Picture this: mobile camera phones and family photography

That the compositing of camera and mobile phone has proven to be highly popular should come as no surprise to anyone interested in both the history of mobility and the history of photography. [1] As media archaeologist Errki Huhtamo recently asserted, the first mobile medium proper was amateur photography (Huhtamo, website, 2004). An examination of the correspondences between the reception and promotion of early amateur photography and the current fascination with (and revulsion of) mobile camera phone practices is instructive in terms of trying to understand our contemporary moment. In particular, the long association between amateur or snapshot photography and the family appears to be rapidly extending itself to the mobile camera phone. Camera phone marketing is awash with images of children, pets, family events and ritualised personal experiences. This raises a couple of interesting questions that this paper will seek to address. Firstly, what impact will camera phone imaging have, if any, on the existing practices of capturing, collecting and the distribution of family photographs? And secondly, how does the promotion of the family as a legitimate subject for mobile camera photography play out against the increasingly hysterical response to the use of mobile camera phones in public spaces?