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Post by dem bones on Apr 4, 2021 17:49:31 GMT
 G. G. Manton do we have a "photography is dangerous" DIY thread by the way? we have now. There are a number of more obvious choices, but this story has played on my mind for years, mainly because the end made me burst out laughing. Could remember neither author or title, just that I'd read it in a bound volume of some Victorian mag or other, hence recent trawl through those I kept. No joy ... until we reach the one at the bottom of the pile.  G. G. Manton : ( Pearsons, April 1896). When Edith ruthlessly dumps childhood sweetheart Denton for a Jewish German millionaire, he turns to his friend, Professor Grantham, for advice on how best to achieve a crushing revenge. The professor hears Denton out, agrees that Edith is a disgrace to all womanhood, vows his assistance. Being something of a pioneer in the art of photography, Grantham decides an appeal to Edith's vanity should do the trick. He will invite her to pose at his studio for a special kind of photo ..... Can you guess the type? |
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Post by helrunar on Apr 4, 2021 18:57:00 GMT
What a pair of fine manly fellows in that top drawing. What a shame they are plotting vileness against one of the Weaker Sex instead of making plans to spend a manly, sporting weekend together fishing in Scotland or engaging in other sturdy activity such as a good manly wrestle on the bear-rug in front of the fire.
Great find Dem!
H.
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Post by humgoo on Apr 5, 2021 5:26:12 GMT
He will invite her to pose at his studio for a special kind of photo ..... Can you guess the type? I couldn't, and of course I had to find out, you fiend! Thankfully it's available online (go to page 386) and I can well imagine why you burst out laughing! I remember a pair from Horowitz Horror: Killer Camera: Matthew King, fourteen, buys the Pentax at a Crouch End car-boot sale as a present for his father's fiftieth birthday. According to the seller, it was left behind by three art-students who absconded without settling for their rent. Matthew tests it out on a mirror which smashes seconds afterward. His delighted father then experiments with shots of the cherry tree in their back garden and Polonius, the family dog. The tree inexplicably withers and dies, the dog is splattered across Wolsely Road by a careless motorist .... Matthew visits the chemist with the roll of undeveloped film that came with the camera. The twenty-four snaps depict the three art-students and friends conducting a nude black magic ritual in a derelict house where their cat sacrifice evidently summoned a demon .... Matthew rushes home to destroy the camera, only to learn his family have taken it along with them to Kenwood House on Hampstead Heath. Can he reach them before Dad gets busy snapping all that moves? The Man with the Yellow Face: While his mum and dad get on with the business of divorcing one another, the thirteen year old son is sent to stay with his kindly Aunt and Uncle in York. Just before taking the train back home to mum in London, he puts £2.50 in a photo kiosk at York Station. The four prints when developed show three of him - and one of an ugly old man with something terribly wrong with his skin. The youngster takes this as a warning not to board the train - there may be an escaped mental patient aboard or "one of those suicide bombers you read about in the Middle East" - but his relatives are insistent. As the express passes under a bridge at Grantham .... |
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Post by cauldronbrewer on Apr 6, 2021 17:24:17 GMT
Tanith Lee's "Yellow & Red" might be my favorite horror story featuring dangerous photography. I read it in Ann Vandermeer and Jeff Vandermeer's The Weird, though it also appears in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror: Volume Ten. |
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Post by dem bones on Apr 6, 2021 20:41:41 GMT
HPL's Pickman's Model isn't bad, either.
Avram Davidson - The Montevarde Camera: (MF&SF, May 1959). The famous Montavarde's camera captured a certain luminous quality in the photographs it took that was unique. What a pity that his famous shot of the infamous Messe Noire should have been banned! What a delight for Mr. Collins to find the actual camera in Mr. Azel's shop!
Caught by a gust of wind, Mr. Lucius Collins' bowler hat blows off into a peculiar shop which, at first glance, is entirely devoid of merchandise. The proprietor, Mr Azel, explains that he shuns vulgar advertising in preference of the personal touch; what is it exactly Sir wishes to buy? When Collins admits an interest in photography, Azel shows him the camera used by the genius Montavarde to obtain a photograph of La Manchette, a mid-nineteenth century French courtesan, serving as the alter at a Black Mass. Mr. Collins, of course, simply has to buy it, and in so doing condemns those he photographs to their deaths. When realisation sinks in, Collins attempts to destroy the satanic camera on Guy Fawkes night.
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Post by Swampirella on Apr 6, 2021 21:03:58 GMT
I found it here:
Malwarebytes says my download is safe, but you can also borrow/read it here:
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Post by helrunar on Apr 7, 2021 3:19:31 GMT
There's this odd story by Basil Copper called "Camera obscura," but I'm not sure it fits in this thread.
