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Photobooth: A Biography
For almost a century chemical photobooths have occupied public spaces; giving people the opportunity to quickly take inexpensive, quality photos. In the last decade these machines have started to rapidly disappear, causing an eclectic group of individuals from around the world to come together and respond. Illustrator, writer and long-time photobooth lover, Meags Fitzgerald has chronicled this movement and the photobooth's fortuitous history in a graphic novel. Having traveled in North America, Europe and Australia, she's constructed a biography of the booth through the eyes of technicians, owners, collectors, artists and fanatics. Fitzgerald explores her own struggle with her relationship to these fleeting machines, while looking to the future.
278 pages, Hardcover
First published May 8, 2014
8 people are currently reading
829 people want to read
About the author
Meags Fitzgerald
8 books44 followersMeags Fitzgerald is a Montreal-based artist and an award winning illustrator, graphic novelist and animator. Her talents also include improv comedy and live storytelling. Fitzgerald is the author and illustrator of the non-fiction graphic novel, Photobooth: A Biography (spring 2014) and the graphic memoir, Long Red Hair (fall 2015), both published by Conundrum Press.
When she's not drawing or performing, Fitzgerald is learning aerial silks and trapeze with the circus.
When she's not drawing or performing, Fitzgerald is learning aerial silks and trapeze with the circus.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 68 reviews
January 1, 2016
I read this because I had just read Darkroom, am interested in photography, and well, I am of an age to recall photobooths being everywhere, and myself and my sister getting these strips of improvised goofiness. I was unprepared for the intensity of this project from Fitzgerald, whose passion for photobooths changed her life in many ways.
I was reminded of Susan Orleans's The Orchard Thief. When I began reading it I had no interest in orchids, and essentially never did develop any real interest, but that book is really more about an obsession with a person and his passion more than orchids per se. In Photobooth, Fitzgerald is a little crazy about photobooths in a constructive and slightly destructive way (maybe). The book is a kind of multi genre project: a memoir of her life long relationship to photo booths, a cultural history of them, a scholarly and somewhat esoteric treatise, and what she calls a "biography" of photobooth.
Biography, you say?! For instance, at one point, talking with her sister about the loss of half of Montreal's photobooths, including some she has a close personal history with, some of there favorites, she illustrates herself sobbing uncontrollably. She tells us she ends relationships with boyfriends and cuts herself off from friends at various points just to spend time with her passion. Thus: a biography, since it has become, in a sense, her "lover."
As an academic, I am familiar with this malady. Lenny Davis wrote a book about Obsession in which he acknowledges that academics get praised for what is essentially OCD behavior. This is also true for my own experience with Goodreads in the past year: I always have read a lot, but in the past year I wrote reviews for more than 600 books. This is clearly crazy OCD behavior, and yet in the context of book lovers, and all People of the Book (including academics and teachers), it is (largely) admired behavior. By you all, maybe, but not the non-readers in my life, who think I should do something more productive with my time. Fitzgerald also has this OCD thing, which she turns into a book that would be of interested to lovers of memoirs, cultural history, and, uh, photobooths, natch.
I wasn't a fan of the artwork, which is not a comic but is really an illustrated history/memoir/biography. My biggest problem with it is this: In a book about photos and photobooths, one that already is a kind of unique mashup of genres, WHY NO PHOTOS? NO actual photos! NONE! Just--and this just seems bizarre to me--multiple illustrations of photobooth strips of photos!
This IS a big deal to me, as you can tell from the CAPS and exclamation points, but on the whole I still liked this book quite a bit. It captures Fitzgerald's passion, and is enigmatic and nostalgic and sort of sweet as it is honest about some of the obsessive-compulsive aspects of her passion. Very interesting book, on the whole.
I was reminded of Susan Orleans's The Orchard Thief. When I began reading it I had no interest in orchids, and essentially never did develop any real interest, but that book is really more about an obsession with a person and his passion more than orchids per se. In Photobooth, Fitzgerald is a little crazy about photobooths in a constructive and slightly destructive way (maybe). The book is a kind of multi genre project: a memoir of her life long relationship to photo booths, a cultural history of them, a scholarly and somewhat esoteric treatise, and what she calls a "biography" of photobooth.
