Time Lapses: Noah, Updated

Image Source: Noah Kalina via Fairspot.

Some of you will remember this post, about people who photograph themselves every day over several years and turn their efforts into Youtube videos chronicling facial and environmental changes. The pioneer in this respect was Gen Y photographer, Noah Kalina, who made the viral video, Everyday, cataloguing his life, starting in 2000 when he was 19 years old: see it here. You can see some of his other photographs here and here. Kalina is one of the first Internet celebrities: "VH1 named Noah #14 on their list of the Top 40 Internet Superstars of all time." As a result, he was asked to pose with some MSM celebrities, below. The photoshoot revealed something stubbornly unsettling and placid about the everyman who achieves Web microfame against the glitzy super-media figures who dominate our ads and movies. Kalina is engaging but he's disengaged. He's not paid to court the viewer, to sell something, to make you believe something. His mere existence is the media statement. That is a hard message for some to absorb.

Image Source: Noah Kalina via Fairspot.

In late 2012, Kalina updated his Everyday video to cover twelve and a half years of his life. As this (still ongoing) video piece gets longer, it is takes on an eerie quality (also evident in the music Kalina chose for the longer video). This new feel is at odds with the initial 6-year time lapse video which reflected an optimism about computers' impact on our lives. The longer video has inspired plenty of Youtube comments, because right around the half way point, Noah's face begins to change dramatically in his mid-late twenties.

Some people, true to Netizens' disbelief in reality, believe that Kalina manufactured the video with Photoshop. Others find Kalina's tech-captured ageing process to be frightening and depressing, since it so obviously contradicts the seamless, glossy, Photoshopped, marketing-driven imagery of models, celebrities and politicians which they are used to seeing. This shows how divorced we are becoming from accepting ageing as essential to, and acceptable in, life. Kalina shows that technology is a two-edged sword. Tech Reality versus Tech Perfection!

That said, Kalina's surroundings do appear to get darker and darker, as does his aspect. There was a lot of interest from Youtubers in the girl who peeks over his shoulder, somewhere between 6:00 and 6:09, although you can't find her in the screen-by-screen stop motion. The dark atmosphere, obscure lighting and dramatically altering contexts make it look like Kalina's life took a Lynchian turn over the past six years. Someone has even sped up the video, condensing it from seven minutes to one, which intensifies the effect.

Comments from Youtube:

