Bored? Talentless? Got digital camera?

[Stephen H]

So...you have a digital camera, have time on your hands, don't know what to do with your camera, but still want to take pictures. There is a website, www.findagrave.com, that has cemetery listings. One of the things you can do is add photos of cemeteries and/or tombstones to the database. So look up your favorite cemetery, make sure no one's photographed it all already, then go start shooting. Generally, something screensize is all that's needed, 640x480 or whatever.

The way the site works is that burial records are put in there only when someone adds them. So you may have a cemetery with 10,000 graves and the site will show "3 burials" for that cemetery, meaning no one's put in the other 9,997...yet. If a burial is already in the database, you can add a photo to it; if not, you add the burial first, then the photo.

I've hunted up three or four little cemeteries in my area that I didn't know existed. One of them had a headstone from 1854 or so, probably one of the older ones in the county.

There are other assorted websites with cemetery and other genealogical information as well, but I like the way this one is organized.

[boxofrocks]

For a minute there, when I read your headline, I thought you were calling me out.

[STP Images]

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[janetg]

funny you should mention this - SEVERAL years ago - i had this idea and told my husband, we needed to work this...but never did.

[scott1120]

I think this idea is cool. Can I just go into the public ones with a camera and take shots? Looks like my local one has no photos listed.

[johnastovall]

As part of a book project, I've done several hundred photos of burial makers and plots over the last 4 years and it does take some talent to do it right.

This type of historical documentations is very needed and I highly encourage anyone wanting to help out get involved. Contact a local Historical or Genealogical society and they will welcome the help and point you to those which need immediate recording.

You'll find shooting in old cemeteries not only rewarding in a part of preserving history but there are some beautiful things in the most unlikely places.

You might want to look a Bill Harvey's Texas Cemeteries which has a section on how to do good marker photographs or check out Terry Jordan's Texas Graveyards for a insight into just what some of the things you'll see on markers and graves represent.

[Stephen H]

"Can I just go into the public ones with a camera and take shots? Looks like my local one has no photos listed."

Generally, yes, you can just go out and start shooting. And, most cemeteries are public to a greater or lesser extent.

Before you do, try a google search and try to confirm if someone has done this, and/or if someone has a list of all the names already. For example, a lady has photographed every headstone in the Oklahoma cemetery where my mother is buried- but they're not posted on findagrave, it's a separate site. So I'm not going to go start shooting every headstone in that cemetery again if it's already on the web.

If you're looking at publishing these shots or something, then you need to be concerned about quality. Otherwise, what people are usually looking for is a decent snapshot with a legible inscription (which also helps you). 90% of the time, light will be from the wrong direction, etc.

You might want to try posting a few of them first, and explore how that site works before you go shoot 1,000 of them. There are different ways to work the details, and I don't know all the ins and outs yet myself.

[Stephen H]

Oh, one other feature of that site is that you can submit photo requests for far-off cemeteries- and can go do photos in local spots for far-off people.