Passenger Sniff Test

Franch authorities recently have authorized a new anti-terrorist

screening method, and instituted giant screening 'sniffers' installed

at the passenger entrances of Paris's sprawling Charles de Gaulle

airport at nearby suburban Roissy. So far, it appears that this new

test has turned up several dozen cases of previously undetected

unbathed Frenchmen, twenty three pair of overripe socks and one giant

roule of Roquefort Cheese. ;~)) (Humor is all to rare here on PN, so

I hope you enjoy). Your ratings and critiques are invited and most

welcome. If you rate harshly or very critically, please submit a

helpful and constructive comment; please share your supeerior

photographic knowledge to help improve my photography. Thanks!

Enjoy! John

In the request for critique there are several spelling errors. The Administration plans to leave open critique requests for a while to make corrections, but that is not yet instituted, so I will have to live with this apologea. I do know how to spell, but to correct them after I accidentally hit the 'confirm' button would have meant removing the photo, making corrections. then resubmitting, and the photo would be embargoed from critique requests for 24 hours, but I wanted to share now.

 

John (Crosley)

Did you notice that roughly this photo is a 'rule of thirds' photo, laid out on its side?

 

Consider the length of the luggage carts, left, the distance to the mouth/nose combination (centerpoint) then the distance to the right edge of the frame, then compare the various distances of the entire horizontal measurement, and consider their proportions.

 

I think, roughly, that will amount to showing this photo is cut roughly into 'thirds' which -- in a very rare instance for me -- has resulted in a 'rule of thirds' photo -- even if turned on its side.

 

Have I measured correctly (and roughly) or is this analysis 'all wet'?

 

John (Crosley)

A delightful comedic response to insanity. Thanks so much for all of it. I love the composition and, most of all, the comment!

Why not be a little ribald or at least flip about today's recent insanities?

 

There's very little left but humour sometimes.

 

The Russians are famous in their language for two things: their swear words, of which there are near record numbers, (I am told), and for their bitter humour -- something that flourished in Soviet times, as the simplest of jokes could mask a barbed criticism of the Soviet system in which one could lose one's life for criticising the system. Jokes became the wherewithal and the sustenance of the Soviet people; now they have capitalism, the stores are full and except for Moscow, where there is plenty and prices are rising daily, I am told, many people cannot afford simple things, or so relatives tell me (but the economy IS booming in relative terms, 'fueled' by high petroleum export prices among other things).

 

Next door neighbor and former Soviet component Ukraine does not have that petroleum, but it does have many strong-willed, good-hearted people, even if things there are a little slower than neighboring Russia which shares a common history (the Soviet times.) and many people in common -- much of Ukraine speaks Russian, at least part-time and about half or more are Russian parentage and culture, or mixed parentage. (I can even tell most which ones are the 'mixed' ones in a country where such subracial characteristics are very slight indeed. (Of course, it's only to sharpen my skills in 'people watching' as it has no practical application, except if one is looking for a particular facial type in doing women's portraiture or choosing a model for a particular 'look' and Ukrainian (pure breed) women often do have a particular 'look' and/or facial shape which is special and highly valued to high fashion magazines which often hire such women as models.)

 

In Ukraine, about 80% of people or more consider themselves 'middle class' but when European economic standards are applied, most of them live in poverty or near-poverty, with maybe 20-25% living in the middle class. However, the country's economy, with hiccups and burps occasinally, is doing rather well, and all things considered, it's better than 20 or 30 years ago (or even ten).

 

That self-economic analysis by the Ukrainians, however, just goes to show you, it's all in one's perspective.

 

This photo is not just about the 'rule of thirds', it's about 'perspective' as you have noted so succinctly.

 

That's a term with many uses.

 

Thanks for your good-hearted comment.

 

John (Crosley)

a really good capture. Sometimes, also if you strictly adhere to the Golden Rules, you won't find any perspective at all ;-) Thank you. G.

John, I searched for and couldn't find my photo of San Diego Airport where a prominent sign declares "no humor". I was chastised in my freshman year of college with, "Humor has no place in a business letter". I never "got the message" and went on to teach English for 37 years ladled with copious helpings of laughter. But I never crack a joke around the Homeland Security Inspectors. They were never my students. Thanks for the smile. Regards, Bernie. PS I love the pic.

