Sunday, May 18, 2008

Selection, Selection, Selection,....

Michael Reichmann, author of the wonderful blog Luminous Landscape, recently posted an interesting essay on the convergence of still and video photography. Citing such new cameras as Casio's EX-F1 and the Red Scarlet (which can shoot 60 frames per sec and 100 fps, respectively, without mechanical shutters, and at speeds approaching 1/40,000 sec), Reichmann suggests that new technologies are harbingers of a future in which the distinction between still cameras and video cameras is blurred, if not made moot entirely.
His assertion is both well argued and nuanced, and I encourage interested readers in clicking on the provided link to enjoy the article for themselves. For my purposes here, I'd like to focus on the aesthetic issues that such a convergence of technologies portends; and will argue that the distinction between "still" and "video" is - artistically speaking - somewhat of a red-herring.
While still photography and videography obviously represent two objectively distinct modes of expression, the distinction has heretofore been largely a technological - not artistic - one (I hope to explain what I mean by this in what follows). Because the two technologies have up until now been sufficiently "different," they required an artist (note I do not say photographer or videographer, but artist, because I think the category must now be made larger) to invest (sometimes huge amounts of) time and dollars in two sets of "still" and "video" equipment. What the technological convergence is leading to - indeed, what it already has led to, judging from cameras such as the EX-F1 - is a time when all serious artists can now use one and the same recording instrument to express their artistic sensibilities. The real issue is "artistic expression"; or what the artist wishes to convey with his/her art, be it still photography or videography. And what lies at the heart of any form of expression is selection; indeed, an almost endless (and endlessly nested) sequence of selection upon selection upon selection. The fact that the act of "taking pictures" has now become essentially synonymous with "taking videos" only serves to emphasize the fundamental role that "selection" plays in the creative process. And that part, at least, has not changed; if anything, it is becoming more difficult to do.
Consider the basic steps that any traditional photographer follows when approaching a subject and, ultimately - after recording and processing the images in either an analog or digital darkroom - using some medium (print, folio, gallery exhibit, or book) to express and communicate a "vision." Each step entails a myriad of decisions - or selections - that a photographer needs to make to complete the work. The not-quite-infinitely-long chain of selections begins with a basic question: "What does the photographer wish to express?" Is it a feeling? A thing? A sense of place? A sense of family? A still-life? The list is almost endless, but a selection must at some point be made. Once made, the photographer must decide on where to go to "find" (or "search" for) pictures.
Having arrived somewhere, the real work begins. In no particular order, and from a first-person perspective (speaking from my own inner experiences): What grabs my attention? Where do I look? Where do I stand? What light do I need? What do I exclude? What lens do I use? What f-stop/exposure-time combo do I use? Do I need to change the ISO? Do I need a filter? Should I shoot a sequence? Should I take a couple of different perspectives? Do I need to position my tripod any lower or higher? I could go on, but the point is clear. While most of this is automatic, much of the "creative process" consists of making a repeated series of selections.
Of course, the need to "select" continues (intensifies even) after we get back to our darkroom. What images do I keep (and "work on")? What software do I use? What factors need adjustment? White balance? White/black points? Tonal distributions? Shadow noise? Global/local contrast? Dodging or burning? Toning? Sharpening?
Now, suppose you've processed dozens (or hundreds) of images for a shooting project, and are ready to start thinking about what needs to be done to "communicate" a vision to an audience. More selection. Which images do I use? What sequence of images do I combine? What manner of expression do I use? If a book, how many to a page, and in what layout? If a gallery, what is wall placement? One row or two? How large should the prints be? ...the list goes on and on. And so we come full circle to the new cameras, such as the Casio EX-F1, that purportedly blur the distinction between still and video photography. While the fact that the distinction between these two technologies is becoming more and more blurred is arguably and demonstrably true, the deeper question is, "How does the lack of any distinction impact the creative process?" If one accepts the premise that art, in the broadest sense, consists of however many selective steps a given artist needs to go through in order to express (in some form, of the artist's choosing) an original idea or feeling, then the only way in which a convergence of still-video technologies impacts art is in providing the artist a richer set of technologies for recording and expressing images.
The question of whether what results remains "photography" (albeit in a different form), changes to videography (but, again, different from more traditional forms) and is no longer photography, or becomes some as-yet undefined "hybrid recording process" (that is different from either of its two historical antecedents), seems to me to be the wrong (or, at least, not most meaningful) question to ask. A better question is, "In what ways will artists adjust their creative process to find a better way to express their artistic vision?" It may turn out that some photographers find great artistic merit in having not one image (or only a handful of images) with which to express their vision but an entire movie; and/or find clever ways to combine still and "moving" images to expand their repertoire of artistic expression. The way in which they "do art" will therefore change, and the "art" that they eventually wind up doing may bear little or no resemblance to what may have in the past been called "photography." Other photographers, earnestly trying out the new technology for the first time, may find themselves overwhelmed with the now thousands of images from which to choose the "right one" - where before they had to sift through a few or at most a dozen - and either walk away from the new technology or (regrettably) take a step backwards as artists. Annie Lebowitz, in a PBS documentary of her life's work, admitted to having virtually no editorial skill when it came to selecting the one or two images that would make it into print from a shoot; a task she was more than happy to leave to the editors. Being good at one aspect of the creative process - or being good at making some "artistic selections" - does not guarantee the same success for other aspects of the creative process or ensure that the photographer will be equally as adept at making all required selections. In the unfortunate event that some new technology enlarges the "selection space" in precisely the dimension in which a given photographer is least gifted as an artist, it behooves that photographer to proceed slowly.
For many photographers (particularly those still working with "analog" large-format cameras), the convergence between still and video recorders will likely make no difference whatsoever. Their art will remain what it is, and evolve as it has and will continue. Still others will inevitably forge a new and unanticipated path - and an entirely new form of art - for which we do not yet have a handy label or phrase, and the nature of which none of us, at the moment, are prescient enough to predict or imagine.
Art, by its nature - and as life - grows, adapts, and evolves. In time, perhaps the very words "art" and "photography" will be supplanted by something else; and, in some future time, be recalled by historians as archaic "symbols of something that used to be done using some older forms of technology." But whatever the new words will be that convey the essence of what we now call "art," I suspect that the creative process itself will remain fundamentally unchanged. And what lies at the core of that process is selection, selection, selection, ... (as determined by the artist's soul).

