#289 ASSIGNMENT: SEAN TUCKER #1
NEW! Monday is assignment day where our special guest sets a photography challenge or a way to think about your picture-making for the next week. It’s a challenge for everybody, whatever interests you have, whatever camera you hold, film, larger format, DLSR, mirrorless, compact or smartphone – it’s all about the picture you see. Listen to the show to hear the assignment and find pictures that match the challenge below.
I would love to share the pictures you make for this challenge here, so please send them into studio@photographydaily.show - 2000 pixels on the long side, any orientation you prefer; square, portrait or landscape.
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PICTURES SUBMITTED
BY GERT JAN KOLE.
This image was shot during one of our weekend photowalks from a dune top near Zandvoort, the Netherlandsland. Shot with a 150 mm (which on my Olympus OM-D E-M5ii gives an angle of view comparable to a 300 mm on full-frame). It shows the Tata Steel plant near IJmuiden, some 6 kilometers north. The compression of the telelens crams everything in one frame, emphasizing how heavily polluting industry, leisure and housing are in close proximity to each other. A recent report showed that this plant is a massive source of NOx (actually the biggest source in our country), sulphur oxides and particulate matter. The sea breeze sends all those toxic fumes either to the densely populated cities in the east, or to a vulnerable nature reserve stretching from north to south along the coastline. The IPCC report made it clear that this will soon be a thing of the past: in 30 or 40 years this plant will be gone. Either because we did the sensible thing and shut it down, or the rising sea level did that for us and took the whole area with it.
BY JEREMY BAKER
Evidence of life before the thing in your hand you're possibly seeing with became so ubiquitous. Simpler times possibly.
BY LEON DROBY
Here in central Massachusetts, USA (Land), gasoline pumps are plentiful and charging stations are few and far between. In time though, I believe the landscape will change to look more like my photo (above). Charging stations will far outnumber gas pumps.
This photo was taken while wandering around Melbourne, Australia. Finding a public phone is becoming more and more difficult and this one also appears to be working, an added bonus. With the widespread use of mobile/cell phones, will they eventually disappear?
BY COLIN MAYER
A dilapidated fence I walk past most days, waiting for it to fall over.
BY KERRY ADAMS.
This power station is local to me and is due to be decommissioned later this year. I love to photograph it in all weather, especially when the conditions are dark and moody and the low clouds hang over the towers. I know in five years’ time or less that these will no longer be here and the landscape will be dramatically different, this is why I’m drawn to photograph them as much as possible.
"DIRTY DIESEL" BY JOHN MILLAR.
With fossil power starting to be phased out, the internal combustion engine is set to become a thing of the past. My idea was simply to get a shot of the open diesel fuel filler flap on our car. Shot with a shallow depth of field for maximum separation from the surroundings, and to blur away ant distractions. I went "old school" with the Canon 5D classic with a nifty fifty, the edit was completed with an Agfa APX 100 black and white film simulation, just to finish the old school feel. Interesting to think that probably within the next 20 years, petrol and diesel-powered cars won't be on our roads anyway.
BY LYNN FRASER
This is an image taken on a recent trip to the Isle of Barra, and these three items were outside the cottage where I stayed. It struck me immediately that it is pretty unusual to see a red phone box these days; they are almost completely a thing of the past. The postbox too - how much longer will we send physical mail? Finally, the bus stop - transport is continually evolving and there may come a point when we don't need to congregate at a set place to catch a bus.
BY SUSAN LARSSON
Here is my submission for Sean Tucker’s assignment - we live in and near what could be one of the last wilderness areas in an over-civilized world. Just a few miles from our home, this dirt road travels through wildlands where we are free to wander - at least before rattlesnake season:-) We pulled over to the side of the road to take some photos - will roads like this still be here in 40 years? Will people of the future have the opportunity to experience this aloneness in nature? And will there be places like this to explore, totally alone, without crowds all around?
BY ROBERT WEIGEL
This barn resides on my wife's family farm in the little town of Pfeifer, Kansas. It's about 20 miles outside of Hays where we live. It was built by her grandpa in the early1900s. I really don't think it's gonna make it another 30 or 40 years. It's leaning quite a bit to the right and the only thing holding it up is a tree on the right side which is out of view.
BY MIKE MILLER
Further to Sean Tucker's Photo Assignment, please find attached my submission. It is of a historical house that is now a business in Downtown Milton. I like the reflection of a historical church in the window of the door.
BY CRAIG HUGHES
Here is a photo I took of a colleague working on an old manual lathe. He is doing internal threading work of some stainless steel parts, you can see the swarf and smoke being thrown into the air. This type of work is becoming a definite thing of the past as these machines are replaced by digital and automated machines making things easier and safer but we are losing the skills that are required to work and use these machines to produce parts. This is a sad fact of modernisation where you don't need any engineering knowledge to work a modern machine all you need to do is push a button.
BY CHRIS CANHAM
On my daily walk into work, it struck me that in this scene not only will the telephone box in the middle background be gone in 40yrs (if not sooner) but also, with the rise of veganism and the association of meat production with climate change, probably the advertisement of meat products, as in the way the advertisement of cigarettes has been banned. Taken on my perennial ‘pocket’ camera, a 10yr old Olympus XZ-2, permanently on black and white as the noise from the tiny sensor in colour is too much.