You very correctly understood my comments above, about the so-called 'Golden Rule' -- but you mean it's plural, and all this time I thought there was just one.

 

You see I've never attended a photo class -- I'm entirely self-taught. I go by what looks good to me.

 

(Oh, I did once sign up for a photo class at Cupertino, California's De Anza College, which had a fabulous darkroom, but the instructor, who was to teach us photography, seemed to have most of his experience in a field called 'photo lithography' which specifically, meant transferring images of circuits and making them microscopic for etching or otherwise transferring onto circuit boards and/or microchips (at that time, a common method).

 

He was totally devoid of any sense of 'aesthetics' let alone of humor.

 

People who have known me for quite some time believe I'm a certain sort of person, maybe mostly devoid of humor, but if they happen to see my photography they begin to treat me as an entirely other person. It's amaazing that . . . the power of my own observations, to communicate to others feelings that they otherwise never can bring out in me, perhaps because they have no 'funny bone' to connect to.

 

When in the presence of someone who 'gets' my humor, it can absolutely be riotous -- with regaling laughter, snickers and sometimes, occasionally snorting (even a Coke will be snorted out a nose at times -- ouch -- or a milkshake which can be a little messier).

 

It is said, by the way, in a Joseph Wambaugh book, that Tijuana, Mexico police used torture on young truant teenagers who raised too much hell across the border when they visited from Southen California -- LA and San Diego. The police would shake a Coke bottle then make the demeanants drink it, forcing the carbonated liquid out their noses -- it brought about more than one 'confession' and I understand quelled disturbances rather effectively.

 

It's a good thing this poor person didn't have his popo (Russian slang for rear end) into the air, or the caption might have been a different one -- perhaps a caption derived from commercials for certain medicated wipes.

 

;~)

 

Thanks Giuseppe.

 

John (Crosley)

 

Oh, and just for the record, what are those other 'Golden Rules' since I am entirely devoid of any inkling of what they might be.

 

jc

... Giuseppe, have you descended into a pun!?? John, you promised me PN was a no-pun zone. Or wasn't that you? Someone did. And yet by allowing the pernicious spectre of humor into this serious photography site, you have opened the crack whereby a pun was squeezed through. Oh, the shame.

 

But then again, how can you fault somebody who puns in languages other than his native tongue?

Well, thanks you (purposeful misspelling - I had a Russian assistant who resisted saying it correctly 'Thank you' and keep a reminder that sometimes people are rather willful in their 'mistakes', she would never say 'thank you', and certain other things she resisted terribly -- I'm still wondering how she made my instant message screen on my distant computer start to shake).

 

This was a 'gimme' almost.

 

How could I resist, even though I was far to the left when I saw this sign, and I had to walk a long distance, mount my zoom tele lens, then wait for the appropriate parties to show up, so I could take this photo - it was not pre-ordained that it would be this photo exactly, but something around what this is. . . .

 

It also looks pretty good in B&W too, so if you think I'm just a B&W guy, as some now do, you might imagine my B&W photos with 'color added' -- all the recent ones (almost all) are desaturated color, and sometimes the choice of whether or not to post in color is problematic, as they work well both ways -- and sometimes appear quite differently in their two different iterations.

 

At one time, people thought I was a 'color guy' until someone remarked that if you desaturate all my photos, they'd really make pretty good B&W captures.

 

I started doing that, and now I'm known for my B&W.

 

Go figure.

 

As to humor, think of laughing so hard that the Coca Cola you just swallowed goes out your nose . . . that's how hard I laugh sometimes when with good people who understand my humor and I just start trading quips or humorous observations.

 

It takes a special kind of person, though, and many see me as quite serious, indeed. Maybe some mistake me for being a candidate for Homeland Security screening inspector . . . . though fat chance.

 

Indeed!

 

They should visit the place in my mind where that light bulb in my mind goes off when I 'construct' a photo such as this.

 

I might have said 'capture' but that would suppose I just 'saw' it in passing and took out my camera and 'shot' it.

 

In reality - unlike some Phothshoppers who seem to make photocollages or photomontages - a little of this from here, a little of that from there -- I actually take reality and WILL it together.

