For our eighth anniversary series "8 Years, 8 Members, 8 Stories" we contacted Flickr members who joined Flickr in February 2004. We asked them what the best thing that’s happened to them since they became a Flickr member, what it is that they love about Flickr, and what their eight favorite photos from other Flickr members are. We will publish the eight installments throughout the day.
Meet our seventh story contributor, Milo Vermeulen (a.k.a. milov), from the Hague for whom the best thing that came from being on Flickr was making new friends, getting to know lots of interesting people and talented photographers, discovering and joining many photo meetups nearby and even making several trips abroad to London and Poland to meet other Flickr members.
Another way that Flickr has affected his life is the fact that Milo now has an easy instant visual reference to any period in his life over the past 8 years.
"I’m grateful that I thoroughly tagged and organized my photos from the very beginning and can usually find any photo I’m thinking of within seconds with a smart tag search."
Flickr changed Milo’s photography in the sense that various local Flickr groups were a constant source of inspiration for finding new landscapes or different parts of the city to go explore with his camera.
"I would recommend Flickr to people getting into photography as a great way to find photo meetups in their area, a fun way to get better and learn from other people with similar interests. And personally I’ve found that the Flickr groups are also very handy for finding sample photos when on the lookout for a new camera or lens."
At first Milov’s favorite Flickr feature was the ease with which he could follow the visual stream of many contacts on a daily basis. Before Flickr, that simply wasn’t possible for him. Nowadays, he says that the tagging and organizational aspects are what he appreciates most. As a webdeveloper, Milo also loves the extensive API, which enables him to integrate his Flickr uploads and metadata into his own site to his own tastes.
"One of my first Flickr faves, I like the sharp texture and pattern, and the way the edges of the broken metal look almost bloody."
"Another one of my oldest Flickr faves, I love the light in this photo."
"These are two of the sweetest cats I know. The ginger one, Hurley, is all grown up now and as big as grey Banks.. looking back at it now, i love how small he looks here."
"This is an example of the perfect street photo to me, a lovely composition of elements and layers."
"The composition and detail in this shot made it one of the photos that convinced me to get a Ricoh GR Digital myself, a great compact camera that I enjoyed shooting with for several years."
"A great juxtaposition, I love the expression on the cat’s face."
"This is the sort of little magic photogenic thing I wish I would encounter when out photo-exploring myself."
"ninnx is the best at finding faces in lifeless objects, her photos taught me to look for more than the eye can see."
Thank you Milo for telling us your story! Please stay tuned for our next episode.
Photos from milov, Caroline, Another side of yukita, njcvh, C。Yu, takazawa kenji, junku, Dal Jean, and ninnx.