Biography, you say?! For instance, at one point, talking with her sister about the loss of half of Montreal's photobooths, including some she has a close personal history with, some of there favorites, she illustrates herself sobbing uncontrollably. She tells us she ends relationships with boyfriends and cuts herself off from friends at various points just to spend time with her passion. Thus: a biography, since it has become, in a sense, her "lover."
As an academic, I am familiar with this malady. Lenny Davis wrote a book about Obsession in which he acknowledges that academics get praised for what is essentially OCD behavior. This is also true for my own experience with Goodreads in the past year: I always have read a lot, but in the past year I wrote reviews for more than 600 books. This is clearly crazy OCD behavior, and yet in the context of book lovers, and all People of the Book (including academics and teachers), it is (largely) admired behavior. By you all, maybe, but not the non-readers in my life, who think I should do something more productive with my time. Fitzgerald also has this OCD thing, which she turns into a book that would be of interested to lovers of memoirs, cultural history, and, uh, photobooths, natch.
I wasn't a fan of the artwork, which is not a comic but is really an illustrated history/memoir/biography. My biggest problem with it is this: In a book about photos and photobooths, one that already is a kind of unique mashup of genres, WHY NO PHOTOS? NO actual photos! NONE! Just--and this just seems bizarre to me--multiple illustrations of photobooth strips of photos!
This IS a big deal to me, as you can tell from the CAPS and exclamation points, but on the whole I still liked this book quite a bit. It captures Fitzgerald's passion, and is enigmatic and nostalgic and sort of sweet as it is honest about some of the obsessive-compulsive aspects of her passion. Very interesting book, on the whole.
April 22, 2015
Totally fascinating history of a technology/niche culture/phenomenon, woven with the personal connections of the author.
Timely, as the author cites that chemical (as opposed to digital) photobooths are expected to go extinct in 2015 (THIS YEAR!), as the chemicals required to make them work are going to run out. One required chemical is illegal in Europe, which complicates the issue further. We have one of these rare chemical photobooths in Olympia at the Brotherhood bar downtown.
Fitzgerald includes illustrations of specific models of photobooths, as well as illustrations of many different types of strips. She talks about her connections with the photobooth community, and muses as to why she's interested in photobooths in the first place. She includes stories about traveling around the world (teaching improv), using photobooths to make art, and tracking down photobooths all over the planet for photobooth.net.
As far the execution goes, I found her drawing style engaging, and she used a wide variety of page layouts, although much of the book eschews panels and speech bubbles in favor of more freeform combinations of text and images.
One thing that niggled at me: I REALLY wanted PHOTOS in this book about photobooths. Photos of the strips, of the models... But I imagine rights on this kind of thing is a bigger monster than Fitzgerald wanted to tackle. And I'm sure it had to have been an intentional (maybe aesthetic?) decision not to mix illustrations and photos.
Timely, enjoyable, accessible.
Read with Syncopated: An Anthology of Nonfiction Picto-Essays
Extra star bc of the rareness of this kind of blend of heavy nonfic content with personal memoir, and the urgent timeliness.
Timely, as the author cites that chemical (as opposed to digital) photobooths are expected to go extinct in 2015 (THIS YEAR!), as the chemicals required to make them work are going to run out. One required chemical is illegal in Europe, which complicates the issue further. We have one of these rare chemical photobooths in Olympia at the Brotherhood bar downtown.
Fitzgerald includes illustrations of specific models of photobooths, as well as illustrations of many different types of strips. She talks about her connections with the photobooth community, and muses as to why she's interested in photobooths in the first place. She includes stories about traveling around the world (teaching improv), using photobooths to make art, and tracking down photobooths all over the planet for photobooth.net.
As far the execution goes, I found her drawing style engaging, and she used a wide variety of page layouts, although much of the book eschews panels and speech bubbles in favor of more freeform combinations of text and images.
