Vintage Photos of New York Superimposed Onto Present Day

Faline · #1 ● 09-26-2013, 01:59 PM

Marc Hermann (@MHermannPhoto) is a professional news photographer born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. He is an official historian and interim trustee of the New York Press Photographers Association. As of November 2012, Hermann has been a staff photographer with the Corporate Communications department of MTA New York City Transit.
In a fascinating ‘Now & Then’ series, Hermann superimposes photographs from the Daily News Photo Archive onto present day photos, taking time to match the angle and framing of the original. The resulting 15-picture series provides a fascinating way to experience a city’s history, especially one as rich and well-documented as New York’s.
As Hermann explains:
In a city as large as New York, the history seems layered, but invisible. So much has happened in so many places that it’s difficult to imagine that the given street corner we pass daily was the scene of someone’s life-changing event once upon a time. This project was originally inspired by the early visual sleuthing of William Frassanito who sought out locations of photographs taken on the Gettysburg battlefield. Since then, the work of people like Sergey Larenkov and Joeri Teeuwisse, who blend historic pictures of war-torn Europe with modern-day views of the same locations, has brought the concept of “then-and-now” into the digital age.

Having covered breaking news since 1997, I shot various locations throughout the city where both the momentous and routine had occurred. Using the Daily News’ massive photo archive, I combined the modern scenes with the vintage images that had been made at those sites.

Most importantly, to me, is that the work of my predecessors is getting another look. It is my way of reminding people, too, to realize that they are part of the same continuum of time, and by seeing these sites in a familiar, modern way, that the “then” of history is also a “now.”
http://www.marchermann.com/dnthenandnow/