BY VICTORIA ROBB
This is not a special scene but speaks to me in a couple of ways. More obviously as we see increasing numbers of high street shops empty and high street buildings changing. More personally, Mr Benn and his varied characters, who they are using to bring some colour to Putney instead of otherwise white or boarded display windows, was one of my childhood favourite TV programmes (Mr Benn lived in a Putney street in the stories). It was a way I could dream myself away into other worlds and adventures. The author of Mr Benn, David McKee, died this past week. Looking forward 30 years', I can imagine the resonance of Mr Benn as a character may be in a diminishing number of people's memories, along with the high street as a shopping location.
Here in Australia the government ensured that everyone should have reasonable access to a telephone under the universal service obligation, to allow people to call emergency services and other necessary phone numbers. What was even more surprising was in August 2021 the government made calls made from all payphones in Australia free (including calls across Australia and to mobile/cell phones). We all know that nothing lasts forever (particularly where governments are involved), eventually the humble payphone will be gone (each year they add a couple to the list for removal). Forty years from now I can’t imagine many of them will be left. I’ve only just recently picked up an X100S (unfortunately I can’t afford a V or even T at this stage), I’ve been really impressed with the quality of the photos it can turn out. This image was taken at night using the built-in flash and shot at f/2.0, 1/30sec and ISO 640, I did some basic editing in Lightroom.
BY JENS ROHDE
This photograph is strictly speaking taken the day before the assignment was set, but since I took it with the intent on documenting this fiberglass bus shed, I decided to allow myself to post it. These fiberglass sheds were everywhere in my childhood. Different shapes, but all a shell made out of fiberglass. Now they have more or less all been replaced by fancy structures in glass and aluminum with amble space for advertising. This one is placed close to home, and I have passed it many times, and each time I was struck with the thought: I should photograph this! Finally did it! :)
Fifty years out, what we will look back at (or not in my case) and think: did people really do that? I am sadly confined to barracks with a bad back so I looked around my study - it’s a small world - and decided that you can have a twofer. Books and spectacles. I suspect poor vision will be a thing of history. Eyesight will be corrected at birth or our sight will be genetically enhanced before we are born. And a physical book? Heavy, expensive, cumbersome, needs storing….. They will be luxury items I suspect. Something along the lines of the Gutenberg Project and the Kindle (urgh) will combine to give us all RaaS - reading as a service. Your own virtual library where a hologram of a real book will be projected and you will turn the pages with your eyes. That would be a tragedy for me. I have thousands of books and one I have read maybe half a dozen times is The Malay Archipelago. I give you Alfred Russel Wallace’s magnum opus, accompanied by my glasses. I own two copies of this book - a reading copy and a Folio Society edition in two volumes. Will it be destined to become a quaint relic as we approach the 22nd century? Who knows but I fear so.
BY GARRY PLATT
Both these items are I think going to disappear, the postbox and the telephone box. The latter as you can see is on its way out now.
BY SYLVAIN DUCHENE.
Being a historian. This is a candid street photo I took while wandering in the streets of Lyon. This little girl was cleaning the window for some reason. I thought it was really funny, but then she stopped and smiled at me, so cute. I only noticed the father later when going through the pics.
Here are a couple of photos that in my view strike a chord with the theme this week. Both are street shots in Stockholm, the beautiful capital of "Swedlandia" (my take on Sweden-land, 'pologies, kind sir, 'pologies), on the way to and from my workplace. In the first one, the older lady getting out of the modern Stockholm taxi was what caught my eye and I only noticed the passer-by staring at his phone after checking the photograph. In the second, a ‘modern classic’ Saab 9-3, a beautiful car that still populates the streets of Stockholm (and other Swedish cities), but probably not for many more decades.
BY NEALE JAMES
Two images from my trip over the last 24 hours to the National Rail Museum in wondrous York. Shooting tomorrow’s history, the left-hand image shows a museum showcase within which sits a Covid-19 sanitising station - an interesting recent addition to our lives which I hope will be relegated to history briskly. To the right, perhaps more subtle, but history claimed these beautiful steam-machines not so long ago. To the right, two more nods to a history, both of which may be consigned to history one day. Newspaper reading, and phone scanning - how will we view our media in the future.
BY COLIN MAYER
Apologies for being a bit late in submitting some photos for this week’s assignment. I have, I think, a valid excuse. It’s been persistently, perpetually, precipitating heavily here on the East Coast of Australialand, causing all sorts of floods, landslides, property damage, and the like and as a result, I’ve been hiding indoors for the past few weeks and haven’t been listening to the podcast. Today. It finally dried up and I was able to go for a bit of a photowalk at Cronulla. Couldn’t get to my usual beach walk – the road was closed by a landslide! Earbuds in I was surprised by a new feature, a challenge set by Sean Tucker. Well, I’m not going to let a challenge go by. Here are a few shots from today’s walk along the front at North Cronulla. I wonder how long it will be before the last of the 1950’s houses are replaced by modern concrete units (flats we called them in the UK).
BY NEALE JAMES
Buttons, buttons. One day these will no longer be the currency of everyday physical necessity. Maybe retina operation, who knows? But my thoughts with this challenge, is that buttons, could well become heritage.