One thing that niggled at me: I REALLY wanted PHOTOS in this book about photobooths. Photos of the strips, of the models... But I imagine rights on this kind of thing is a bigger monster than Fitzgerald wanted to tackle. And I'm sure it had to have been an intentional (maybe aesthetic?) decision not to mix illustrations and photos.
Timely, enjoyable, accessible.
Read with Syncopated: An Anthology of Nonfiction Picto-Essays
Extra star bc of the rareness of this kind of blend of heavy nonfic content with personal memoir, and the urgent timeliness.
December 3, 2017
Photobooth: A Biography is a unique history of a machine and of a woman. From a young age, Meags Fitzgerald enjoyed snapping personal photos in the photobooths in and around Edmonton, Alberta. Her interest moves into passion, then obsession with photobooth and their history, and even a kind of activism to save them from "extinction". Fitzgerald charts the story of Anatol Josepho, the inventor of the photobooth, melding this with her own biography. She traces her time in art school when instructors told her that photobooth photography was not serious art and worth the time, and her later vindication when she meets a dedicated group of other photobooth enthusiasts who use photobooths in their "serious" art.
Fitzgerald travels through North America and Europe documenting photobooths, working with other artists, photo technicians, and general enthusiasts. She laments her beloved chemical photobooths slow demise in favor of the quicker and easily serviceable digital models, and this leads to many tears and soul-searching in spending so much time and energy on something that is ephemeral. We see Fitzgerald mature through the pages of the book - as a frequent model in her own art of photos, she shows herself in many lights, vulnerable, naive, angry, and exhausted. She closes the book in an intriguing way, and it makes me curious to see what she has done since this book was published in 2014.
Fitzgerald travels through North America and Europe documenting photobooths, working with other artists, photo technicians, and general enthusiasts. She laments her beloved chemical photobooths slow demise in favor of the quicker and easily serviceable digital models, and this leads to many tears and soul-searching in spending so much time and energy on something that is ephemeral. We see Fitzgerald mature through the pages of the book - as a frequent model in her own art of photos, she shows herself in many lights, vulnerable, naive, angry, and exhausted. She closes the book in an intriguing way, and it makes me curious to see what she has done since this book was published in 2014.
Read
October 4, 2016Once again I have evidence that Meags Fitzgerald and I are living parallel lives. This book began with a love for photobooths that started when she was a teenager, and that’s something I can certainly identify with, although I dare say my love didn’t turn into a full on obsession which fueled Meags to travel Europe and North America and change the direction of her career for years. The end result of all that research, travelling, and life experience is this book, which is the oddest amalgamation of history, memoir, cultural exploration, and thoughts about art and photography that somehow works to make this delightful book about a very unlikely subject. The graphic format works great here as she does an amazing job illustrating all the different models of photobooths as well as all the different people who created and love them. If you loved photobooths when you were a teen and you and your friends brought crazy props with you to enact weird elaborate performances you’ll love this book and also feel a bit sad and nostalgic. I did. But I think this is also a fascinating exploration of one piece of technology and cultural phenomenon that will interest even readers who’ve never given photobooths much thought.
–Casey Stepaniuk
from The Best Books We Read In August 2016: http://bookriot.com/2016/08/31/riot-r...
–Casey Stepaniuk
from The Best Books We Read In August 2016: http://bookriot.com/2016/08/31/riot-r...
August 24, 2016
Once again, Meags Fitzgerald appears to be writing about my own life, although her interest in, and dare I say obsession with, photobooths went much farther than mine ever did. But this did feel very nostalgic for me, as my friends and I were super into photobooths in high school and our early twenties, doing the same kind of things Meags did, bringing props to orchestrate these elaborate performances. My fridge is full of them to this day. A fascinating exploration of the history of photobooths, full of juicy historical/cultural/technical details, personal stories, and beautiful drawings. Totally captivated me. It's a mix of genres I don't think I've read before, and I thought it worked brilliantly.
