Long-exposure shots in St Petersburg, Russia turn people into ghosts

Alexey Titarenko's "City of Shadows" is a series of haunting, gorgeous long-exposure shots of street-scenes in St Petersburg, Russia. The long exposure-times turn the people in the shots into ghosts and suggestions of motion. Link (Thanks, Marilyn!)

[#1 posted by Bevatron Repairman , June 13, 2008 6:36 AM]

I like the two fellows by the tree, staying in place long enough to be resolved.

[#2 posted by meateye , June 13, 2008 6:57 AM]

Architectural photos use long exposure to remove moving object (people, cars, puppies,etc) and make structures appear unobscured. Occasionally you can see faint traces of the figures. Why in this photo are the people not fainter or the buildings darker? Photochopped?

[#3 posted by Latente , June 13, 2008 7:22 AM]

hum...not long exposure...looks like more a multi-exposure, like mine take at Louvre:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/e-coli/235355061/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/e-coli/230906079/

[#4 posted by marnanel , June 13, 2008 7:26 AM]

This is eerily reminiscent of those lines in THe Wasteland where the crowd of dead flow over London Bridge.

Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,
A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,
I had not thought death had undone so many.

[#5 posted by Kieran O'Neill , June 13, 2008 7:52 AM]

Wow. The one with people boiling out of a (metro station?). Just wow.

[#6 posted by SamSam , June 13, 2008 8:14 AM]

I believe that Latente is correct, especially as his (very nice) photos have the identical effect.

Alternatively, it's a long exposure which is a) not very long (so everyone isn't rendered invisible, and b) affected by the way people don't move smoothly up steps, but rather one step at a time, so we can see their feet motionless on the steps, their heads almost motionless, and in between we see just a blur.

Anyway, very nice depiction of the huddled masses.

[#7 posted by Net , June 13, 2008 9:19 AM]

I have been a photographer since 1975 (yes, older folks read "boingboing" too!), and really enjoyed this post. I only have a handful of long exposure shots, but they are not online. And they are not as cool as these. And Latente, I've posted your link on our site so others can see your fine work, as well. Thank you!

[#8 posted by JJMS , June 13, 2008 9:20 AM]

Reminds me of Zdzislaw Beksinski paintings.

[#9 posted by clueless in brooklyn , June 13, 2008 9:29 AM]

These photographs are really quite beautiful.

I can't help but to think about the experience that different people from different parts of the world have when viewing this work.

I wonder if the work looks less eerie to those who were born and raised in these urban soviet landscapes.

Perhaps to a tropical islander this work is so beyond the norm that it is a shock to ponder.

Good stuff.

[#10 posted by Melody Platz , June 13, 2008 9:41 AM]

The photo is beautiful, but creepy. I feel like those people could swarm out of the picture and start wailing at me. "ooooooh."

"Shivers and turns on some happy music."

[#11 posted by nihilarian , June 13, 2008 9:46 AM]

i found these profound and shocking. the closest thing i can think of is marey's chronophotographs, but many times more dirty and ghostly. truly extraordinary.

[#12 posted by airshowfan , June 13, 2008 10:27 AM]

Interestingly, some of the very first photographs (taken with pinhole cameras) had to be long exposures. All the people (and carriages and horses) disappear except for one guy getting his shoe shined, who stayed in one place for long enough.

It's neat how, as people move, their shoes (and hands on a hand-rail) stay still for most of the time, and then quickly hop from one spot to the other, looking fairly clear. I have taken pictures like this at dance halls, and they look like a bunch of disembodied feet with a misty/smokey/ghostly cloud over them. Pretty freaky. One of my favorites was taken during a traveling waltz, so the whole room swirls in a big spiral. [Shameless self-promotion]

[#13 posted by Scott Wetterschneider , June 13, 2008 10:38 AM]

I think this is what we really look like in a "universe as a big holographic crystal" sense.

[#14 posted by ill lich , June 13, 2008 10:57 AM]

Photography didn't turn people into ghosts in St. Petersburg . . . Stalin did.

[#15 posted by SamF , June 13, 2008 11:03 AM]

In Soviet Russia, photograph takes YOU.

Oh, wait, this isn't slashdot, is it?

[#16 posted by Clay , June 13, 2008 11:14 AM]

"From that foggy tangle that crept silently across the square there shot, now and then, the fleeting phantom of a hand, the impression of what might have been a face, forms of prosaically-attired anatomy to be glimpsed as of a distant memory..."

[#17 posted by Antinous , June 13, 2008 11:30 AM]

Net,

No signature line and no link to your blog, please. You can put your URL on your profile page and your name is already above the comment. In-thread links are only for things specifically related to the post (or discussion).

[#18 posted by Mindpowered , June 13, 2008 11:57 AM]

http://www.alexeytitarenko.com/cityshadows_pix/city_pict18a.jpg

The perfect picture for Friday the 13th.

Enjoy

[#19 posted by pwr , June 13, 2008 12:02 PM]

Michael Wesely kicks some serious long-exposure booty...some exposures are years long!

http://www.wesely.org/wesely/gruppe.php?var=potsdamerplatz#

[#20 posted by Bruce Arthurs , June 13, 2008 12:26 PM]

My first thought was of "Smoke Ghost" by Fritz Lieber.

[#21 posted by nhvzr , June 13, 2008 12:52 PM]

I think Latente and SamSam are right that this one's a multiple exposure – you can, for example, see what is clearly one person's hand in different positions moving up the rail. Also, a single long exposure wouldn't usually behave in quite this way: too much stuff in the image from people's movement, which I doubt would show up if it were just one shot.

Airshowfan (and Cory) have it right, too, though: if it was merely multiple exposures, you wouldn't get the flow of people effect – the hands wouldn't be the only thing that would stay still, everything would.

So, I posit that it was made with multiple (I think 2) long exposures (of at least 5 seconds), and that everyone wins. I'm definitely going to have to try this myself, ideally with a large format camera in a busy place. Great post.

[#22 posted by Slavofile , June 13, 2008 1:44 PM]

The comment about Stalin turning people into ghosts is a good point. But there are other ghosts in St. Petersburg, like Dostoevsky's. You can trace Raskolnikov's footsteps if you know where to look.

[#23 posted by AlexG55 , June 13, 2008 2:04 PM]

@22- not to mention the thousands of people who died actually building the city under Peter the Great. According to my Russian friends, SPB is built on a graveyard- another reason not to drink the water!

[#24 posted by JG , June 13, 2008 6:04 PM]

Multiple, slow exposures have been used to accomplish this effect.

If you look at the lead image posted on BB you will see the same running shoe clearly resolved on several steps. It appears approximately 6 times as the person climbs the stairs during several slow, blurred exposures.

Simple technique, random outcome.

###

[#25 posted by nihilarian , June 14, 2008 6:05 AM]

maybe a cover for the next reprint of 'human smoke'?

[#26 posted by k97 , June 15, 2008 6:08 AM]

these photos are immense, i tried to recreate them with a load of images i shot for a time lapse video, and it didnt come anywhere close to the level of these, but i think im gonna try it again, http://www.flickr.com/photos/24918435@N02/2578465492/sizes/l/