Issue No. 8 - Analog Intelligence. Welcome to Issue No. 8 of The Small Hours. March was full in every sense, with work and life moving at a pretty relentless pace. One of the highlights was going to my first Golden Gloves event to watch local hero Sleepy Joe Guerrero fight his way to a second-place finish. Work also took me up to San Francisco for RSAC, the world’s biggest cybersecurity conference, where 1Password had a major presence.

Being in San Francisco, and especially at RSAC, it felt impossible to escape A.I. It was everywhere: in the copy, the images, the airport helper robots, and of course the endless promises from every cybersecurity company suddenly claiming to be experts in it. There’s something both exciting and a little unsettling about being surrounded by so much faith in the future of technology.

Maybe that’s why carrying around a 35-year-old point-and-shoot film camera felt especially grounding. After eight months of bringing it with me almost every day, I can honestly say it’s given me my love of photography back. People seem more open to being photographed on film too. Maybe it’s because there’s less pressure in the moment. Less need to instantly see, judge, or perfect.

That slower pace has been good for me. There’s something meaningful in waiting to see what develops. Even when a photo isn’t technically great, it can still hold a feeling, and that’s something I find is often missing from the thousands of images that pass through my phone.

Thanks for spending a little time here. I hope you enjoy the collection.