Layering photos

I'm glad that I invested ($60 sale price) in Joel Sartore's photography course at Great Courses. Sartore, who shoots for National Geographic, offers an immense amount of insight to aspiring photographers. He stresses that his course is not about buying lots of expensive equipment (though he certainly demonstrates what one can do with tripods, flashes and various types of lenses), but rather how to see, how to work a scene and how to cull through one's images for the ones that are really worth sharing. He does this in 24 30-minute lectures, most of which I have already watched, and I consider his course to be an excellent investment, at least at the sale price that was offered a few weeks ago. [More . . . ]

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Charlie Chaplin speaks

I hadn't before seen Charlie Chaplin's movie, The Great Dictator, but it ends with a rousing speech. First, a bit of background from Wikipedia:

Chaplin spent two years developing the script, and began filming in September 1939. He had submitted to using spoken dialogue, partly out of acceptance that he had no other choice but also because he recognised it as a better method for delivering a political message. Making a comedy about Hitler was seen as highly controversial, but Chaplin's financial independence allowed him to take the risk. "I was determined to go ahead," he later wrote, "for Hitler must be laughed at."Chaplin replaced the Tramp (while wearing similar attire) with "A Jewish Barber", a reference to the Nazi party's belief that the star was a Jew. In a dual performance he also plays the dictator "Adenoid Hynkle", a parody of Hitler which Maland sees as revealing the "megalomania, narcissism, compulsion to dominate, and disregard for human life" of the German dictator.
Watching this speech reminds me about how history so often repeats itself.

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Photos of fear

I don't know what is going on at Nightmares Fear Factory in Niagara, Canada--I've never been there.  Based on these photos of horrified people, though, they have many satisfied customers. At least these Nightmares Fear Factory customers asked for it, unlike this creepy elevator scenario foisted on unsuspecting people by this Brazilian television show.  You couldn't do this in America--the show would get sued after one of the victims had a heart attack.

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