Two young men are eating some some of sandwich in front of a restaurant called Casa Bella. Above its door is a sign reading Pizza Kebab. The door to an adjacent bar is open but only a slate floor is visible.

Oslo. The hotel had rare windows that opened wide. (Leica M Monochrom, 50mm f1.2 Noctilux M ASPH)

I decided at the beginning that these are environmental portraits of the phones and they shouldn’t have people in them. That sometimes means a lot of waiting for a “clean” shot. But I gave only had to wait four or five times because someone was making a call.

Don’t forget the sad specimen down the street at the gas station.

I'm now on my way to 750 images of them. Documenting them is a disease, I fear. But since I started about five years ago, a very large number of the ones I shot are no more.

A British "call box" without a door and painted black but with a phone. Where it would traditionally say TELEPHONE, the sign reads: WiFi here and has a WiFi logo. In the background are ride share bikes a bus stop and a hotel with many fancy SUVs and cars. The words Park Lane are visible on the hotel.

OK, back to phones. This one across from Hyde Park in London was painted black perhaps to indicate its claim that it offers WiFi. That may be true. I didn't test it. (Leica M Monochrom, 28mm f2.8 Elmarit M)

It is a wonderful thing

Did you ever see Kilo?

There is/was also a Moonbeam Motel with space aliens featured in its sign.

A white flying saucer structure with tree legs in drifting snow at sunset. Behind are the Canadian, Franco Ontarien flags and a flag representing something I don't recognize.

The flying saucer in Moonbeam, Ontario, population 1,200, as seen 20 years ago. Remote is a bit of a understatement for the town's location. The spacecraft was put up to lure people off of the Trans-Canada Hwy in 1991. Kilo, the town mascot, is a green alien (Nikon D70, 20mm f2.8 Nikkor AF-D)

A very large and not very realistic 2D plywood chickend on a well mowed lawn with a line of trees. A many in shorts and a white t-shirt is just beyond the chicken but its head is blocking his head. To the right is a highway and hills.

The giant chicken promoting a Labor Day fundraising dinner outside of the church in Wilno, Ontario "Canada's first Polish settlement." This was 2016. The church has since redone its plywood chicken display along similar lines. (Fuji GW690III, 90mm f3.5 Fujinon, Fuji 160 NS)

Thank you. A brilliant setting and very interesting phone booths.

I no encourage it

Payphone action!

A traditional London call box with some graffiti. The word "Telephone" has largely faded away. A bike share ebike is not to it and in the background is a hotel with the sign: London Hilton on Park Lane

London: where I'm not alone in photographing the pay phones. This one was conveniently positioned at the hotel. I noticed, however, that other visitors spurn the "modern," often vandalized phone booths although I find them very interesting. (Ebony GP69F, Zeiss 80mm f2.8 Planar, Fuji Acros 100)

I encourage everyone to follow my neighbor and friend Alfred Leblanc @alfredjleblanc.bsky.social who has long been chronicling Cape Breton, where he is originally from, and has more recently added the people of the Ottawa Valley

I don't imagine that the National Capital Commission will use a similar photo for its tourism promotions

A woman in silhouette walking under a concrete bridge at sunset. At the bottom of the frame is a canal guardrail with some melting snow behind it.

Bronson Bridge, Ottawa. One of the less scenic highlights of the Rideau Canal, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. (Leica SL Typ 601, 80-200 f4 Vario Elmar R)

A black phone booth next to an expressway. An office building is to its left. The phone and a leafless tree cast long shadows. More leafless trees are in the background.

Tokyo, Chiyoda City. Note the small, sort-of stool in anticipation of protracted conversations. (Eboy GP69F, Zeiss 80mm f2.8 Planar, Fuji Acros 100II)

Ward Wright, Micksburg, Ontario.

Thank you

Even allowing for the unbelievably terrible Ilex shutters on the larger lenses, Ektars and Commerical Ektars are among my large format favorites. Few 4x5 lenses offer the performance of the 127 Ektar for so little money.

A large loading dock seen through out of focus bars. A dog is looking up at the camera down on the dock and is next to a man on an office chair. Two more men, one sitting the other standing, are further down the dock which has a great deal of mechanical equipment.

The loading dock of the hotel complex where I stayed in Mumbai. It was not clear if that's a guard dog or just an employee's companion. (Leica M Monochrom, 50mm f1.2 Noctilux)

That is truly magnificent. I bought what was advertised as an H16 but turned out to be an H8 for something related to my payphone mania. I may just go Super 8 now.

H16 or H8?

Two pay phone kiosks mounted at different heights on a light colored brick wall. To the left is a shiny black wall. To the right is a washroom with a notice that it is our of service attached to the door.

Two more phones from The Forks, a rebuilt and vibrant former rail freight terminal, in Winnipeg, Manitoba. (Mamiya 7ii, 43mm f4.5, Kodak TriX)

A phone booth underneath an outdoor stairway. Part of its door is ventilated and there is a small chimney on its roof. A sign advertises free WiFi. A black metal cage is to its left. A sign on it says No Smoking in English, twice. Tall buildings are in the background.

Tokyo, Minato City. The purpose of the cage next to the phone booth was unclear to me. The No Smoking sign suggests that it perhaps once held butane or propane tanks for cooking. (Ebony GP69F, Zeiss 80mm f2.8 Planar, Fuji Acros 100)

A payphone is inset into a curved wall of polished stone. There is an empty soft drink can sitting next to it. Four similar carve outs for back-lit ads are in the distance. A circular light fixture is on the ceiling along with a black and white sign reading Telephone with a handset logo and an exit pictograph

This hallway in the Sydney Opera House (which is as profound as a cathedral seen in person) is partly open to the outside. So I risked a tripod. Inevitably, it attracted a guard. But he asked if I wanted him to stop people walking into the shot! (Leica M4-P, 50mm f1.2 Noctilux ASPH, Fuji Acro 100)

A stainless steel pay phone kiosk with a large, shiny black panel that reads TELEPHONE and which has a phone pictograph. A panel has replaced one of the phones. The receiver for the remaining phone is resting on a shelf. Immediately behind it is a decorative railing. The Queen Mary 2 is docked at the next quay. Behind it is the lit up span of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Sydney's Harbourfront has a special pay phone kiosk. Although one of the phones is gone and the other was left off the hook.That's the Queen Mary 2. I met a couple who sailed from the UK on it I guess because Australia isn't far enough away by air. (Leica M4-P, 50mmf1.2 NoctiluxASPH, Fuji Acros100)

That's very interesting about their near absence in anime. South Korea, which I went to on another work trip last year, appears to have no pay phones whatsoever.

A dark colored phone booth at night on a deserted street. It has just rained leaving droplets on the glass of the booth and dampening the street. The phone is very well lit and has several signs in English boasting about "Free WiFi". Various other signs mostly in Japanese display various special telephone numbers. The street is lined with small trees.

Tokyo is a global center of pay phones even if it's not obvious that anyone uses them. So it was bit frustrating during a recent work trip there that I very little free time. I was up at 5:00 am to shoot this one near the hotel in Chiyoda City. (Ebony GP69F, Zeiss 80mm f2.8 Planar, Fuji Acros100II)