 

I saw the sign, and I WILLED this person into proper position for this capture after I purposefully moved my body into position to capture this photo. This poor soul did have some 'free will' but not much when in the powerful 'force field' of my camera and lens, where people tend to behave absurdly, strangely, even sometimes surreally -- in other words, like people and somewhat predictably, if one watches people enough and becomes very experienced at it.

 

So, this is a 'construct' of mine.

 

I saw one element and WILLED the other element into place -- something I do with a certain percent of my photos (how else to explain my success in making interesting photos -- it's like voodoo, or 'black magic'. . . . ?)

 

But I would never say such thing around those mostly humor-devoid Homeland Security inspectors.

 

They have to have a formal divorce from their humor when they take the job, I think -- even pay alimony (or is it child support) to their now-abandoned senses of jollity . . . so severely do they take their busienss, it seems, but I keep trying . . . and I sometimes succeed in breaking the ice (ICE?).

 

Thanks Bernhardt for enlifting this discussion; fooey to those people who can't stand humor (this is not a practical joke either, for those may have few places where they should be tolerated) -- isn't this more like a Gary Larson 'Far Side' cartoon?

 

I commend you to an early photo in this folder, in which a school of salmon (in blue) appears to be following a man (with child partly concealed). 'Don't Look Back, We May Be Being Followed' (striclty 'Far Side' and dedicated to Mr. Larson himself.).

 

John (Crosley)

We'll have to send Giuseppe to the punitentiary where he can punder his misdeeds -- a sort of punishment, if you will. (Not the same 'black magic' or voodoo whereby I 'willed' this poor individual under the sneaky proboscus of this poster child for intrusiveness.)

 

John (Crosley)

 

;~)

What is there more to say than I love it. Life as it is.

With greetings

 

Thanks for ratings this photo -- it seems a natural for someone with your first name. (Oh, yes, I know many countries and languages pronounce the 'j' as a 'y' and I'm sure including yours.)

 

John (Crosley)

 

(thanks for rating, not a high rating thanks or a low rating thanks but just for stopping by and rating at all. I don't reward high raters or even look at rates when someone comments until after I've finished my respose or reply.)

 

jc

The comment above was made after you 'rated' and before I saw your comment -- it may not even have been posted.

 

I'm very glad you enjoy this photo.

 

If I'd known people would enjoy it so much, I might have posted it at Christmas when everyone was so blue, what with family oblgations, worry about how to be 'generous' as is expected at holiday time without eating potatoes and beans the rest of the year -- a time when 'frivolity is enforced' much as Homeland Security enforces 'no frivolity' at the airports.

 

This photo was taken sometimes last year -- I think in December, but possibly in Oct.-Nov.

 

And things couldn't have been less humorous than to be in France during the Transport Workers Union nationwide strike when just getting a bus to a distant rural hotel from the airport cost $45 one way, what with the obligatory rude taxi meter surcharge -- in other words, 'monsieur, I'm gonna (sur)charge you to 35 Euros, and not turn on the meter, or you get out, OK?' (one better smile when that's the only taxi for 15 miles and one has waited an hour and a half for it and it's after midnight and reach into one's pocket for tomorrow's 'lunch money' so the taxi driver can pay off his new vacation house loan or some such.)

 

(I think one of those taxi drivers just bought his own private island from his surcharges from that strike -- he worked hard raping his customers, and now he needs someplace to rest.)

 

Then waiting three hours for the RER (Interurban train) from the airport to the Gare du Nord (North Train Station) in Paris, where everybody got out and the train stopped.

 

The whole trip was each time replete with much pushing, shoving, and (no doubt) pickpocketing and a wonderland for perverts who like to be jammed up agains other people of course (it's a fetish -- called flottism, if you can believe that -- getting turned on by being shoved into a crowd.) TMI?

 

So, this photo (taken during that strike), had its progenitor in much distress and discomfort.

 

It's the 'silver lining' to a very dark cloud which almost bankrupted me.

 

Thanks for stopping by; always appreciated.

 

John (Crosley)

When Presentation software is updated so I can work with it better, this photo is destined for my Presentation on 'Threes in My Photography'

 

Why?

 

Look at it carefully.

 

First there are three full luggage trolleys -- that's 'three' right there.

 

But wait! There's More!