My only complaint is that the text needed better copy editing. Clearly the editor has no idea what a comma splice is, the book is full of them. [See what I did there]. I don't mind a few of those, especially if they're used for effect, but really some other punctuation would have been better in most cases. Also, let's remember the difference between "whose" and "who's." A few other grammar things like missing articles were also a bit distracting for me.
My only complaint is that the text needed better copy editing. Clearly the editor has no idea what a comma splice is, the book is full of them. [See what I did there]. I don't mind a few of those, especially if they're used for effect, but really some other punctuation would have been better in most cases. Also, let's remember the difference between "whose" and "who's." A few other grammar things like missing articles were also a bit distracting for me.
December 21, 2015
An absolute essential read for anyone who has appreciated the quality of drawing back the curtain in a dip-and-dunk photobooth over the years. A lovely personal journey of a lovely and talented person with a real passion for photobooths. The fact that this is Fitzgerald's first foray into the world of graphic novels (after working as an illustrator and designer for years) makes the great storytelling all the more striking. I love, love, love this book.
I say all of this from a completely biased perspective - I interviewed Meags as part of a radio documentary I made about photobooths in Canada back in 2012 and she mentions this in the book. I may have squealed with joy upon seeing it.
I say all of this from a completely biased perspective - I interviewed Meags as part of a radio documentary I made about photobooths in Canada back in 2012 and she mentions this in the book. I may have squealed with joy upon seeing it.
January 24, 2018
I thought this would be one of those non fiction in-depth books that although I’m not that interested in the subject the writing and art would be sufficient to keep me interested. It wasn’t one of those.
I got bored. It was too in-depth, the side stories weren’t compelling enough either. I got sick of her love for photobooths and didn’t have sympathy for her sadness that they are going away. She came across as really privileged and whiney at times.
Her art is amazing and her layouts are interesting and well done. I’d read more of her stuff just for that, hopefully she writes about stuff I like sometime.
I got bored. It was too in-depth, the side stories weren’t compelling enough either. I got sick of her love for photobooths and didn’t have sympathy for her sadness that they are going away. She came across as really privileged and whiney at times.
Her art is amazing and her layouts are interesting and well done. I’d read more of her stuff just for that, hopefully she writes about stuff I like sometime.
January 4, 2023
There's a lot of heart here. A story of obsession without the climactic ruin that sometimes accompanies it. It's interesting to see this sort of near-monomania in a context where everything works out. This is clearly something more than an interest or hobby for Fitzgerald, and her enthusiasm carries the book for the most part, though personally, my momentum flagged in the final half of this volume.
We tiptoe up to a few transcendent questions that would have been interesting to sit with for a bit longer: art vs consumption, constructing personal identity, preservation vs. practical modernization. There are no answers, of course, but when are there ever?
We tiptoe up to a few transcendent questions that would have been interesting to sit with for a bit longer: art vs consumption, constructing personal identity, preservation vs. practical modernization. There are no answers, of course, but when are there ever?
August 9, 2014
I had never really thought anything about photo booths. This graphic novel changed that. I had never pondered their history, their place in the world, or how chemical changes and the advent of digital photography threatened their existence. The author tells a compelling story full of research, passion, and a dynamic picture of a unknown subculture.
August 13, 2016
Fitzgerald's passion shines through and is infectious. A delightful read that reminded me of all the reasons I loved going to photobooths in high school.
August 26, 2019
Photobooth: A Biography is a dense, beautifully constructed history and love letter to photobooths. Informational, contemplative, thorough, devoted. I am amazed by all that this was. On a personal note, I was really excited that the author spent time in Halifax, my heart skipped a beat seeing the illustration of old photobooth at Scotia Square mall. I don't claim to be nearly as passionate on the topic as the author, but I am nostalgic for the photobooths of the 90s and the excitement of taking a strip of pictures with my friends 'back in the day.' Photobooth: A Biography not only sheds light on the history and science behind these artful designs, but captures an array of emotions these machines can bring on.
