Photo Lab Workers See Some Crazy Shit

All illustrations by Drew Shannon.

The proliferation of photo-sharing sites and the fact that every phone can now act as a camera and a way to store everything from prom pics to creepy Snapchat screenshots has made it pretty unnecessary to print off physical pictures. At least that’s what I thought before I took a job as a photo-lab technician a couple of years ago. Serving everyone from people desperately hanging on to their 35mm point-and-shoot to teens printing off shitty pixelated Instagram pictures, the small-town photo center I worked at processed more than a thousand 4x6 prints every day on average. While my experience was slightly less thrilling than Robin Williams’s in One Hour Photo, I did see my fair share of unexpectedly bizarre shit. What really stuck with me during the year I spent there is how little people seemed to care about what was on their photos and who saw it. Just to be clear: Photo lab employees see your photos. They probably aren’t purposely checking out each one, but at my place of employment we had to flip through all orders for a quality check. Though the majority of the prints I saw were the standard birthday, graduation, and embarrassing vacation pics, there were a few that really stood out.

Private Dancer

I was working alone when two elderly customers came in to use the self-serve printing kiosks. It was extremely rare for any customer at the self-serves to not need assistance navigating the menus, let alone two people who appeared to be well into their 70s. After a few minutes of seeing them struggle through the different printing options without asking for help, I walked over and asked if I could be of service. They immediately became frazzled and rudely informed me that no, they did not want my help. It wasn’t unusual for a customer to be impolite, but it did seem strange that they were so obviously freaked out by my presence. I went back to work but occasionally looked over at them to make sure everything was OK. I noticed that the man seemed to be making quite an effort to stand directly in front of the computer screen, blocking it from my view.

Their photos started printing from the kiosk, falling out into the clear plastic collector, and it struck me as even weirder that he crouched down to grab each picture as it came out, rather than letting the full order print before collecting them. Were his pictures really worth busting a hip over? My initial curiosity was now in full Criminal Minds mode, so I did my best to discreetly look over from behind the counter at what was on their pictures in the seconds before he could snatch them up.

The first image I saw looked like a close-up of a woman’s crotch in underwear with her legs parted in a full stripper pose. I didn’t want to believe that these oldies were here printing anything other than snapshots of their bridge club, but these naughty nana pics would explain their strange behavior. The next photos played out like every grandchild’s nightmare—the pair was posed with a lovely young lady, who I will assume was a call girl, in their home. Right there on the kitchen table was grandma, arms around a woman in a PVC string bikini. As I reeled in shock, I watched as they collected their photos—which I’d like to say didn’t violate the store’s no-nudity policy, but to be honest I wasn’t about to go through them and check. They left without a word.

Cake Boss

It wasn’t unusual for us to print photos for small businesses promoting their work, which meant everything from overly-teased-hair stylists to roofing and paving companies. During one of my shifts, a woman placed an order of about 200 prints, all of them photos of her cake-decorating business. Being the type of person who often ditches Friday-night plans for a Next Great Baker marathon on TLC, I felt it would be cruel to stop myself from looking at the shots as they came out of the printer.

The order started off with the usual novelty wedding and cartoon-themed birthday cakes, but things took a turn when a cake in the shape of two very heavily spray-tanned breasts with upsettingly small nipples fell from the printer. I had my very own That’s So Raven moment and immediately knew what would be next—a penis cake, the ultimate achievement in novelty baking. This bachelorette cake, however, was not what I expected. Having attended a liberal arts college with an active gay-pride alliance that loved to throw half-assed fundraisers, I've seen my fair share of penis-shaped baked goods. I think there’s a point in one’s life where every penis cake is a sad penis cake, but this was the Sia "Breathe Me" MP3 of penis cakes. One could argue that, technically and gravitationally speaking, all penis cakes are flaccid, but you could just tell looking at this one that even if it were possible for a cake to have an erection, this one would need the help of a few pills and some niche porn. As wide as it was long, nothing about this cake said, “Put me in your mouth, you drunk bride.” It was impossible not to wonder if the woman behind this masterpiece had perhaps modeled the cake after a real-life disappointment. Was it crafted in the likeness of her husband's or boyfriend's member, the only penis she’d ever known? Was she completely unaware of the all-too-real disappointment she delivered to her client? This was not the penis cake the bachelorette party wanted but probably the penis cake the bachelorette party deserved.