 

Not Only do you Get Three Luggage Trolleys but you get an entirely different set of 'Threes'!

 

In fact, the entire photo is pretty well divided into three distinct parts.

 

The parts are (1) The left, the trolleys; (2) the center, the mouth, and nose (the olfactory portion or better the 'sensing' portion and (3) the right, the passenger and passenger baggage and trolley (the emitting portion).

 

See, three parts.

 

(1)+(2)+(3) = Three (new new math).

 

So it's destined for my presentation on 'threes'.

 

;~)

 

John Crosley)

I agree. Also, it's interesting that you only depicted three sensory organs in the middle - mouth for taste, nose for smell and eye for sight. If you omit the cart with the luggage on the right side, the man with the two luggages by both sides make for an interesting trio - a pyramid of some sort.

Or an inverted pyramid or triangle -- or simply part of an implied parallelogram -- take your pick . . . .

 

There's all sorts of geometry in this photo, isn't there?

 

No one yet has remarked that the line separating the fully saturated portion of the poster from that which is not saturated does not cut off a third of the photo, but more like a quarter -- if I'm right, then this is a photo about the 'rule of thirds' and the 'rule of fourths' - I've posted several photos and noted they stood for the 'rule of fourths' (somewhat puckishly, I must admit).

 

I've got my puckish hat on today.

 

Thanks for stopping by; this place is always the richer for it. I'll save a seat for the next good one (which may be the next posting or ten postings from now - one never knows; surely I sometimes don't even know even after I've posted 'em).

 

John (Crosley)

HAhahah....this is funny! Great title as always! I this it's even funnier because the gentleman seems to be zipping his fly :)

Diana,

 

I hadn't really looked and supposed he was locking his luggage or something, but if a man finds his fly is 'open' or 'unzipped' then he will turn away reflexively from everyone, then crouch over and face up against something, just like here, as he is against his luggage, then zip that sucker up (keeping care, just like in the movie 'There's Something About Mary' not to let the 'extension' get zipped up with the zipper, if you get my drift, as that for my money was one of the most hilarious scenes I can remember in all of moviedom -- I had an unstoppable attack of laughing asthma from seeing that scene.)

 

So, when I saw your comment, I said to myself 'oh, that can't be, I look at my photos before posting better than that', but on closer inspection, you maybe exactly right.

 

And that gives the old 'sniffer' test post here some greater authority -- perhaps he should have bathed himself even more carefully (good thing we can't see his face, and he shall remain anonymous forever. If he sees this photo he may divine who is is, but he can never prove it with certainty . . . so we may speculate all day long about what he actually is doing and be free of invasion of privacy claims in the ultrasensitive EU.)

 

You may, in this selfsame folder, come across a photo of a woman and man kissing, as seen through train passenger coach vestibule doors which are open at the end of a train in Budapest, Hungary's Keleti (International) train station.

 

What I didn't post was a more intimate (and more fuzzy) photo of his woman nuzzling him and simultaneously in her hands holding his 'male member' -- because they apparently were not aware they could be observed by me with telephoto lens from the elevated rear of another train coach through its own open vestibule door.

 

But it's a very fuzzy photo, and I had to examine the photo carefully . . . . 'v e r y

c a r e f u l l y' as did all my friends, to determine that was indeed a male member, [but it was] as one could tell by the flesh tones, but that photo won't ever get posted even as a blooper as I don't show that sort of 'candid camera' photo, even as a gag.

 

I'm not a spy camera or voyeur freak. I take real photos of real people, and this is just one example of how 'real' my photos are, but I'm not into the really intrusive sorts of photos -- photos of women's 'nip slips' or such things. I have better photos to take (usually).

 

As to your opening my eyes about my own photo:

 

HERE'S TO YOU AND YOUR WONDERFUL EYE (all caps in celebration of your wonderful eyesight-- it's worth 'shouting over')

 

John (Crosley)

Your own work, by the way, is pretty fantastic.

 

I've seldom added to my 'most interesting' list, but I've marked you down. You truly understand the use of light in photography, as evidenced by your portraits and also by your wonderful use of color. Also your own portrait seems similar to those of your models, is that an autoportrait? It's very good/excellent in any case. If you're trying to make art it helps to start with quality material, of course . . . . (if you get my drift).

 

John (Crosley)