On #ChattingThePictures, we describe how #BrandonBell’s photo for Getty Images rises so far above the standard heat wave pic. With thanks, also, to Prof Saffron O'Neill (inactive account). Watch now: readingthepictures.org/2022/07/more-r… #visualsociology #visualstudies #ivsa #visualculture #envcomm #climatecomm

The New Venice (aka Pittsburgh, 1907)

Not to be outdone by Venice, Paris in 1910

The Cactus Lover, c 1850

"Touch is the most demystifying of all senses, unlike sight, which is the most magical.” --Roland Barthes, Mythologies

I’d really like to know how many files titled “Meaning of Life” are stored on Google Drive.

This book makes you see the whole world differently. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to talk about it with two fantastic artists, Josh Smith and Vanessa Woods: Talking in the Library - Ken Graves and Eva Lipman's "Restraint and Desire" youtu.be/xw0Ij8oHu_U

For your Labor Day and every day tessa.lapl.org/cdm/ref/collec…

I have so many questions: “The core dataset was trained on LAION-Aesthetics…created with a new CLIP-based model that filtered LAION-5B based on how ‘beautiful’ an image was, building on ratings from the alpha testers of Stable Diffusion.” stability.ai/blog/stable-di…

Tabletops have made a comeback!

All of the above: ☑️

Auto-reply avant la lettre

The photograph was by Ansel Adams. Its title: “High Country Crags and Moon, Sunrise, Kings Canyon National Park.” Its date: “circa 1935.” Could an art historian find out exactly when and where it was taken? nyti.ms/3ZZ1Xz8

Gonna have to use wood glue for my 1st class stamp

We are delighted to announce 📣 More Than A Snapshot: A Visual History of Photo Wallets by Prof. Annebella Pollen — the tenth title in our beloved Irregulars series. Out this May, pre-order your copy here ⬇️ fourcornersbooks.co.uk/books/more-tha…

Today in photo forensics: Babe Ruth Baseball Bat Breaks Auction Sale Record Thanks to Photo Evidence petapixel.com/2023/04/06/bab…

With Kim Beil (Kim Beil) in the bookshop The Photographers' Gallery. Double whammy of our two little books on the front desk! Anonymous Objects (published by MACK) and More than a Snapshot (published by Four Corners Books). Called for a silly s(h)elfie…

Correspondence Course: Letters on Photography is a new essay series co-authored with Kim Beil. During lockdown, Kim and I (who had never met) became photographic pen pals. Our eight letters are now part of Photomonitor’s Experiments series. Part 1 here: photomonitor.co.uk/experiment/cor…

“My running diary is a stack of 8 ½ x 11” papers printed with a calendar grid.” Kim Beil’s running diary for our series, Gym Week. theparisreview.org/blog/2025/01/2…