A Homeless Artist Finds Recognition With The Help Of A Bus Station Photobooths

Lee Godie was a homeless artist who found her passion in 1968. At around 60 years old, after attending an Impressionism exhibition, Godie declared herself a French Impressionist. 

She began painting and selling her portraits of high society women until 1990. Godie discovered a photo booth at the Greyhound Bus Stop in Chicago. There she would take self-portrait glam shots and add color to the 5x4 gelatin silver black and white prints. By using lipstick and instant ice tea she was able to create her own unique style. 

Lee Godie's Self-portrait collection continues at John Michael Kohler Arts Center (608 New York Avenue, Sheboygan, WI) through February 8, 2016.

Philippe Halsman inspires The Booth

Philippe Halsman was an American Portrait photographer. He was known for his images that were sharp rather than in soft focus and closely cropped.

We were inspired by what Halsman called Jumpology. He commented, "When you ask a person to jump, their attention is mostly directed toward the act of jumping and the mask falls so that the real person appears.”

We couldn't agree more!

Marilyn Monroe by Philippe Halsman 

William Holden by Philippe Halsman

Our guests in sync!

Jason's self portrait

The Booth Prepares For Halloween!

With Halloween only a few weeks away, we are excited for all the costume parties coming our way. The costumes get better and better each year. The Booth is on-site to capture all the fun, laughs, and Halloween fear!

What will you surprise us with?

Absolutely Brilliant.

The entire Booth team has a background in professional photography. We had the honor of working with One Medical Group and their amazing team. Originally, our gear was packed with a seamless backdrop but once the silver freight elevator caught the eyes of our team, there was a change of plans. Our team was able to make the adjustments needed and create a custom look using the surroundings, pretty cool right?

The Health Benefits of Photo Booths

According to researchers in Berlin, Germany there are health benefits of using a photo booth. A study found that taking pictures with your friends helps rejuvenate minds and makes people happy. This Booth happiness helps reduce stress levels which is absolutely necessary for a healthy mind and body. Read more at Healthnewsline.net As you can tell, The Booth and our guests knew this all along!

Go. Stop. Go. Stop. Go check out our GIF Booth.

Once in The Booth, we guarantee you'll want to take more than one photo. Let's make it a GIF Booth!

1. Step into our GIF Booth.

2. Bust a move as we snap a series of photos.

3. Leave with an animated GIF you and your friends will love!

Pretty easy right? Check out some fun GIFs below.

The Booth Goes Back to School!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art Stirs A Flashback at The Booth.

Starting on Monday, The Metropolitan Museum of Art will exhibit 100 Years Of Portrait Photography In West Africa. Works of Seydou Keïta of Mali, J.D. ‘Okhai Ojeikere of Nigeria, and Malian photographer Malick Sidibé will be displayed. Flashback Friday! Last Fall, The Booth had the honor of joining The Africa Center to recreate historical photographs from West Africa. We can't wait for the next inspired Photo Booth project! See a few of our recreations (right) along with the originals (left) below.

Richard Avedon in Photo Booth History.

The modern concept of the Photo Booth originated 90 years ago by Anatol Josepho. After his arrival from Russia in 1923, Josepho successfully showcased the first Photo Booth in 1925 on Broadway, New York City. Within the first 6 months more than 280,000 people used the popular photo booth.

As a team favorite, we were happy to learn about Richard Avedon's use of the photo booth. In 1957, Esquire magazine delivered one of Mutascope’s art deco booths to Avedon’s New York studio.

“According to the article, Avedon ‘has long asserted that true photographic talent cannot be restrained by a camera’s technical limitations.’ The Esquire editors picked celebrities and challenged Avedon to produce photographs. The resulting photomatic essay is stunning, including images of Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, Truman Capote and Ethel Merman.” – From ‘A History of the Photobooth’, PanModern.com

Painting. In The Booth. With Lights!

Light painting was created by pioneer Gjon Mili, who shot a series of experimental light painting photos of a violinist in 1952. With a long exposure and by attaching a light to the Violinist's bow, Mili captured the image below.

Photographer Stephen Orlando's recent light painting with music is absolutely stunning. By attaching LED lights to the bows of violin, viola, and cello players, Orlando is able to capture a creative representation of the sounds created by musicians. A great article on petapixel.com.

