Voices
A photograph tells you what it looked like. A voice tells you what it was like.
Under any photograph, anyone in the family can leave a memory — written, or recorded in their own voice, right there, with nothing to install. Thirty seconds of your mother describing her own wedding day, kept beside the picture, for the grandchildren she may never meet. Nothing else does this.
How it works
Press record. Talk. Press stop.
A recorder under every photograph, in the browser, on any phone. A live level meter so you can see it’s hearing you; play it back before you send. Each recording sits with the picture it’s about, signed with the speaker’s name and the date, so a child can find it in thirty years and know who was talking.
Leave a memory
Where was this? Who took it? What happened just after?
Signed Helen · 12 March 2026. Play it back before you send.
Already here
Jim · 2018 · “Your mother chose that boat. I chose the weather.”
What to ask
Don't ask them to tell their life story. Ask about this picture.
Where was this? Who took it? What happened just after? People who would never write a paragraph will talk for a minute about a photograph in their hand. Sit with them. Open ten pictures. You will get ten recordings, and some of them will be the most valuable thing the archive ever holds.
At an occasion
Guests can leave one too.
At a wedding, the guest link lets anyone who was there leave a written or spoken memory under any photograph — the speech they remember, the thing that happened at table nine. In memory of someone, it is the whole point: a page where everyone who knew them says so, in their own voice.
The first dance. Somebody’s phone, somebody’s shoulder.
Added by Priya · Helen’s 80th
Helen in her own voice
12 March 2026
0:41Tom
14 March 2026
She made me practise for a fortnight and still trod on my foot at the end. Best night of my life.
Common questions
- How are voice memories recorded?
- They are recorded straight in a web browser, under any photograph, with nothing to install. The recording is kept alongside the picture for good.
- What should we ask people to record?
- Ask about a specific photograph rather than someone's whole life story. Questions like where it was taken, who took it, and what happened next get people talking for a minute.
- Can guests leave a voice memory at an occasion?
- Yes. The guest link lets anyone who was there leave a written or spoken memory under any photograph.
Record the oldest people first. There is no later.