Is Roark Johnson here?

[BradS]

Roark, Are your here? I find your Stranger a Day project absolutely fascinating and would love to hear a little story about how you did it. How do you engage your subject? Come and spin a yarn for us!

 

[jd callow]

I'm not Roak, but the work and idea does rock.

 

[MenacingTourist]

I couldn't pull myself away from that site. Some of those shots are really great and you gotta admire the guy for doing that kind of project.

 

[jss]

i've seen it before. awesome stuff. i am grey with envy.

i tried forcing myself to shoot strangers. i got as far as the guy i saw every morning at the coffee shop (the shop employee) and a coworker and then i gave up. just too darned timid/shy/introverted.

 

[BradS]

Agree an awesome, insipred concept and body of work! I am filled with hope that he will find some means to publish the work as a book or at least, hang a show.

 

[paul owen]

Portraits have never been my "thing" - until now! What a simple yet inspired, sensitive study! Speechless!!

 

[philldresser]

I don't 'do' people but this makes me want to try

January_28_2004 is my favourite

 

[Flotsam]

He sure doesn't like foreheads.

 

[jd callow]

Neal, you have to click on the thumbnails. He did a bad job of cropping the thumb's the full prints are better. Having said that some of the compositions are a little snapshot esq (interesting items cropped out and uninteresting things included) and on others negs look like they may have been fogged or suffered from a light leak.

Overall the idea is great, the effort is not small and IMHO the bulk of the prints run the gamut from ok to very good.

I offer the criticism, so that the work is put in perspective. I think the work is about the idea. Getting the perfect composition, exposure etc.. I would think was a goal but not a requirement. I don't think each image is intended to stand alone but be viewed with all others and that the totality of all the images is the final piece.

 

[BBarlow690]

I think the real value of Roark's wonderful project for the rest of us is the inspiration to make one picture a day, no matter what. It might be a portrait, it might be the dog, it might be the doorknob, but to take time from the rest of life and concentrate all our energies on making one picture - and only one - a day as an exercise is bound to improve our photography radically.

Good for Roark!

 

[Daniel Grenier]

This guy has to be commended for seeing his project thru every single day for an entire year. I mean, taking an 8x10 out to take portraits of strangers daily 365 days in a row is no small feat. A lot of these portraits are great, for sure, but his including shots plagued by huge technical flaws (flare, leaks, severe vignetting) is to me terribly bothersome. It cheapens an otherwise brilliant concept.

 

[Flotsam]

This thread inspired me to dig out my copy of "Chasing The Light" by Jim Brandenburg. He hiked into the Minnesota woods every day for ninety consecutive days one Fall. On each day he took a _single_ exposure and put them together into a book. Amazing! As far as I can tell, he was shooting film back then. Unbelievable!