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Is that an immature ostrich? Is it looking over a peculiar fence or the headstones in an oriental graveyard? Who knows? I searched 2.1 Billion images on the web (using Tineye) and did not find a source.

It comes from Theo, of course.

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From one of those Russian photo sites which never give any information or sources. That looks like a Burmese python to me, and like a very bad idea.

I guess it’s not surprising to find that Leitz invented the the 35 mm format, and that the reason a smaller film format was created in Germany was to make photography more convenient when visiting the mountains.

Wikipedia:

The first Leica prototypes were built by Oskar Barnack at Ernst Leitz Optische Werke, Wetzlar, in 1913. Intended as a compact camera for landscape photography, particularly during mountain trips, the Leica was the first practical 35 mm camera that used standard cinema 35 mm film. The Leica transports the film horizontally, extending the frame size to 24×36 mm, with a 2:3 aspect ratio, instead of the 18×24 mm that cinema cameras use, as they transport the film vertically.

The Leica went through several iterations, and in 1923 Barnack convinced his boss, Ernst Leitz II, to make a pre-production series of 31 [other sources say 23 or 25 -JDZ] cameras for the factory and outside photographers to test. Though the prototypes received a mixed reception, Ernst Leitz decided in 1924 to produce the camera. It was an immediate success when introduced at the 1925 Leipzig Spring Fair as the Leica I (for Leitz camera). The focal plane shutter had a range from 1/20 to 1/500 second, in addition to a Z for Zeit (time) position.

Last month, at Westlicht Galleries in Vienna, one of the ten or eleven surviving Leica 0-series, a still-functional camera numbered 116, sold at auction on May 12th to an anonymous bidder for €2.16 million euros, or roughly $2.8 million dollars, setting a new record for camera prices.

HuffPo story.

The photo of these 19th century shooters is from Lindsay McCrum’s Chicks with Guns.

Evidently the ladies, too, competed in Schuetzen precision shooting matches with specially-made target rifles in which the shooter fired from a standing position, typically outdoors at 200 yard targets. The photo is small, but those rifles look like Ballards to me. They would have been chambered in .32-40, the preferred American target competition cartridge.

Buzz Feed says that this photograph is the result of such an event at the Kuwait Scientific Center, but I find no corrobative reporting.

Still, it is neat image.

Hat tip to James Coulter Harberson.

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Update:

Yes, it’s a fake.

The stories he could tell. (click on picture for larger image)

From Oleg Sandro-Panfilov via Viktorija Ruškulienė (at Facebook).

St. Clement Cave Monastery, Inkerman, Crimea, Ukraine (click on picture for larger image)

I usually consider myself terribly well-informed, but every now and then along comes some glimpse of new oceans, new continents, entire new worlds of history and detailed information.

A Facebook acquaintance from the Czech Republic posted this picture of the Cave Monastery of St. Clement at Inkerman in the Crimea, which allegedly held the relics of the martyred 4th Pope until they were transferred elsewhere by Sts. Cyril & Methodius.

What a location for the next Indiana Jones movie!

Romanian Orthodox sites website.

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I think this photograph of Queen Elizabeth firing a fully-automatic assault weapon from a shooting rest is real, but I don’t think it is quite recent.

From ISI via John Brewer(Facebook).

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I found several thumbnails of this image on British, Swedish, and Chinese web-sites, but could not get to the original postings. I have no idea how Fred Lapides comes up with certain images.

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UPDATE, 5/29:

Commenter Sydney Duodenenum refers us to this Russian video:

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This came my way on Facebook without attribution or explanation. I tried researching it with small success. The photo clearly comes from Russia, and that front goose looking sideways is a Photoshop addition.

Yahoo explains the whole thing’s origin:

[T]he man in the photo is New York’s Zeddie Little, 25, who was taking part in the Cooper River Bridge 10k run, which was held on March 31, in Charleston, South Carolina.

Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) systems analyst Will King, who was just taking a seemingly random photograph of runners in the middle of the race, snapped the photo and uploaded it to his Flickr account.

“One of my friends commented on the picture and said something along the lines of ‘I dub this guy Mr. Ridiculously Photogenic,'” King said. “I thought it was a pretty cool comment, so I posted it on Reddit. For some reason it just took off from there.”

And QuickMeme has captioned responses.

(photo: Peter G. Allinson) click on photo for larger image

Fred Lapides posted this intriguing photo today without identification or comment, the wretch.

I searched and found that the photo dates back to 2010 and comers from an article about Andrew Armour, a dive operator on the island of Domenica, who developed a personal rapport with a young male sperm whale. Grind TV