It was dramatized on Night Gallery with the always delightful Ross Martin in a lead role--I remember watching it half a century ago, and I remember Ross's smile, but can't recall much about the story. It was intriguing however. I must revisit it soon.
H.
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Post by bluetomb on Apr 7, 2021 16:43:39 GMT
There's this odd story by Basil Copper called "Camera obscura," but I'm not sure it fits in this thread. It was dramatized on Night Gallery with the always delightful Ross Martin in a lead role--I remember watching it half a century ago, and I remember Ross's smile, but can't recall much about the story. It was intriguing however. I must revisit it soon. H. If we're thinking of the same Camera Obscura it has an ace nightmarish pay off. |
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Post by dem bones on Apr 7, 2021 18:13:00 GMT
 W.H. Silvey: ( Weird Tales, March 1953). I've spent so much of my life in the dark brooding land that is Africa that i wouldn't go on record about what might have appeared on any film taken there.While seeking out gorilla in the Kenyan jungle, young Frank Simons inadvertently films the ghost of Phillips Cord, a man five years murdered by a treacherous colleague. |
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Post by dem bones on Apr 8, 2021 18:29:17 GMT
 Vincent Napoli : ( Weird Tales, Sept 1950). It's one thing to focus your camera; another when it takes matters into its own hands and focuses itself. Miss Lydia Lancaster, 33, inherits the all of an uncle she never once met. George Faversham, black sheep of mother's family, leaves a house in East Darwich, £50, 000, two chests crammed with photographic equipment, and a vendetta against three treasure hunters who plotted his murder. Quitting her London job, Lydia takes up photography, whereupon she discovers that Uncle George's voodoo-enhanced Spanish camera - salvaged from the wreck of a slave ship - is focused on settling scores. Ruth McEnery Stewart - The Haunted Photograph: (Dorothy Scarborough [ed.] , Humorous Ghost Stories, 1921). Brian Lumley - The Man Who Photographed Beardsley: (Hugh Lamb [ed.], Star Book of Horror #2, 1976). Karl E. Wagner- The Portrait of Jonathan Collins: (Nancy Collins & Ed Kramer [eds.], Forbidden Acts, 1995). Michael Marshall Smith - More Tomorrow: (Stephen Jones & David A. Sutton [eds], Dark Terrors, 1995). *** Nowt to do with photography, but inspired by A Photograph of the Invisible, a personal preferred ridiculous method for ridding oneself of an enemy. "To us, deSade seems one of the great bores of all time, but in France in the age preceding that of Swinburne (1837-1909) people were so convinced of the supernatural power of his novel Justine that one writer, Frédéric Soulié, made the villain of his novel Les Mémoires du Diable (1837) put a copy of the book into the hands of the heroine with the idea that it would drive her mad. The heroine was locked up alone in a dungeon."
Ronald Pearsall, Night's Black Angels, 1975.
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Post by Middoth on Jul 14, 2021 11:13:22 GMT
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Post by ropardoe on Jul 15, 2021 8:34:00 GMT
I’ve been waiting for someone to mention E.G. Swain’s “The Man with the Roller” - a photographic take on “The Mezzotint”.
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Post by Dr Strange on Jul 30, 2022 21:13:54 GMT
independent.co.uk, 28th July 2022 -
Netflix UK set to remove ‘worst horror film ever made’ with 0 per cent Rotten Tomatoes score
Unanimously disparaged film centres around a haunted polaroid camera
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A film dubbed the “worst horror film ever made” is set to be removed from Netflix UK’s streaming catalogue in a matter of days.
Polaroid, first released in 2019, tells the story of a cursed polaroid camera.
According to the official synopsis, the plot is as follows: “High school loner Bird Fitcher finds a vintage Polaroid camera that holds dark and mysterious secrets. She soon realizes that those who get their picture taken by it meet a tragic and untimely death.”
Among the film’s cast are Skins star Kathryn Prescott, who plays the lead, and Twin Peaks actor Grace Zabriskie.
The film has a damning score of zero per cent on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes – a rare feat for any film to achieve.
Polaroid will be removed from Netflix’s UK catalogue on 9 August 2022, giving viewers just a matter of days to catch up on this dubious horror gem.
While few would consider unanimously negative reviews a badge of honour, critical scorn like this can sometimes help a pulpy horror film rise to the rank of “ironic classic”.
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Post by helrunar on Jul 30, 2022 22:59:29 GMT
I read a story that seems to have had the exact same plot as the film Polaroid somewhere or other a few years back, but of course can no longer recall the author or title.
H.
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Post by PeterC on Jul 31, 2022 10:29:29 GMT
I read a story once. I can’t remember what it was about or who wrote it. Can anybody help?
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