We cover the tough stories here at Photobooth.net, like this one, about Jai Rodriguez of “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” fame, who apparently took photos of himself kissing a woman in a photobooth at Fran Drescher’s “Living with Fran” party this weekend. That’s about all there is to the story, actually.
Another copy of the 2003 Billy Childish book “photo-booth” has been listed on eBay this week, with a starting bid of £50. The description for the item once again mentions Tracey Emin, the most well-known personality photographed in the book, as well as Sexton Ming, and describes the book as having “a very small press run of only 50 books.”
Another copy of the book was listed on eBay in mid-April and eventually sold for nearly £100. The current copy is a little different, with gallows woodcuts covering the front, and, as the description reads, this copy is “signed Billy 03 in red pencil on the back cover.”
Residents in Workington in northern England would rather see a post box in their local post office than a photo booth, according to an article in the Workington Times & Star. We can’t blame them, actually; it seems pretty strange that a customer in the town post office would have to queue up and hand a stamped letter to a postal clerk, rather than be able to drop the letter in a post box.
Is that an excuse for photobooth-bashing, though? As one unhappy resident is quoted about the current setup at the post office, “Instead we’ve got a silly photo booth, which they’ve already got in Woolworths. They could’ve put a post box somewhere.”
The National Trust for Historic Preservation reports on the opening of a restored Woolworth building in Oxnard, California. The building opened as a Woolworth store in 1950 and closed in the late 1990s, when Woolworth closed their 400 remaining U.S. locations. (The article states that the closing was in 1998, though Wikipedia and other sources state July 17, 1997 as the date).
The first floor of the newly restored building houses a museum of Woolworth history, including “vending machines, an antique take-your-own-photo booth and payphone.” Woolworth photobooths introduced the affordable, instant photograph to a great number of people over the years, and the mass closing brought an end to the only photobooth in town for many communities. Nice to see one back in the plus column.
This image, found in the May 2005 issue of Real Simple magazine, takes the cake for the most ambitious faked photobooth yet. The booth is real, I do believe, but the metal delivery chute has been moved (in Photoshop) from the side of the photobooth mechanism (camera, darkroom), to the side where the subject sits. For this configuration to function, either 1) the person sitting for their picture will have to slip the picture in the chute (then step outside and retrieve it) or 2) the picture must be beamed via an as-of-yet undiscovered technology to the metal chute. Perhaps this is a booth from the future.
Also worth noting is the signage that was most certainly removed (again, with the help of Photoshop) to make room for the article title and lead-in.
The article gives 14 tips on how to look great in a snapshot. Some highlights include: how to avoid the dreaded double chin (keep below the level of the lens), avert a fake smile (don’t say cheese, think of something funny), and evade the evil red-eye (dilate your pupils by looking at a bright light).
This sunny spring morning brings with it the full, official, public debut of Photobooth.net. Since this site has at its core an interest in collecting and documenting the history of the hard-to-find photobooth and its often ephemeral by-products, it seems like a good idea to take stock of the history of the site itself, before we lose sight of where we came from in the flurry of contributions and accolades. Let us know when that’s supposed to start, will you?
I started my photobooth project in the fall of 2003. By the spring of 2005, when I folded it into this collaboration, I had 31 films, 8 television shows, 4 commercials, and one music video featuring photobooths listed.
In my Photo Booth Directory, I had 50 photobooth locations listed, seven of which were submitted by five different contributors. The booths were located in 14 states and one foreign country. I had personally visited the other 43, in ten states and one foreign country.
On May 1, 2005, Photobooth.net was the 26th result in a Google search for the term “photobooth”; the result was for the 7th International Photobooth Convention page. Interestingly enough, the ninth result in that same search was for my Doubleperf.com Photo Booth Directory page, and the tenth result was for Tim’s photoboothstl.com, so we were both already well-represented.
I also spelled “photobooth” as “photo booth.” Tim and I, ever the trendsetters with hopes of creating our own brave new linguistic world, have agreed to spell it as one compound word. This is important stuff, really.
A lengthy photobooth session led to a major altercation at a Massachusetts Chuck E. Cheese’s this past Sunday, the Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise reports. Three girls, all cousins, aged 21, 18, and 14, were arrested and charged with “assault and battery with a dangerous weapon (shod foot).”
Apparently, the girls sat in the photobooth taking photos for at least half an hour while a family waited outside to use the booth. When the girls finally relented and let Eduarda Silveira, her husband, and their six-month daughter in to use the booth, the girls continued to insult and abuse the family. The abuse escalated into a fight in which “one teen allegedly began pulling Silveira’s hair, punching her, and eventually knocked her to the ground and kicked her.”
We love photobooths, but come on, people, they’re not worth fighting over. Especially when the fighting involves punching, hair-pulling, and assault with a shod foot.
This is not the first time a photobooth has been in the middle of an incident involving assault and Massachusetts law enforcement officers, though. A few years ago (and if anybody knows when, I’d appreciate the info), photobooth artist Paul Yates was assaulted and detained by rent-a-cop security personnel at the BostonBowl photobooth as he was taking photos, some of which happened to involve no clothing. The Boston Phoenix’s story on the incident is worth a read.
UPDATE, Thursday, April 28, 2005: According to a report in today’s Fitchburg Sentinel & Enterprise, the photobooth was a digital “Photo Sketch” model.
Domino, billed as “the shopping magazine for your home,” is the latest offering from the Condé Nast empire. The debut issue features a story about three mother-daughter duos and their decorating similarities. Each duo is pictured in a black and white photostrip. Check out the online preview here. more…
In the May 2005 issue of Reader’s Digest, the editors select “America’s 100 Best” falling in six categories: Legacies, Passions, Adventure, Innovations, Time Off, and Connections. In the Time Off section, old-fashioned photobooths are named the Best Snapshots. We most wholeheartedly agree.
For an interactive web-version of the article, click here, then click on the state of Texas.
French eBay is a treasure trove of photobooth paraphernalia, we’ve recently discovered. After nabbing a photobooth pin and Photomaton promotional brochure a few weeks ago, I came across this interesting item today: an adjustable photobooth seat, or “Tabouret de photomaton,” as they say in Paris.
The stool gives the choices of “Plus bas” and “Plus haut,” with instructions to “Réglez le siege” also printed on the seat. The seller describes the item as “super déco”; I would have to agree. I don’t know if it’s worth 100 euro, where the bidding starts, but it would certainly make a great conversation piece, or a nice replacement seat for an ailing booth.