Tomorrow morning, bright and early, I will be on CityTV Vancouver’s Breakfast Television talking about The Anonymous Photo Project.

This will be The Project’s first time to be featured on the telly, and it’s live! So, if you’re an early bird, be sure to tune in, and watch me stutter and stammer! I think my segment will be on sometime between 9:00 and 9:30 – well, I guess that’s not really being an early bird, it just seems so to me, since I’ll have to be there much earlier than that.

Way back in August, Emmi Jormalainen left Camera #123 at the opening of the Art Goes Kapakka Festival at Senate Square in Helsinki, Finland – the first Finnish camera!

Well, after a short time, it came back to Project HQ on September 10, 2008. 

There’s crowds. There’s hamming it up for the camera. There’s the “Out ‘N Loud” crew. And – best of all – they’re hanging out in the Helsinki Drinking District!

On September 24, Valerie Thai and Roger Allen were in Beverly Hill, and their intention was to leave a camera on Rodeo Drive, but all of the high-end stores have security guards outside their entrances. So, instead, they placed Camera #118 on a newspaper dispensing box at Beverly Drive & Dayton Way, which is right around the corner.

Maybe we’ll get a peak into the lives of the rich and famous…

In August, I went with some friends on a bike camping trip to the San Juan Islands. I found room enough in my paniersto bring three cameras along, and I placed them around the two islands we went to. A couple of weeks ago, Camera #114 came back.

This camera seems to have been picked up by a fellow camper – it probably helps that I left it on the beach of the campground. Many of the pics are of the campground we stayed in, and the surrounding area. The photo of the starfish, seaweed, and lock of hair – above – is my personal favourite.

A while ago, Chandler Poling of the Life is Dynamite blog contacted me wanting to Help Spread the Project. His blog deals with old and found photographs, so, it fits in with the found nature of The Anonymous Photo Project. He’s based in New York, and I definitely look forward to seeing what new stuff comes back from there!

Previous New York cameras have been lost, smashed, and returned empty. And three others have made it back with pictures: #60, #62, #72.

So, I’ve been terrible lately at providing updates as to what’s been going on with the project, but here’s an attempt to remedy that.

Over a month ago, the Project got another camera back – from Switzerland! Camera #122 was placed by Lori and Pax in Geneva under a palm tree in the courtyard of MAMCO (Musee d’art moderne et contemporain + Centre de la Photographie). I think putting it outside the Centre de la Photographie was key, since it was picked up and returned with a bunch of interesting shots. There’s art, street scenes, junk, jazz, and costumed ladies.

It’s not the first camera to have gone to Europe, but it’s the first one that’s been dropped there and returned. Camera #60 was placed in New York, and went all the way to France and back. And, Camera #33 went on a Scandinavian cruise after being left near Toronto.

It’s been busy here at the project lately – and I’ve been neglecting my updating duties! It’s been over a month since my last post, but that doesn’t mean that there hasn’t been anything going on. There’s been a bunch, and this post is about the new cameras that have gone out into the wild.

My friends, Lori and Pax, went on a European trip and dropped a couple of cameras in Switzerland on July 12:

• #122: Under a palm tree in the courtyard of MAMCO (Musee d’art moderne et contemporain + Centre de la Photographie). Rue de Vieux-Grenadiers, Genève, Switzerland.
• #126: On the bleachers at the skateboard park. Plaine De Plainpalais. Genève, Switzerland.

And, I went on a bike camping trip to the San Juan Islands in Washington with some other friends – one of the reasons for taking this long to provide updates as to what’s going on. I was able to fit 3 cameras in my paniers, and, after finding a post office to get some postage, I dropped them off:

• Camera #114 was placed on the beach at Odlin County Park on Lopez Island on August 13. It was near a whole bunch of camp sites.
• Also on August 13, I left Camera #116 was left at the entrance to the San Juan County Fair in Friday Harbor on San Juan Island. Unfortunately, due to my neglect, it was labeled #113, which was already placed! Whoops!
• And, on the last day of the journey, on August 14, Camera #115 found itself on the Boardwalk at Spring St + Front St in Friday Harbor on  San Juan Island.

And last, but definitely not least, the prolific placer, The Girl, found herself on the other side of the International Date Line in New Zealand and Australia, and left 2 cameras in each.

• Camera #152 was left on a bench in Albert Park on August 7 in Auckland.
• The same day, Camera #153 was left on a bench outside the Auckland Art Gallery.
• Camera #154 was left at Starbucks in Hawthorn, Glen Ferrie Road in Melbourne, Australia on Friday morning, August 15.
• And, on August 19, Camera #155 was dropped in Melbourne on a table just outside of Subway and the Shoe Repair Shop in Hawthorn.

So, a very prolific period! 2 new countries and 9 cameras in just over a month – it’s been a while since The Project was this busy.

And, a bit of a teaser: 2 of these have already been returned!

Well, after many many attempts and more attempts, I’ve finally had success in Vancouver! A camera was picked up, pictures taken, and it was returned. As I’ve mentioned before, it seems like Vancouver isn’t a random photo project kinda place – I’ve placed 8 cameras here throughout the years, and I’ve only received Camera #113 back.

Looks these guys had one helluva a day though. Okay, I might be making some big assumptions, but the guy above is wearing his red Andre the Giant shirt from breakfast at the beginning, all the way to the end.

This being the first camera received back from a place I know well, I went on a mission. A friend and I sifted through the pictures and came to the following conclusions:

• They started with breakfast at Caffe Barney on Main Street
• They then drove downtown, via Main + 2nd Avenue
• They then cut up a bunch of meat somewhere. Okay, this one isn’t much of a stretch since it’s right there in the pictures, but we think it happened at their next stop:
• Boneta in Gastown – one of the pics seems to have a bowl of meat on the counter…
• Then they closed up the evening at The Greedy Pig.

All this was possible through the clues in the pics – signs seen on the street, telltale countertops and curtains, and menu boards – and following up with Google Maps, Flickr, and the websites of the restaurants.

It’s amazing what can be figured out just from the pictures.

If anyone else out there has unreturned cameras from Vancouver, return them so I can do some more detecting!

I got an email from the creator of another project that is similar to The Anonymous Photo Project in some respects. It’s called Photonymo.us, and they’ve been at it since March and have gotten 5 cameras back so far, with some interesting results.

They place cameras in the Greater Cincinnati Area – so, it’s much more local – and they also accept submission of disposable cameras from people that haven’t found one. And, they have one caveat:

“Take photos telling something about yourself without showing your name or your face.”

It’s interesting when people come up with similar ideas without knowing about the other. After starting The Anonymous Photo Project, I came across PhotoTag which is another project which precedes mine.

You gotta give this guy credit for telling the truth! I wonder how long it takes this guy to reach his goal. Unfortunately, it looks like most people are ignoring him, and missing his genius sign.