The other day…
The other day I was scrolling through social media looking at all the posts when something popped out at me. The usual pics came up of food, hotels, cars, beaches, and other places of attractions. At the same time as I was scrolling through my phone, I came across a photo of my Aunt. My Aunt passed away just before Christmas and my scrolling got me thinking of the photos she had of us and the ones I had of her.
This got me thinking of all the photographs she had and we have sitting in a great big box. There is a box in storage in my apartment and a box in storage at my dad’s.
This also got me thinking.
Remember the days when we had film, 35mm film, and had to get it all developed? Or the Polaroid camera that had a cartridge of 10 shots?
So yah back in the old days right?
I was not thinking so much about the photos at the moment but the way we tried to take photos of important things and the way we took the photo.
Could you imagine taking 20 selfies to post the one you liked? Could you imagine trying to retake a photo and throwing the film in the trash, or rather “hit delete”? Imagine if we had to take photos the old way all of a sudden.
That’s not the point I am trying to make.
I am curious how the photos will be passed on from generation to generation. Sure, they are shared on social media now but how will I pass on my photos to my kids? How will we share the past in the future?
How do we share the past in the future?
At the moment I have tons of photographs in a box and on occasion every 5 years or so we sift through them and look at the past. However, in the future, with pics and memories scattered on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, how will this process go?
Besides knowing what I had for breakfast, lunch, and dinner on Instagram how will I share that with possible grandchildren and how will I be remembered by them? How will my son share the photos of me with his kids?
Never mind the silly stuff.
The selfies, the meals, and the locations we think are fun and important will be meaningless. Before we took photos for memories and not likes and shares. We took photographs to remember people and not for others to consume. So what are we doing? Do we even know?
All we are doing is giving ammunition to advertisers to target us and give us crap to buy using the date we provided to them. In the old days, we shared photos and sometimes made duplicates to give to friends and family.
The day when a class photo or a graduation photo had to have retake days can now just be altered or easily retaken. What a laborious time that was… So next time you take a photo, imagine you shot on film and had to finish a roll of it to get your pics back in a few days… How times have changed…
Zsolt Zsemba 