Inspiration for our next music industry client has been found! Check out some images from our past Light Painting Photo Booths.

An Impressive Camera For A 9 Year Mission.

NASA’s New Horizons probe finally reached Pluto and its dwarf moon, Charon. After traveling 9 years and 3.6 billion miles, New Horizons took hundreds of images on Tuesday morning. With three cameras on board, the most impressive is "Ralph." A camera equipped with a 75mm lens at f/8.7, capable of capturing visible light and some infrared light. As New Horizons traveled away from the sun, temperatures drop causing materials to shrink. Lisa Hardaway, an engineer at Ball Aerospace in Colorado knew "Ralph" would have to be built almost entirely of one type of material.

“We actually built the mirrors and the chassis out of aluminum so that as they shrink, they would shrink together, to maintain the same focal length. We could do a reasonable test on Earth and still expect the same quality image,” Hardaway says.

Even the camera’s mirrors were made out of aluminum. To turn dull aluminum into mirrors, Ball sharpened it with diamonds. The lens was one of the few pieces of the camera that could be safely made out of glass.

A huge mission. An impressive camera. One set of historic photographs.

Love. Joy. Pride. History. #SFPride

A historic day on Friday and the joy continues. This past weekend, we had the honor of joining Airbnb at the San Francisco Pride Parade. Our Slow Motion specialists, a lot of confetti, and tons of love makes for an extremely fun activation. Check out some of the attendees having a confetti blast!

Steps forward for the LGBT Community

President Barack Obama proclaims June 2015 as Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month. We are proud to work with companies such as the Anti-violence Project and The Center for Anti-violence education. One thing is for sure, we are all happy to see this progression and will always be supporters.

We know stop motion. This producer mastered it.

A great article on NPR, Son Lux's "Change Is Everything" music video is some of the best stop motion we have ever seen. This reminded us of the stop motion clips we created for airbnb at the Sundance Film Festival.

The Director, Nathan Johnson and the Producers, The Made Shop took stop motion to a whole new level. Two long weeks, over 4,000 frames, and many sore fingers later. This Masterpiece was created. We cannot wait for our next stop motion booth, does anyone sense a challenge brewing?

Happy 10th anniversary to The Huffington Post

The Booth joins The Huffington Post for their 10th anniversary celebration!

The site launched on May 9, 2005, when blog sites were not considered as a news medium. Arianna Huffington, the Huffington Post's founder and editor-in-chief, said that her site proved to be a credible medium. Today the site reaches over 200 million unique visitors per month, and that is something worth celebrating!

The Preakness Stakes approach as The Booth's Stars Shine

The Booth joined Eleven Madison Park at their Annual Kentucky Derby party and as usual, we all had a blast. Neil Patrick Harris photo bombing a group and then showing off a glamorous pose. Can you say legen... wait for it... dary! Even Aziz Ansari was goofing around with our giant sunglasses prop. Bring it on Preakness!

Off To The Races in The Booth

BarkBox brings Puppy Fever To Our Photo Booth

Even The booth was wagging their tails this weekend.

Sigurjon and Justin spent the weekend with Barkbox, the doggie product subscription service, turning cute dogs into glamourous superstars! 

Our "puparazzi" coverage on the red carpet captured costumes, treats, and of course, the cutest pups in the world. We absolutely loved being part of the 1st Annual Kentucky Derpy, and can't wait to come back next year!

The Booth Spring party 2015

Our first annual spring fiesta was held at the Tortaria in NYC.  Our staff proved they know how to create an unforgettable experience, not only on someone else's job, but at our own party!  Channeling upcoming Cinco de Mayo festivities, our group enjoyed margaritas, tacos, tortilla chips, margaritas, guacamole, margaritas and, oh, did we mention, margaritas? Leave it to a bunch of photographers to all leave their cameras at home.  Thank goodness for iPhone photo technology.

Favorite photo booths from around the web

The dogs at the Humane Society of Utah got a huge treat with the help of photographer, Guinivere Shuster.  They found a creative way to show the world how cute and friendly rescues can be, Photo booth style.

We think every shelter should try this. We would be happy to help!

With faces like this, who could say no?