You know what I love about photography? Being nosy. Having a camera is a license to bother people and learn things. For example the other day I went down to the UMass Animal Research and Education complex and loitered. I’ve learned some things in my day, a good way to get attention is to trespass. When I was doing interviews for the 2010 Census and people wouldn’t come to the door I’d go looking around the backyard and poke around their sheds. Sooner rather than later, the owner would accost me and I had my man. So sure enough while I was cursing donkeys and getting zapped by the electric fence, I was found out by some students in the animal husbandry school. I complemented them on their baby donkey (dude they are unbelievably cute) and they invited me to photograph them make their adorable fuzzy rounds. I saw giant pigs, tiny goats, and learned about how protective llamas are of other species. Here are some pictures of different animals I’ve met.
Also on a technical side note all my cameras are broken, so Samuel Quinn was kind enough to lend me his Mamiya c330, which is a beast of a camera, but pretty damn good. It has a wide angle (55mm) lens which is both exciting and frustrating. Do you remember me talking about getting closer to my subjects from ‘These Kids Today’, well now I have to get twice as close and the distortion bothers me sometimes. Its ok, its something I can learn to deal with until I have some money to fix the Rolleiflex, but I know some of these pictures would be better with a normal lens. Que Sera Sera, right?
karapture 