Announcing the Downtown Photo Project
June 15, 2006
Although it may seem like downtown development projects come and go with the seasons, change is happening before our eyes. In the next five years, Fresno will have a dramatically different downtown. At a minimum, there will be hundreds of new housing units, thousands of square feet of new retail, and one fuzzy collective memory of what things looked like before.
It's not just the structures that will change, but the energy and feel of the neighborhoods. There will be people on the sidewalks and cars parked in the street at night.
What will happen to the decor at the lazy Fajita Fiesta restaurant on Divisadero and Van Ness when it's packed with hipsters on Friday and Saturday night, with a 15 minute wait for a table? Will it look the same?
We've already lost too many downtown landmarks. The Vagabond pool is a vivid memory for some, but urban legend for others. Who can remember what the Wilson Marquee looked like before Cornerstone Church put up a digital display?
We think it's important to document this time in downtown's history, right before the first wave of new residents and businesses move in. Preserving our history, even if it is one of boarded up buildings and empty lots, has meaning.
Photographing every block downtown is a huge task. But with hundreds of volunteers, it becomes much easier.
What we're proposing
It's an experiment in distributed journalism: each individual photographer takes on a small piece of the overall project. Adopt a city block, or two. Take digital photos of the buildings and streets around you. In five years, they'll look much different.
How you can help
We need as many amateur photographers as we can get. Explore an area of downtown, and photograph what you see. Then upload your digital photos to the Fresno Famous group on Flickr. Flickr is a free online photo storage service. To register, all you need is an email address. To join the Fresno Famous group, simply click on the "Join this group" button.
To offer an incentive to get out there and take photos, we'll be giving away a Flickr Pro account once a month through September. The winner will be chosen at random from those who contribute photos.
What we'll to the photos
The project will close September 30. We'll then create a virtual downtown Fresno online with your photos. To see how far we've come, it will be useful to remember where we've been.
This is a community-wide project. Anyone with a digital camera is welcomed and encouraged to participate. Any questions, please leave a comment.
Disclosures:None.
"Although it may seem like
"Although it may seem like downtown development projects come and go with the seasons, change is happening before our eyes. In the next five years, Fresno will have a dramatically different downtown."
ive heard this one beofre. i remember back in 1994 they said downtown fresno would look dramitically different by 2005. but all i saw was that two more buildings went up.
disfunctional
A function of college education.
hella weird comments.
hella weird comments.
WAEASDD
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levitra link move to
levitra woman
levitra
Get out there!
Still so much to see and document in the downtown area. Now IS the time to do this before so many great buildings and signs get sacraficed to the Starbucks and Wal-Mart Gods!
Organized way of Claiming/Dedicating a Block
Wouyld it be possible for each photographer claim/take a block. If it were more organized in this fashion we would be able to get more blocks because of non-overlapping. Good idea, Bad idea?
Are you SuRe you mean whatchu say ?!
Fresno,
will IT
be
Better
That Way ?!
Stop thinking about your art.
(Finish what u start)
What 'bout
ECONOMY ( ! ! )
Shut the hell up-
for one
Minuto,
por
Favor ( ! )
pu-leese
Listen- (Mitigación, mi amigos)
to
(no, not me)
cous-
'don't need no enemies'
but
The People
has
Got
To Be.
Sorry to have to say it, but money is a necessity. YOur luckier than most, in this goddamn world.
See ?!
natalie nicole
Historic photo project is good for valley collective memory...
What a great idea. In the future some historian will find a treasure trove of historic material just because of this project. Other people do the same with oral histories, interviewing old timers and folks on a wide range of Central Valley topics... and it all adds to the body of knowledge on Fresno and the San Joaquin.
Color or B&W
We defer to the photog, although color will be better for comparing changes (new paint, etc).
Go for it!
For my vote, shoot'em in Living Color!
DowntownDon
Living Large SOUTH OF BELMONT
Fresno Downtown Photo Project
I got some freetime. I favor the idea. Would you prefer it in color or B&W?
What a Brilliant Idea!
Along with the buildings, the signs(better snap that Luau sign before it disappears!) there probably are some "characters" to photographically chronicle as well--how great to be able to capture some of the treasures that our awesome downtown offers--the bar at the Cosmopolitan, the lounge and piano-bar at Richards, the patio at Papagayas, the murals, the yard sculptures and the old Broadway brick warehouses--Kudos for a great idea!
DowntownDon
Living Large SOUTH OF BELMONT
Great idea!
This sounds like a great deal of fun! I cannot wait to see what people come up with!
before and after
it's fun to look at before and after photos, like recently in San Francisco they have an exhibit of before the 1906 earthquake and 100 years after... the after images taken from near the same spot as the before.
kind of like what Vintage Fresno did with their comment for the Fresno Hotel
besides finding more old photos of Fresno at various archives of the Country Library or the Fresno Bee and other photographers collections, you can find a good number of images from various valley county's at the San Joaquin Valley & Sierra Foothills photo Heritage part of the San Joaquin Valley Digitization Project that started in 2001 and it seems like they have not added that much more in the last few years...
Perhaps there should be a
Perhaps there should be a Flickr tag just for this project? DowntownFresnoProject?
I'm already a member of
I'm already a member of Flickr and the Fresno Famous group there. I've posted several downtown-related photos, but I'd love to participate more. Anything I can do, let me know!
sure!
Any way you want to digitize photos.
What about film?
if you get your film developed at a processing center, can you have them burn a disc and upload to flickr that way? (same goes for scanning photos)
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