"When you love something, you can't just choose not to feel that way anymore." -Meags Fitzgerald
"When you love something, you can't just choose not to feel that way anymore." -Meags Fitzgerald
April 24, 2018
I needed a microhistory and a Canadian author for a book challenge, so score! Fitzgerald's illustrations are gorgeous. I like the historical parts better than the person memoirs, but that was just my personal preference. At times, I felt a little bogged down. I don't share Fitzgerald's passion for photobooths and it began to feel like I was stuck listening to a Star Wars fan go on and on and on about Clone Wars for too long. But I appreciate her passion. I get it and I learned more than I expected to about photobooths.
Read
July 24, 2017A tad overlong by the end (in part because it had some repetitive moments -- I knew Meags's birthday by the second time she said it and didn't need it mentioned ten more) but a totally wonderful graphic biography of photo booths. It's part social history and part memoir about a love affair with the booth and what they came to mean for the artist who loved them.
There's a lot of travel in this one, and in a lot of ways the marrying of a passion with the personal journey reminded me of Lucy Knisley. And also, I need to hunt down a real, not digital, photo booth.
The art is excellent. I loved seeing the graphic rendering of photographs so much more than I thought I would.
There's a lot of travel in this one, and in a lot of ways the marrying of a passion with the personal journey reminded me of Lucy Knisley. And also, I need to hunt down a real, not digital, photo booth.
The art is excellent. I loved seeing the graphic rendering of photographs so much more than I thought I would.
February 5, 2018
I learned so much from this book! I used a photobooth once when I was 9 (1969) to get a ski membership at Chicopee in Kitchener, ON. I really have never given photo booths much thought before reading this book.
July 22, 2017
A really fun history of photobooths!
October 2, 2015
Near the start of Photobooth: A Biography, Meags Fitzgerald talks about taking photobooth pictures with a friend in 2003 to celebrate the last day of classes of tenth grade, and how, after that day, she got very into photobooths: taking photobooth pictures, learning about the history of the booths themselves, and collecting photobooth pictures taken by others. The rest of the book talks about Fitzgerald's experience with all those things, and also about various photobooth-related travels she's taken, including a trip to California for the International Photobooth Convention and visits to photobooth warehouses in Montréal and Holland.
I am really fond of this kind of book in general—I find it easier to find "graphic memoirs" or illustrated travel journals or nonfiction comics that I like than I do to find graphic novels I'm excited about—and also, I like photobooths. So it's not surprising that I really liked this book. Fitzgerald's drawings of photobooths, photobooth pictures, herself, and various people she met on her travels are really satisfying, and pair well with the text. I liked reading about various different angles of photobooth history/production/art/culture, including but not limited to: how chemical photobooths work and what their charms are, and how they're largely being replaced by lower-maintenance digital ones; the precursors to the photobooth and various inventors and companies whose work shaped the photobooth landscape; why photobooths appealed to Fitzgerald in high school, and how her relationship to them has changed over time, along with the art she's made in them; how photobooths have been used by various artists and ordinary people throughout their existence. (Speaking of Fitzgerald's photobooth art, I like it, and you can see more of it here and here.)
I am really fond of this kind of book in general—I find it easier to find "graphic memoirs" or illustrated travel journals or nonfiction comics that I like than I do to find graphic novels I'm excited about—and also, I like photobooths. So it's not surprising that I really liked this book. Fitzgerald's drawings of photobooths, photobooth pictures, herself, and various people she met on her travels are really satisfying, and pair well with the text. I liked reading about various different angles of photobooth history/production/art/culture, including but not limited to: how chemical photobooths work and what their charms are, and how they're largely being replaced by lower-maintenance digital ones; the precursors to the photobooth and various inventors and companies whose work shaped the photobooth landscape; why photobooths appealed to Fitzgerald in high school, and how her relationship to them has changed over time, along with the art she's made in them; how photobooths have been used by various artists and ordinary people throughout their existence. (Speaking of Fitzgerald's photobooth art, I like it, and you can see more of it here and here.)
September 16, 2015
As a third generation camera store employee I thought I knew it all. Nope.
