Once at the beach from my hotel balcony I saw a large number of people gathered at the water’s edge a few hundred feet down the shore from the hotel. After a while they dispersed but a few hours later gathered again at the same spot. At the time I had a 5 megapixel prosumer camera with 5x optical zoom (which was pretty high-end for the time) so I took lots of photos of the group to try to figure out what was going on. This was before the days of internet-capable smartphones, so I had to wait until I got home to google up the fact that there had been two separate drownings at the beach that day thanks to a rip current, and when I examined the photos on my PC found in a couple of shots two people carrying a body out of the water by the hands and legs.
Another time at the beach I saw a smaller group gathered around a lifeguard, this time away from the shore. Like before. I took a few photos to examine later, and found a teenage girl with lines of large welts runninf from her thigh to knee–she had obviously been hit pretty bad by a jellyfish. A third time–less serious-- I was on the bank of the Nantahala river watching whitewater rafters. One shot I took was just at the moment that the raft hit a bump, and I got a perfect freeze-frame of an old guy that resembled Wilfred Brimley partially in the air, with the bottom of his bare foot pointing outwards towards the camera, while a young boy (possibly grandson) was caught in mid-cringe.
So anyone else got any notable unplanned captures?
I was taking pix of dogs at the shelter. I would sit them on a bench and using a squeaky toy try to get them to look at me with the cute cocked head. I was having success, overall. One bad tempered shepherd mix was not having it. I got him down and put another dog up on the bench. I was squeaking away. As I snapped a picture the shepherd mix jumped for the toy in my raised hand. I have the perfect shot of him flying through the air and the toy is a few inches from his opened mouth. A print of it is prominently displayed on the bulletin board at the shelter.
This is my favorite accidental photo. I was taking a series of photos of these jellyfish at the New England Aquarium when all of a sudden a little boy ran into one of my final shots and stopped to watch them in rapture. I’d already pressed the button, and that’s the result.
I was taking a photo of a flying bird on a river in Oregon, in the background was an old plywood mill that I didn’t even notice at the time. It was loosely covered with pieces of corrugated metal painted different colors and mixed with rust and some few odd pieces out in front of it. Turned out to be my favorite photo of all time and I lost it when my computer crashed.
Many years ago, before I went digital, I was photographing a scene in Paris on Bastille Day evening… Eiffel Tower, the Seine, the magnificent Alexander III bridge… all lit up with the most amazing light show reflected in the river. My camera was on a tripod, and each shot was perfectly framed. Until someone bumped the tripod just as I was releasing the shutter. I mentally cursed the person, since they had ruined my shot. Until I got the film developed, and I saw the shot that contained psychedelic abstract swirls and sparkles of many colors. A true work of art, and one of my all-time favorite photos!
That reminds me, a couple years ago I was taking a (digital) photo of a stream, but I tilted the camera as it was taking the picture, and the result was a perfect swirl centered in the middle of the picture, and you could still tell it was a creek.
I took a picture at Butchart Gardens on Vancouver Island years ago. There was a log hut that the woman who designed the gardens used to look out over the gardens. I wanted to take a picture and was hurried by other people wanting to get in the hut. I didn’t notice that my focus was on a log beam framing the window instead of the view outside the window.
The developed photo showed the beam in sharply detailed focus, but the garden was just this blur of bright colors. It was cool.
Another of mine–I was sitting on my covered porch photographing hummingbirds visiting the feeder hanging from the ceiling. I always hoped to get more than one bird in the frame at the same time, but they were very aggressively territorial, attacking each other as soon as any two were near the feeder. But I did (very accidentally) capture this moment. (The photo won the contest, BTW.)
Many years ago while on vacation in Holland I took a picture of my father in front of a canalside eel stand. He is smiling, unaware (as was I) of the menacing-looking young man striding towards him from the left with fists clenched.
Nothing happened (he passed behind my Dad without giving him a second look), but it makes for an eerie photo.
This isn’t an odd thing but an odd flaw. I baited a tree with peanut butter (and later leftover rice with sausage grease) hoping to attract interesting arthropods to photograph at night. (It was mostly disappointing–ants, crickets, pill bugs.) Recently I was trying to photograph some ants. This photo was blurred, but an interesting thing happened with a carpenter ant that was running away from me. That long black line running up the right side of the photo? That’s the carpenter ant.
Pro cycling race, 14.4 mile circuit. I had worked at this race for many years & was tired of the same old photographs. Went out to a more remote part of the course & started shooting when they came over the hill. There are no timeouts in cycling & each rider must ride the whole course which is even tougher to do if you’re riding solo as you conserve energy if you’re drafting off of the rider(s) in front of you. Especially earlier in a race when the pace is slower, there’s an unwritten rule to allow for a ‘nature break’; but when the action picks up, nope, you’re on your own.
After the race when I was looking at the pics (may have been long enough ago that it was still film) I discovered that I got a very good, crisp, clear blurred background motion shot of the peloton & the one rider right in the middle of the frame had decided to whip it out & pee (yes, while still riding). Caught him holding it in his hand. So much for a great shot that I could show to anyone.
I was at a figure skating exhibition and I took a photo of one of the skaters in mid-spin. Just as I took the picture, my arm slipped off the arm rest, and the resulting photo had a very artistic blurry look to it. I couldn’t have done that if I’d tried.
On an old camera I had, the power button was stupidly close to the shutter button, resulting in my taking an inordinate number of photos of my feet when I thought I was turning the camera off.
On vacation in Costa Rica several years ago the group I was with was playing a game attempting to lasso a stuffed bull’s head hanging on the wall. I was sitting off to the side of the bull’s head photographing people throwing the lasso. One person’s aim was way off and he lassoed me instead. Purely by accident I ended up with a very cool photo of the lasso in midair flying towards me in perfect focus.