Reeling from the disappointing dick, I stayed glued to the printer like an addict, knowing full well it would only get uglier from here. The next novelty confection was one I could have never prepared myself for. Judging by the writing on the cake, I can only assume it was for a doctor’s retirement party. The cake itself was shaped like human buttocks, with a hospital gown falling just above the crack in that flirty sort of way that says, "I’m incredibly ill." Though an ass cake would startle anyone, it was the insane amount of detail that branded the image into my mind forever. Just underneath the red icing, which so eloquently stated, “Now you’re retired, stick it up their…,” the cake included a butthole. A very brown butthole. Whether this was at the client’s request or something the artist added in, I will never know. But I sleep better knowing several old white people ate ass at a retirement party that day.

Fair Game

Living in a small town where getting to the nearest airport requires a four-hour bus ride, you can imagine there wasn’t a lot for people to do in their spare time. Hunting was, therefore, not only an acceptable hobby but more common than having all your front teeth. At least 75 percent of the photos we printed during hunting season were covered in camouflage and deer carcasses. It was a full family affair, and the number of photos we processed of smiling families gathered around a deer strung upside down in a shed like they were just chilling around a Christmas tree was, frankly, pretty fucked.

Looking to put a positive spin on things, I set out to find the best hunting picture of the season. The shot I chose as my favorite showed a man standing next to his pickup truck with a massive deer thrown in the back. The man’s son, probably about six years old, was standing next to the truck, posed and pointing at the deer in what can only be described as a tribute to the Lynndie England Iraqi-prisoner-abuse photos of 2004. It was horrific, disturbing, and perfect, and it embodied everything I both hated and loved about the job, the town, and possibly the universe as a whole.

You Only Punta Cana Once

During the winter months it seemed like almost every order was filled with vacation photos from families, high school grads, seniors—basically everyone in town was going on an all-inclusive cruise except me. At least 90 percent of the photos were from Punta Cana, which I knew based on the “Punta Cana [insert vacation year here]” written-in-sand pic that everyone takes (google it). It wasn’t uncommon for the resort photos to overlap, with at times other families from the town actually appearing in the background of people’s pics. The average order was pretty boring, half of it being blurry underwater shots of strangers’ feet, the rest being hotel towel swans and families decked out in American Eagle shirts and plaid shorts (the number-one choice for North American dads).

One order, however, offered a lot more than shitty Hawaiian-shirt selfies. Both in their 50s, the couple had visited a resort I didn’t recognize from any past orders. This particular one came through while we were having coloring issues with our system, so I had to watch every picture as it left the printer. It started off innocently, but I soon noticed that the couple, who were openly all up on each other in their pics, were also all up on another couple as the order went on. They were, quite clearly, swingers who were at a swingers' resort. The wives—whose tanned skin resembled that of old baseball mitts—had no problem making out with each other’s husbands and each other.

Though surprising, I wasn’t completely put off my game and honestly welcomed the change in the routine. The poolside portion of the order, however, revealed itself to be a real treasure of secondhand embarrassment and sadness. As the camera fell into the husband’s hands, the photos included multiple attempts at underwater dick pics and hairy-ass selfies. Had this man never seen the George shrinkage episode of Seinfeld? Was he unaware that another human (me) would be subjected to the blurry water snake? I tossed the pics that violated the lab’s nudity policy (as sad and unerotic as they were). If I could wink without feeling a surge of shame, I might’ve thrown one to the wife as she came to pay for the pics, in an “I’d be swinging in Punta Cana too, girl,” kind of way. Instead, I went about business as usual, ignoring the urge to stand with my face in the chemical eye-wash station for the remainder of my shift.

Miss New Booty

A very polite, seemingly demure couple in their 30s came in asking about our photo books—which are basically just pre-made photo albums so you don’t have to fuck around with those plastic inserts. They asked if I’d be working later that day, saying they’d prefer me instead of a male employee when they returned with the pictures. It wasn’t uncommon for people to ask that a specific employee work on their pictures if they had to be edited or restored, but it was strange that they didn’t want a guy seeing the content of the book. I assured them I’d still be there and waited to see what this gender-specific photo-book mystery was all about.

It did not disappoint. In a variety of effects and filters (black-and-white, high/low contrast, and the definition of class, sepia) were photographs of the woman’s buttocks. Close-ups, high angle, low angle, shadow play, you name it. Her ass was the star of this photo book, and it was finding its light in ways Tyra herself would approve of. One shot in particular—a black-and-white extreme close-up of one cheek from the side, backlit for an artistic touch—could easily find itself in a motivational poster alongside sand dunes and baby dolphins, and nobody would think twice. To be completely honest, it was probably some of the best amateur photography I’d seen pass through the lab, though I resisted complimenting the man on it for fear that he’d take it the wrong way and ask me to sit in on the next session and hold up a reflector.

Follow Marie C. Hudson on Twitter.