The Times of Your Life

 

I made a simple fade in/ fade out slideshow set to this music.

Old family pictures from 50 years back up through later years as we grew together.

Gave it to my Dad and the tears flowed.

He loved it.

So simple and easy to do and readily adaptable to any set of family, friends, coworkers/ retirees.

I miss the good old Kodak Days.....

My first camera.

Kodak was a household word in my family from an early age.

I was 7 and ordered it through the mail with some cereal boxtops. I remember like it was yesterday, the mental image of the small cardboard box in the mailbox which I had checked every day.

I was talking to Dad this morning about some older pictures I sent him yesterday.

He observed how when we take most pictures, especially of people we love, the value of the photos is nearly nothing in that moment.

Probably wouldn't even have taken many of them if not for the novelty of a camera we liked or just purchased.

"But just look at how they accumulate value with the passage of time."

I replied "Like planting an insignificant seed or seedling that grows into a 40' oak".

Taking pictures and planting trees on the place here are two of the simplest but most gratifying things I've done.

My first camera was the Instamatic 25. I too remember it like it was yesterday. My mother had an Instamatic 100 - it was like a Leica in comparison.

I wonder occasionally where all the images I've taken will end up and the old news photos are probably in a landfill by now, negatives and all. One thing I spend a good bit of time doing is scanning slides that my Dad and in-laws shot in the 50s through the 90's at least. We didn't think much of it when we were shooting but now I'm so glad we used the film. We always took the film to the local drug store for developing, they'd get back in a week. There would often be 3 Christmases on a roll. My Dad was pretty shocked when he saw how much film I started using, thought I was wasting money. My first camera was the Kodak X-15. It used magic cubes instead of battery powered flash cubes. It introduced me to Verichrome Pan and b&w photography and I still have one. If it hadn't been for that damned camera I'd probably have found a career like everyone else.

 

Rick H.

Phil, that was amazing. Loved the image edit and my responses to it.