• The original viral video. I remember it was on the news because it got 1 million hits in less than 24 hours...
• it is one of the gold of youtube videos.
• he started taking photos before I was born, and here I am now, watching his project develop. This is crazy man. crazy.
• How old is this guy?
• He's 32. Born July 4, 1980.
• l['ll] go with your answer. Some guy told me he was 56, but he doesn't look THAT old. :/
• At a certain point you start to realize you're just watching a man die...
• Or watching a man live?
• genius noah. to me it says, life goes by fast, so do something with it. freaking, love this.
• this vid just shows how fast time flys
• This gets pretty frightening and powerful in the second half. I think I need to take some time think about how I'm spending my life...
• yes it's impressive and scary watching this, realizing how quickly our time flies. BUT we can't change that, so don't count the days, make the days count! :P
• Dude 12.5 years i feel like i have known you for so long were like best friends now
• 12.5 years in 8 minutes :) Nice
• 4,563 Bad Hair days
• It takes a long time to become Zach Galifiankis
• Weird how everything moves but his face is always in same position
• he loves that yellow jumper
• 12.5 years- 1 facial expression
• this is AWESOME! but can he smile?
• Someday, Noah. Someday you'll smile.
• if i were him i would have 1 smile out of all those photos just so we can try to find it
• 3:38 onwards, the things in the background looks friggin' awesome!
• I don't know if anyone noticed but starting at around 3:40 Noah start gathering the bitches yo!
• interesting to watch the furniture behind as well when you get a few minutes in....
• No[a]h, what happend in your life after 5th minute of video? I think from 5:16 you changed a lot, your eyes changed really a lot, was something happen[e]d at that time?
• 5:20 he stopped shaving,must've had a serious break up
• You could tell when the economy started to fall, LOL...
• A lot of things have changad over this 13 years but this guy is one of the best representations.
• The music makes this video incredibly morbid and horrifying. Well done
• the music is going to give me nightmares.
• I never realized how creepy this was until I saw it without the Carly Comando piano in the background.
• The music got scary when he got freckles
• He got freckles... then they left!
• ha yea, I noticed that, he must have taken up jogging outside as a hobby or something then got lazy and quit, lol.
• THE LONGER YOU LOOK THE MORE AL PACINO IT GETS
• go through the numbers 1 to 9, he gets sadder and sadder
• Pause it and press 1 and 9 a few times to get the scope of this thing
• holy fuck the beard bit makes you trip
• It looks like you became an outdoors type of guy for some time. Flannel shirts and a full beard finally. If you continue this, please smile once in a while.
• i like watching his beard grow then boop then its back 4 pics later
• not gonna lie your hair was hilarious moving like it was in the wind constantly haha.. i love how you kept growing your beard then cutting the hair off a few days later like NOPE NOT GOOD ENOUGH - then you grow a gross homeless beard. Come on dude. The photos are the proof.
• Slightly addicted to watching his beard grow and disappear
• I like the 20-30 false starts on the beard before the final commitment. I wonder what was going on there. Was he thinking about the video, or were the external forces at play.
• Lol at the end I just started waiting to see how long his beard would get before he finally shaved it off
• I like how when you started, you'd shave like once a week, just to get that tiny stub of hair under your lip, then you grew it out and shaved it as soon as it was full for like a year and a half, until finally "Fuck it I'll keep it." When you first grew it out it looks like you neglected to trim it. Stop trimming for 1 year.
• 6:09 - Creepy face behind him?
• There's a girl at 6.09 !!
• Neat video... I've always wondered what it would be like to watch someone turn into a serial killer... I'm just kidding... But the music did get pretty intense....
• The original was inspirational. This is serial killer documenting his days.
• oh no, im sad, hes getting old :'(
• He aged quite a bit!
• OMG doesnt he get old??!!
• this is pretty sad and scary
• this was kinda depressing... o_o
• saddest video on youtoo
• :( this is sad
• For some reason after watching this i feel upset ;'( ...
• he reminded me how life suck
• Really creepy.
• What's incredible when you think about it is that the human body cells are completely replaced in about the space of 10 years... Meaning the Noah we saw at the start of the video no longer was the same Noah we saw at the end...
• Noah, thanks for this vid & sharing your soulful eyes. This vid is a reminder of how our soul never changes. -- You know how it feels when you look in the mirror and you still feel like you're still at a younger age? THIS feeling is real - its the unaging, timeless soul within us all. :)
• Anyone else feel like he's starting into your soul
• This man now owns over 4 million souls...
• Dude...you've changed (shake of the head)
• wow you look totally different, how old were you when you started? And how many places did you live? just curious.
• i feel like i just stepped out of the twilight zone
• he has nice eyes though.
• HIS BIG GOOGLY EYES IT BURNS
• Those eyes...I just...it's like as I'm watching this...and he's staring into my soul, saying, "Who am I? Help me...help me...help me...who am I?" and he just won't stop. I feel like I'm almost going insane. Like, I seriously need to take a break right now, I'm legitimately freaked out. And the music didn't help either.
• that is really scary had a staring contest for 12.5 years and he won! XP
• Hey man, I remember watching when you put this up back in 2006. Good job on keeping it going :)
• Love it.thats devotion
• I tried to start something like this but just didn't find I had the dedication. Really appreciate that someone has that ability. It's fascinating watching the changes. Well done.
• congratulations Noah,it takes a lot of patience and will to produce something as awesome as this video,keep up the good work
• Nobody should criticize this because this kind of video requires many years of patience to do and the result is, I must say, very hypnotic. What we see is the "cycle of life". What if this man has courage to go on this video till the end of his life ?
• wow.. what a great video... its... better than a the most movies. i'm speechless. Well done.
• Prob[ab]ly the coolest video on the Internet
• this tells a better story than most modern books or movies
• nice photoshop, 100% unreal. look at this eyes and mouth
• I like how Noah has only two videos on his channel yet youtube prompts you to subscribe... new content every 6 - 6.5 years? Yeah I'll just check back in 2018.
• See you on 2018 ?
• se[e] you in 2020? ;P happy years Noah see your new video in 2019 or 2020.
• El inexorable paso del tiempo que marchita nuestra existencia...

See the video below the jump.

Video Source: Youtube.

Youtuber collapsed version of above video, sped up to condense to 1 minute viewing time. Video Source: Youtube.

See my other posts on Time Lapses: here, here, here, here, here and here.