Photobooth Convention in Chicago, let us know about a unique event at the museum where he works: an art auction whose proceeds will go towards helping the museum purchase a photochemical photobooth.

The Massillon Museum is seeking help in the form of donated artwork to be auctioned to help raise funds to purchase their photobooth.

The Massillon Museum will host its one-night only Photobooth Project: Silent Art Auction on September 25th from 7:00pm to 10:00pm in the Main Gallery at the Massillon Museum. All proceeds from this event will benefit the Photobooth Project.

Each donor will be recognized in the event program. Upon purchase of the photobooth, your name will also be included on a plaque installed on the photobooth.

If you want to donate your original artwork, download an application from the website (www.massillonmuseum.org and click on the Support tab) or contact Scot Phillips at 
bsphillips@massillonmuseum.org. 

Donations outside the fundraisers will be greatly 
appreciated. If making a donation, just specify that you want it to go to the “Photobooth Project” fund.

The deadline to donate artwork is Saturday, September 18th. You may donate artwork from now until the deadline, just contact Sandi to arrange pick up/drop off — don’t hesitate. We greatly appreciate your consideration and hope you will help make the Photobooth Project a success. Hope to see you at the Silent Art Auction! 

Not since 2005’s fracas in Fitchburg has the photobooth shown up so prominently in the global police blotter. In what can only be described as global photobooth crime spree (it’s all relative, right?), two separate photobooth-related incidents transpired in the past few days.

The first incident took place in Northern Scotland and looks to be an inside job. Colin Smith, 35, misused his role as a photobooth technician to steal £10,000 from booths he was in charge of servicing. The money was being used to pay down his mortgage, not buy drugs, so he has that going for him.

The second incident comes to us from Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. A disgruntled arcade patron became angry when a photobooth would not refund his money. He did the only sensible thing; he punched the booth and cracked the glass. The report fails to mention whether the booth ever gave any money back, but at least the perpetrator has a nice photo of his bloody knuckles.

Last night saw the opening of an exhibition at the Fleming Museum at the University of Vermont called Picture Yourself: The Photobooth in America, 1926–2010. Nakki Goranin, author of American Photobooth, organized the show, and told us a little about what can be found there. The exhibit includes

…my working Auto-Photo 14 and my wooden 1934 handmade photobooth plus parts of a street photographer’s photobooth (circa 1930s)… Many vintage photos from my collections, an original handbook written by Anatol Josepho, one of his original lenses, etc.

We look forward to seeing photos from the event and hearing about how it went. 

We’re happy to be able to bring a report from the opening of the new photobooth in Vienna we mentioned last month. Thanks to Ole for the report and to Asger Doenst for the top three photos. The final photo is by fashion photographer Josef Gallauer; if only every photobooth operator were lucky enough to have Mr. Gallauer capture them and their booth.

After more then one and a half years of preparation and negotiation, the classic Photobooth found a wonderful spot in the courtyard of Klosterhof inside the Museumsquartier in Downtown Vienna. And it is here to stay.

The booth is accessible daily from 6 a.m. until 1 a.m. 4 Photos 2,- Euros.

On May 21st, 2010 we opened the Photobooth Vienna with a party. Famous actor/director Peter Kern gave a speech and actress Katharina Lorenz gave a little performance before we invited our guests to take a seat inside the newly renovated booth. The party went on until after midnight.

See update at the bottom of this entry.

This week is an exciting time to be a photobooth fan in Europe. Tomorrow, May 21, and Friday, May 22, will see the debut of two new photochemical booths in Austria and Italy.

First, from the good folks at Photoautomat London, we learned about the opening party for the first photochemical photobooth to return to Vienna. The event, advertised here with its “Do it like Andy” Warhol-themed poster, takes place tomorrow night, May 21, at 7 pm. We look forward to seeing photos and hearing stories about the event.

Photoautomat have a page up on their website for the booth, which joins their ever-growing European family.

Secondly, we heard from Marco in Italy letting us know about the booth that will be debuting this Saturday night in Florence. More info about the booth can be found on its website at Fotoautomatica.com.

The opening begins at 7 pm on Saturday, making it easy for a true fan to get there from Vienna and take part in both events. We’ll have photos and an account of the event as soon as we get it, and will add location pages for both booths next week.

We’re really pleased to see these new additions, especially the first new booth in Austria, and are enthusiastic about the health of the photobooth scene in Europe. Thanks to everyone for letting us know about the news.

UPDATE 5/21/10: First, we’ve found out the new booth is not the first photochemical booth in Vienna, but the third. We’ll be adding entries for the other two soon.

Second, thanks to Ferdinand for contributing photos from the new booth at Pratersauna in Vienna.

Here’s a video of the booth being installed. Thanks, Ferdinand.

We salute Peter Graves, who died Sunday at 83, one of the first men ever to step into a photobooth on television.

While photobooths in the U.S. have had their ups and downs of late, it’s becoming apparent that Europe, once overflowing with photochemical booths but then reduced to extinction just a few years ago, is now coming back in a wonderful way.

This week, we’ve made a number of different additions to our various sections, representing a range of recent developments in the European photobooth scene.

First, Igor sent word of a new photobooth at the Bonton in Paris, “a concept-store dedicated to the universe of childhood.” It’s always great to see another photobooth come to life in Paris (our count is now up to four).

Next, we have a trio of items from Germany: first, an article in the Hamburger Abendblatt, listing the Feldstrasse photobooth as one of 100 must-do experiences in the city. “The machine has achieved cult status in Hamburg.”

Next, in the very same Hamburg photobooth, musical duo Liebe Minou shot a video for their song “Mein Zuhause” inside the booth.

And finally, concert venue Uebel & Gefaehrlich features a few different photobooths in a video they’ve released as a podcast. Nina Persson and her band “A Camp,” Pete Doherty from the Libertines, and a guy named Andreas each take some photos in a booth, while a narrator adds some commentary.



From our friends Martin and Ira at Schnellfoto in Moscow, we have a terrific article about photobooths, published in a recent issue of the Russian magazine Foto & Video.

Martin and Ira’s article covers, as far as we can tell, the history of the booth, information about their booth, as well as photobooths in art and a great technical look inside a dip and dunk booth. Thanks so much to Martin for sending us copies of the magazine. 

And finally, we’ve been cleaning out our “To-Do” list lately and finally got around to posting an entry for

our appearance on the BBC web show “Click” a few years ago. We mentioned it here when it first came out in 2007, but now we’ve got screengrabs, crummy as they are, and we’ve immortalized the host’s opinion of Photobooth.net as a “wonderfully pointless site.”

I didn’t know who Chris Benz was before coming across this piece in the New York Times, which describes some recent changes in the young fashion designer’s life. He recently moved to a new studio space, and left his photochemical photobooth behind:

You recently moved into a new studio space, but you didn’t bring along your famous photo booth.

It was getting to be a bit of an albatross. It broke down. There was only one company in the tristate area that sold them and serviced them, and it closed. So it was just sitting there, all 2,000 pounds of it. We ended up begging this guy in Pennsylvania to take it. At first he didn’t want to, because he said it was worth so much money. We were like, “Just take it!”

New York Magazine characterizes the move this way: “Already he’s moved on from his old studio, ditching a beloved, near-inoperable photo booth in the process…”

You can see some photobooth photos here and a photo of the booth and some photostrips in a New York Times post he guest-blogged in 2008.