Photo Stories, Box 34, 1948

Telling stories with photos is nothing new, but it is an art that needs to be mastered by photographers.

How to convey a story in an image (or few images), sounds easy, but it’s not.

This particular box has some good material in it. The negative box has “Weekly 1948” written on it. Not clear if all the material was made for the Pacific Weekly, or if some images just made it in and the marking was a memory aid for Joel.

Thirty one negatives in total, two major subjects. All of it could have been class assignments.

Both above images pass as a single-image story.

Another example how a single image can tell a story, or at least, allows us to make up a story. I do prefer the second image from a compositional perspective. The lighting is also better.

From above, image 1, 3 and 4 work well to tell the story. There’s actually a good flow in the third image.

NOTE: I discovered “Sadie Hawkins Day” in the Naranjado 1947 and read up on this by now irrelevant comic strip reference published in 1937. Google is your friend. (June 3, 2022)

The above images have a Rockwell Norman feel to them. The last one’s perspective is dead on, the perspective distortion amplifies the setting.

I’m sure Joel had a lot of fun making these, he must have had a good sense of humor.

The rest of the images are taken in class settings and have a documentary feel, rather than telling a story per se.

Joel did a second take on the previous image, better composition, he must have felt is was “off”.

We’ll look at two sports subject from this box of negatives in the next blog post.

Cheers !