I had the pleasure of meeting Meags and hearing her talk about this medium she feels so passionately about-- a subject so close yet so far from what I know of photography. A must read for lovers of vintage, of photos and of stories about crazy writers in over their heads.
I had the pleasure of meeting Meags and hearing her talk about this medium she feels so passionately about-- a subject so close yet so far from what I know of photography. A must read for lovers of vintage, of photos and of stories about crazy writers in over their heads.
June 9, 2017
A really nicely written history of the mechanical photobooth, drawing on Fitzgerald's own personal experiences with them. There are a lot of comma splices, which is annoying, but forgivable due to the fantastic art.
July 11, 2015
A lot of information and beautiful drawings of photobooths - the story wasn't that interesting to me.
August 12, 2017
I was digging it for the first hundred pages but its just too esoteric a subject to hold my interest for the whole book.
July 7, 2018
I’m old enough to remember when nearly every dime store, bus station, and amusement park had a coin-operated photobooth. Close the curtain, take a seat, feed in a couple of quarters, and smile -- or, more likely, if you were a teenager, make faces. And out would come a strip of six black-and-white wallet-size portraits. Because the image was printed directly to paper and there was no negative, each shot was unique and non-repeatable -- a tiny time capsule of a single moment in your life. I posed for photos with my buddies in high school and with my girl friend in college. Those images are all long lost now, but I did keep most of them for many years, because you don’t casually throw away the person you once were.
The author got hooked on photobooths when she was in an arts high school in Alberta, and as her talents in the visual arts and in improv theater evolved, her interest in the history and artistic possibilities of photobooths grew. She’s now one of the leading experts in that small community and the first half of this intriguing graphic volume traces the history of the machines from their invention in the 1880s (really) to the shift from chemical to digital photography in the 1990s and the photobooth’s near disappearance. The second half shares highlights of her own experience in chasing down surviving booth locations during her travels all over the world and her artistic experiments. If you have any interest at all in 20th-century social history, I can enthusiastically recommend this one.
The author got hooked on photobooths when she was in an arts high school in Alberta, and as her talents in the visual arts and in improv theater evolved, her interest in the history and artistic possibilities of photobooths grew. She’s now one of the leading experts in that small community and the first half of this intriguing graphic volume traces the history of the machines from their invention in the 1880s (really) to the shift from chemical to digital photography in the 1990s and the photobooth’s near disappearance. The second half shares highlights of her own experience in chasing down surviving booth locations during her travels all over the world and her artistic experiments. If you have any interest at all in 20th-century social history, I can enthusiastically recommend this one.
January 21, 2018
I've read both graphic memoirs and non-fiction comics in the past, but this book combines those genres in a way that's original and utterly captivating. Although I had never heard of Fitzgerald or been particularly interested in photobooths before picking up this book, I became deeply invested in both subjects within a few pages. I also loved that, although Fitzgerald's work features historical documents and detailed renderings of significant places on almost every page, she never incorporates scans or photos--it's really fascinating to see her hand-drawn recreations of old newspaper articles, identification papers, and photobooth strips of every description. My only complaint would be that the text is peppered with fairly conspicuous spelling and grammar errors, which I found distracting.
August 2, 2018
I purchased this book after enjoying (immensely) the author's short story "Waxing Moon" in the Secret Loves of Geek Girls anthology. WOW! This book is absolutely gorgeous and filled with fascinating information about photobooths. A topic I never thought I'd enjoy learning about so much. It made me think back to my photography classes I took in high school and wonder why we never covered the topic of the photobooth.
The design/layout and artwork in this book is just visually hypnotizing. Last night I spent more than an hour just slowly turning the pages and taking in the drawings. Books like these always bring me to tears when I can just sit and slowly admire their beauty.
Thank you Meags Fitzgerald. I Cannot wait to read/check out your other material!
Also, I let out a loud cheer of some sorts with the inclusion of Quimby's located in Chicago.
