Even Artichokes Have Hearts...
October 13, 2010 7:53 PM   Subscribe

Amelie has turned me onto the occasional and random hobby of taking pictures of myself in photo booths....

...but I'm beginning to run out of ideas for posing, things I could wear, etc.

Although I do have a digital camera, I find this a fun way to document small things, like dying my hair, or amusing myself with the random urge to make weird faces.

I already plan to take some pictures of myself on Halloween (dying myself blue with food dye, wearing a fox mask and tail and going as a kitsune type creature from Japanese mythology), but could really use some cheap or money-less ideas on so called "costumes" I could wear for future pictures. As a side note, I consider all clothing to be a costume and don't find myself limited by things such as "preppy", "goth" or "nerdy". Also willing to bring small props, and for reference, I really enjoy taking artsy photos, as limited as I'll be by the box I'm taking them in.

I'm also looking for ideas on what to -do-, since it's usually a small frame with pictures often taken in a mostly rapid succession. Although I'm willing to do these poses again, I've exhausted the normal smiling, sticking my tongue out, looking serious style poses.

For those who are interested, I'm most likely going to simply glue these in some journal-type book with the date and location next to them.

(Also, I live near Harrisonburg, VA. I know of the one in the Regal movie theater, and of the one in the mall, but if anyone knows of any others nearby, or a way to find them.....)
posted by DisreputableDog to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (12 answers total) 5 users marked this as a favorite
 
If you're the especially outgoing type, you could ask a random stranger if they'd like to take a picture with you. You keep two of them, they keep two of them. It's been many years since I've seen Amelie, but wasn't her thing collecting pictures of other people? This way you could collect strangers. (But, like, don't be creepy about it.)
posted by phunniemee at 7:58 PM on October 13, 2010


Best answer: take pictures of yourself with a picture of yourself from a photobooth, various actions poses, interactions, etc.

bring posters of places you want to go e.g. eiffel tower, mount everest, golden gate bridge. pretend you are there

bring food to eat

having never been in one, is it dark enough to use glow-in-the-dark facepaint?
posted by wayofthedodo at 8:02 PM on October 13, 2010 [1 favorite]


if anyone knows of any others nearby, or a way to find them.....

Have you seen Photobooth.net and its locator?
posted by sigmagalator at 8:08 PM on October 13, 2010


Response by poster: phunniemee - She actually finds a photo album filled with found and re-assembled photo booth pictures.

wayofthedodo - I like the poster idea, and the picture of myself with a picture of myself idea makes me think I could somehow get a non-flash-ruined mirror effect. Also, no, they aren't dark enough. Most are just a box with openings on either side that have curtains which let a lot of light filter in.

sigmagalator - nice resource, but those only list old photo booths. They don't include the now more common digital or Polaroid booth, as stated on the site.
posted by DisreputableDog at 8:20 PM on October 13, 2010


Mirror at 45 degree angle.
posted by RobotHero at 8:20 PM on October 13, 2010


re. your facial expressions:

print off the day's posts from a short-format blog like OneSentence or PostSecret, without reading them.

photograph your reaction to reading them - likely to be reasonably subtle but different every time!
posted by greenish at 2:50 AM on October 14, 2010


Mustaches!
posted by vitabellosi at 4:28 AM on October 14, 2010 [1 favorite]


I don't know if these are the sorts of ideas you're looking for exactly, but:

You could make paper cut-out masks and put on a different one for each shot. Maybe even make a paper cut-out mask of your own face for one of the shots. I think Abraham Lincoln would be a good one, too...

Wear a big sweatshirt and for each shot, stuff more and more stuffing into it so you look puffier and puffier. Or maybe it would be easier to start puffy and remove the stuffing...

Make a sock puppet and put a picture of your face on its face. Maybe you could make the sock puppet get eaten by a plastic shark. Not that I want you to get eaten by a shark, of course. That would be horrible.
posted by smirkyfodder at 7:50 AM on October 14, 2010


Signs. Go in with four sheets of paper that have words or phrases written on them so when the whole strip is viewed it reads like a poem, or story.
posted by dirtdirt at 8:03 AM on October 14, 2010 [1 favorite]


Why do you need to do anything? If you amass some huge collection of these, what will be more interesting then the funny face you make are the subtle changes in your person that become visible over time.
posted by chunking express at 8:09 AM on October 14, 2010 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: I (almost) always end the photo strip (4 pictures) with a serious face.

I'm choosing to take a mix of "normal" and "funky" pictures because it will interest me years down the road. With so many pictures being taken nowadays, both by myself as well as people who know me, the idea of doing an "always serious" photo montage holds no interest for me; I can look at these other non-photo-booth pictures to see how I'm aging, if I'm interested.

Does anyone else out there do this? Take normal to wacky photo booth pictures, including digital or Polaroid, if nothing else but for the heck of it?

I liked the poetry-on-signs idea, dirtdirt, and am definitely writing all of these ideas down as ways to "think outside the booth box".

Please keep them coming!
posted by DisreputableDog at 9:39 AM on October 14, 2010


I've never actually been inside a photobooth, but if you can see the lens maybe you can make photos different/interesting by taping things over the lens - like coloured cellophane, kaleidoscopes, prisms, anything transparent that'll alter the photo.
posted by robotot at 1:03 PM on October 14, 2010


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