Do you remember what it was like? When you didn’t have the perfect camera on your phone to capture all life’s memories. Many times getting a photograph took planning and patience. Sometimes you’d run out of film and if you weren’t prepared, you might not get the shot you really wanted. And if you didn’t advance the film, you might get stuck with a double exposure. Not to mention developing and printing the photos. It took a lot of time to get them back and for you to see how they developed. Sometimes the results were like this photo of Jean, a little out of focus.

In the 1930s, owning a camera was a significant step toward documenting life. There were various camera types that catered to a photographers needs. The selection was endless from the easy to use Kodak Brownie, to 35mm cameras like the Leica and professional cameras that enabled photos to have a depth that was missing from the earlier camera models. However, image quality was limited by lens technology and film speeds, especially in low-light conditions.

Here we have a photo taken from Cousin Jean Bourscheidt’s scrapbook of our Jean and a friend. While the photo itself is fuzzy it’s not so out of focus that we can’t tell it’s Jean. I just love how she’s sitting with her legs tucked under her. You can just see where her socks are. The collar of her dress is so cute, it looks like there might be something embroidered on it, but unfortunately we can’t tell. She looks so cute holding a little paper parasol. There’s nothing on the photograph stating who the other person is with Jean. But they look like they’ve been having a good time.

This photo reminds me that even though things may sometimes get a little out of focus that’s when we need to slow down to ensure that all our photos are in focus and our prints are sharp and clear.