The design/layout and artwork in this book is just visually hypnotizing. Last night I spent more than an hour just slowly turning the pages and taking in the drawings. Books like these always bring me to tears when I can just sit and slowly admire their beauty.
Thank you Meags Fitzgerald. I Cannot wait to read/check out your other material!
Also, I let out a loud cheer of some sorts with the inclusion of Quimby's located in Chicago.
July 27, 2024
3.5 rounded up.
Had this graphic novel on my shelves for years, unread (literally, I just saw I bought this book in 2015. WHAT!?). I think I misunderstood what this was gonna be about. I thought it was basically fiction, stories from people using photobooths or something like that. It's totally not, it's part autobiographical and part history lesson. The author/illustrator is a huge fan of photobooths and went in great detail about everything you could want to know about them, where and how they started, their evolution, how they can be used to make art, etc etc. I have to say I respect the amount of research she did (this is over 250 pages) but I personally wasn't that interested in the topic. Don't think I will keep it in my collection.
Had this graphic novel on my shelves for years, unread (literally, I just saw I bought this book in 2015. WHAT!?). I think I misunderstood what this was gonna be about. I thought it was basically fiction, stories from people using photobooths or something like that. It's totally not, it's part autobiographical and part history lesson. The author/illustrator is a huge fan of photobooths and went in great detail about everything you could want to know about them, where and how they started, their evolution, how they can be used to make art, etc etc. I have to say I respect the amount of research she did (this is over 250 pages) but I personally wasn't that interested in the topic. Don't think I will keep it in my collection.
October 19, 2024
If you're into niche art or photobooths or history, this may be for you.
For me....while I found it interesting, i also felt it was a bit dull.
Plus the author would jump from her own experiences to the people in history who made photobooths happen and back again with no real tie and it felt disconnected in a way.
Then she'd go into some art info and then back to just talking about all the people she met lol
So again, some interesting facts. And really shows how deep someone can go with a hobby. It can be taken to "extremes" but also be opening doors and experiences. It's all how you look at it.
Makes me wish I could turn my hobbies and obsessions into jobs and world traveling opportunities haha
Also did make me want to revisit a photobooth, so there's that 😁 lol
For me....while I found it interesting, i also felt it was a bit dull.
Plus the author would jump from her own experiences to the people in history who made photobooths happen and back again with no real tie and it felt disconnected in a way.
Then she'd go into some art info and then back to just talking about all the people she met lol
So again, some interesting facts. And really shows how deep someone can go with a hobby. It can be taken to "extremes" but also be opening doors and experiences. It's all how you look at it.
Makes me wish I could turn my hobbies and obsessions into jobs and world traveling opportunities haha
Also did make me want to revisit a photobooth, so there's that 😁 lol
September 1, 2020
Really enjoyed this book. I was turned on to it during a zoom photo share during quarantine that the East Bay Photo Collective put on and ordered it right away as I am a big fan of film photo booths. The history and following the path of Fitzgerald's interest and love of photobooths is well written and drawn. Definitely a fun read that will educate you on the history of the photobooth and hopefully inspire you to find a local one to use - there's nothing quite like film photography! Go find a local one here: http://www.photobooth.net/locations/
January 31, 2017
I am in awe of the artists' (author, illustrator, collector and curator's) passion for chemical photo booths. The book was warm and generous, and Fitzgerald was highly successful in translating her love to her text and illustrations. I'm glad I picked up this book based on the cover art. I'll be headed to Scotia Square tomorrow to locate one of the many photo booth she highlighted in her quest to preserve the medium before they expire.
May 26, 2017
3.5. A history of the photobooth, with some personal memories from the author. I especially liked the way it is illustrated and organized/designed. My only real criticism is that I wanted a little bit more of a connection to the author as the history (while new and informative) wasn't that captivating to me.
July 23, 2023
This was a really interesting read. It's a combination of personal history and the history of the photobooth - which was a lot richer and more complicated than I imagined. I had no idea that there was an art scene or a collector's community centered on these. The graphic novel looks at all aspects from technical to personal journey to the importance of memory and history.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 68 reviews