Amazing GIF Animations by Jamie Beck

No Flash, no HTML5 trickery. Just good old-fashioned GIF animation. New York photographer Jamie Beck has constructed a great collection of GIFs using her own captures. What’s intriguing about these GIFs is how only certain elements of the photo are animated while everything else stays suspended. Take the Busy day in Manhattan… shot as an example. What would seem like a very lively shot with moving objects everywhere has been reduced to an isolated animation of the sitting man paging through his newspaper. I’m also impressed that these GIFs have great colors to them and don’t exhibit excessive dithering, given the limited 256-color GIF palette. [From Me To You]

RED Epic-M Camera Still

Check that picture out. Not really impressive at first glance right? Until you realize this is a frame grab from recorded footage of a camera. Photographer Vincent Laforet recorded/captured this shot with the RED Epic-M camera. This $58,000 beast shoots 5,000 lines of resolution at 96 frames per second. A very fitting name for the camera, I say.

Click here to view it at 100% full resolution. [Vincent Laforet]

Moon and Venus Over Switzerland

A stunning photograph by David Kaplan showing the small towns of Trübbach, Switzerland and Balzers, Liechtenstein blanketed by clouds with the moon and Venus on display in the morning sky. [NASA]

A Dog’s Devotion

A dog’s loyalty knows no boundaries.

The floodings and landslides in Teresopolis, a city near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, continue as I’m writing this, with hundreds lost or dead. A single photo puts a face on the tragedy the country is facing. Two days after his owner died from the flooding, Leao has sat beside her grave refusing to abandon her.

The spirit of Hachiko lives within him.

National Geographic Photo of the Day

Where has the hell has this been hiding? I have a few places on the Internet for my daily fix for interesting photos such as Boston.com’s The Big Picture, Flickr Blog, and deviantART. Chalk one up for National Geographic’s Photo of the Day as my newest addition to my daily feed. I mean seriously, just take a look at the past 10 photos. They’re all amazing. When you have an institution so dedicated to educating and informing people about the earth, its people, and its history, you get amazing works of art, publications, and articles as a result. I’m a bit peeved that Dish Network no longer carries the Nat Geo channel… [National Geographic]

Photo Spotlight: Rice Harvest

Rice Harvest is a great candid shot of workers working in the North Vietnamese rice fields. Istvan Kadar, also known as fesign on Flickr, did a great job capturing the subject matter in their natural manner against an amazing backdrop. These workers gotten so used to the view they just go about their business. For me, I can probably sit out there for hours alone at peace, relax, read a book, and stare out into the fields and mountains. Looks surreal and otherworldy.

Here is Istvan’s excerpt about the photograph:

Two and a half miles (4 km) from Sapa, is Catcat village. This is a traditional Hmong people town.
One of the largest ethnic minorities in Vietnam is the Hmong Tribe. Hmong originally means “free people”. They came from China, and now live in different regions throughout Vietnam.

After discovering this photograph, I had to check out the photographer’s other work. He has tons of other photographs carrying this same style and aesthetic, all high quality work. One can tell he takes time and effort and takes pride into each photo he publishes and doesn’t just dumps a bunch of photos into a pool. Go check out his photostream! [Flickr]

Old World War II-Modern Day Photo Juxtapositions

Russian photographer Sergey Larenkov took old World War II photos and superimposed them into modern day photos with matching perspectives. What comes out as results are powerful images of stark contrast. Streets that were once occupied by marching military personnel and weapons are now occupied by cars and everyday folk. Architectures that were once in rubble from war and military occupation are now beautiful places of interests bustling with activity. Gritty, poor quality photos placed along with clean, high quality photos shows the advancements we’ve made with photo technology.

It’s crazy when you think about the locations you see and visit everyday; what they’ve gone through throughout their histories. And even before they existed, what was there or what was going on before. During World War II, during the Civil War, during the Revolution. Hell, during prehistoric times. [Sergey Larenkov]