The FBI electronically scans documents requested under the Freedom of Information Act. This works great for text documents but can sometimes do strange things to photos. I found the following collection of FBI evidence photos from a 1971 blue box bust in Montana to be oddly haunting. (Click on any image for a higher-res version. And if you're reading this on an RSS reader that doesn't include images, do come and visit this blog with a browser; I think these are really cool photos...)
Id sure like to bump into some of these on ebay! man... in technology terms these are historic relics that should be in a computer science museum! no doubt they got destroyed!
Posted by: Number Six | November 14, 2008 at 02:22 PM
The FBI has such a stylized flair! Bunch of art-school dropouts.
Posted by: rob getzschman | November 25, 2008 at 08:20 AM
weird angles on those box shots, they're almost isometric.
Posted by: p | November 25, 2008 at 09:37 AM
there is something so cool about these old school hacking/phreaking devices...
Posted by: jamie dalgetty | November 25, 2008 at 09:43 AM
IF these "are" photos, they are a record of somebody's great drawing skills. They can not have been produced from photos, at least not without a great deal of work.
They look like exercises I did in Art School about a million years ago combined with the homework I did for my boyfriend for his drafting class. They are the evidence of a brilliant draughtsman with a paranoid imagination.
I have managed to save an old Bakelite phone for use in my studio. It prevents me from freaking out and punching the numbers the computer caller asks for.
This would be a great exercise in drawing for my new class.
Thanks!
Posted by: Boo | November 25, 2008 at 10:56 AM
Boo, I think these look like standard photocopies of photographs. I think your drawing experience has tainted your perception! ;-)
Posted by: dculberson | November 25, 2008 at 02:26 PM