Comparative studies

Big old scissors. Huge honking pencil. Little little men: fabulous. This image (via Orange Crate Art) is from the Life archive, free on Google.

About the image:

“Movie stagehands pushing a 400-pound pair of gigantic scissors on a dollie next to two men carrying a 21-ft. pencil, just some of the props that created the illusion of a dwindling hero for the movie The Incredible Shrinking Man at Universal Studios.” Photograph by Allan Grant, September 1956, Hollywood, California.

Wigging out in 1903 Tibet

A portfolio of photographs taken by John Claude White, from Younghusband's 1903-1904 British mission to Tibet, the first known images to leave the region, is being auctioned by Bonhams. NPR presented a selection of these photos; my favorite is the group of nuns, kitted out in spectacular wigs, at left.

Photography of Afghanistan

Not images from the war. Just images of everyday life in Afghanistan. By Jan Chipchase. I like the man selling boomboxes, a man loading grain in Mazar-e-Sharif, and this customized gun butt.