Old Dog Photography

If you’ve ever seen the movie “A Night at the Museum,” you may have had your perspective on museum displays… changed a bit by it.

A few weeks back, I was wandering through an aircraft museum called the Valiant Air Command Warbird Museum in Titusville, Florida. In the exhibit space was an arrangement of mannequins intended to display U.S. Air Force uniforms of the second World War — but to me, it almost looks like something else is going on here…

Sure, they’re just mannequins. Still, I’m used to seeing the regular ones that are cast to just stare straight ahead — and they don’t usually have eyes painted in, either. Here it almost looks as though a flash of human feeling was captured in the face of the figure on the right — maybe longing, or unrequited love?

If you’re curious, I only did a little post-processing of the original image to “de-clutter” the background (although it took me plenty of time to accomplish, since I’m not exactly a Photoshop expert). I made a mask in Photoshop Elements, and blurred / desaturated / darkened the background to emphasize the figures’ faces.

Here’s the original image:

Meanwhile, here’s an image of the three figures from a different angle:

As you can see, the shot only works from one particular point of view (and even then, I wish all that stuff wasn’t on the wall behind them!).