Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community  

Go Back   Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community > The Academy > Tilted Paranoia


 
 
LinkBack Thread Tools
Old 07-05-2007, 04:13 PM   #1 (permalink)
Upright
 
Giant steps are what you take...

Ok kids...gather round...it's time for a story. We all have at least one good one knocking around our past and I thought I would share one of mine-the following is true-I only blocked out my friends last name to protect his privacy.

A few years back I was living in Las Vegas and working as a photographer-one day I got the idea that I’d like to make some large format images (I was in some cheesy photo supply store and I saw a giant print on the wall)I asked who made the print and the guy told me it was a customer of his named Mike ******-I got Mr. ****** number and called him the next day-
-he told me he worked out of his house and invited me over-the first time I arrived at his rather modest home there was a hovercraft parked in his driveway-yup,that's what I thought...and so began my association with one of America's pre-eminent commercial photographers.
Mike's house was like a maze of stuff-this was due primarily to the fact that nearly every day equipment arrived from photographic supply manufacturers, camera and lighting companies and every other business that had anything remotely to do with photography (for Mike's review and possible endorsement) he would receive new cameras daily and literally stack them one atop the next-he was often out of town, lecturing at some university or attending a photographic symposium-he also wrote for several publications and photographic trade magazines.
In his home was his darkroom-only this wasn't just any darkroom my friends-this was like the laboratory of some mad scientist-it included a machine valued at the time at around half a million dollars that could format prints the size of a billboard-that was this guys playroom-
needless to say I spent a great deal of time hanging out with Mike-even though he’s nearly 30 years older than I am we hit it off immediately and he took me under his wing-he was kind enough to give me equipment to use and would regularly process and print my film for me at little or no cost-many times I would have to insist he take at least the cost of his supplies-
Many other times he would come upon a negative of mine and just decide he wanted to "work' it-as he put it
I would end up more often than not with several 8 x 10 and 11x14’s and something very very big...lol


O.k. this brings me to the story...ahem...

First of all Mike ****** is a very private man-he never was one to offer a whole lot of information about himself-and chances are if you look for him you won't find much-over the years I knew him I did learn a few things about him
I learned that he had been a Lt.Col in the Navy and a pilot-he showed me his flight suit one day and a ton of decorations
he also told me another day that he was a member of N.E.R.T.-or the nuclear emergency response team(whatever god forbid that is) and showed me credentials for that-to me he seemed pretty heavy duty -but he had long since retired from the military.
Occasionally when I was over there another older gentleman named Gene would stop by-Gene and Mike would disappear for awhile and talk while I processed film-I learned that Gene was Mike’s best friend.
Often when I would go to Mike's house he would leave me unattended while he worked in the darkroom-during these times I would rummage through his stacks of stuff and look at the pictures and negatives, what have you-Mike would come out after awhile and I’d ask him about what I'd found-whether it was candid photographs of Muhammad Ali relaxing at home or a vintage 1960’s Playboy layout or just pictures of some dead body at a murder scene, I never knew what I was going to find-but it was all work Mike had done in the past, and basically he just left it where it fell when the jobs ended
So one day I’m going through his stuff as usual right? and under a pile of crap I come upon a roll of 70mm negatives-this is the size negative that the Hasselblad large format camera uses (for anyone not familiar with the size)-and on the roll where photographs of what looked like...ready for this?...the surface of the Moon.
So what the hell was this guy doing with a roll of negatives of the surface of the Moon you might fairly ask at this point in my tale...well...that's what I asked
And here's what my good friend Mike (after much encouragement) told me...

Mike said that they were in fact photographic negatives of the lunar surface...and that he himself had exposed them

He told me that when he was in the Navy, he was commissioned by NASA to go along on a manned flight to the moon BEFORE Apollo 11 and to make the photographs

He also told me that several flights were made before Apollo 11 to ensure the success of the landing -in light of the intense public scrutiny of the space programs both at home and in the former Soviet Union; this actually makes a lot of sense at least to me

So that’s it. Everything I just typed is true-two more quick addendums-first the 70mm Hasselblad was in fact the camera NASA used to photograph the lunar surface

And second Gene’s last name -is Cernan-he is an ex Naval fighter pilot and former astronaut,and he happens to be the last man ever to walk on the Moon (Apollo17)…

Or so we’ve been told…

Pretty cool huh?
holly9000 is offline  
Old 07-05-2007, 10:01 PM   #2 (permalink)
Crazy
 
Laugh-O-Matic's Avatar
 
Location: Everywhere :)
One question, however insane it might sound. WTF was an ex-Navy/ NASA's partner-in-crime doing in Las Vegas?
__________________
How you bore me, Florrie,
With those eyes of vacant blue;
You'll be very sorry, Florrie
If I marry you.
Though I'm easy-goin', Florrie,
This I swear is true,
I'll throw you down a quarry, Florrie,
If I marry you.
- Saki.
Laugh-O-Matic is offline  
Old 07-07-2007, 04:55 PM   #3 (permalink)
immoral minority
 
ASU2003's Avatar
 
Location: Back in Ohio
Quote:
Originally Posted by Laugh-O-Matic
One question, however insane it might sound. WTF was an ex-Navy/ NASA's partner-in-crime doing in Las Vegas?
That is where JANET airlines flies out of.

I went to a retirement dinner a few months ago for my boss and learned that the first job that he got when he got out of the service after WW2 was in East Germany. Although he was still working for a US government agency. He apparently worked for them for quite some time after that as well.
ASU2003 is offline  
 

Tags
giant, steps


Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are On
Pingbacks are On
Refbacks are On



All times are GMT -8. The time now is 06:07 AM.

Tilted Forum Project

Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.
Search Engine Optimization by vBSEO 3.6.0 PL2
© 2002-2012 Tilted Forum Project

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230 231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240 241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250 251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260 261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280 281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320 321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330 331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340 341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350 351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360