Sunday, May 04, 2008

Finding New Things in Old


I am always amused when I hear young photographers lament about there not being anything interesting left over to take pictures of (after they have spent all of a few hours somewhere taking pictures). The lament only deepens and becomes more poignant after a particular place has been visited a number of times (days, weeks); and reaches a fever pitch after visiting the "same old place" for months (or - goodness - years!). To be sure, even experienced professional photographers go through inevitable dry spells, during which they find their wellspring of inspiration at a low ebb, and nothing seems aesthetically inviting or interesting (especially - so the argument goes - a place that the artist knows extremely well).

But there are really two issues at play here: (1) the feeling that one's inner muse has temporarily put up an "out to lunch" sign and does not wish to be disturbed, and (2) that the worst place to find the muse quietly "munching on its lunch" (and in a receptive mood) is somewhere where the photographer has already "been" with his or her muse. An artist’s chagrin during such lows is certainly understandable, and (speaking as a photographer who has had his fair share of "searching" for his "lost" muse) immediate family members are usually the ones who suffer most since they must bear the brunt of the artist's unhappy "low tide" mood (never a pleasant experience for anyone involved! ;-) But it is still sad for me to see young photographers, who genuinely aspire to find and develop their artistic vision, continually lament the apparently dull visual landscape that they've convinced themselves is all their "day jobs" permit them to be surrounded by and in which to find their "vision." I suspect that the real problem is not the place - per se - but what needs to be done to reconnect to the place (the "connection" being what may otherwise, and more poetically, be called one's "muse").

"Spirit always stands still long enough for the photographer It has chosen." - Minor White


“How many times can I go to that same park?” one might ask; or, “I’ve shot a dozen rolls of film in that garden, and I’m bored; all the flowers are beginning to look alike!” While there is no magic elixir to remedy such moments of temporary angst—which all artists, from aspiring to established, are destined to experience countless numbers of times in their careers—I can offer two useful pieces of advice: (1) the angst is temporary, and requires nothing more than simple patience for its effects to wear off, and (2) to accelerate its disappearance, remind yourself that any place in nature, no matter how small or transient or seemingly devoid of any interesting features, can be perceived in an infinite number of ways, in an infinite number of contexts, and yield to an infinity of interpretations.

Case in point...not far from where my family and I live in Northern Virginia is Great Falls state park; indeed, I have written about it several times (Rocks, Leaves & Water and Staccato Flow Abstracts). Because parks and kids go rather well together, and my wife and I have two, we visit this park often all year round.

It is no exaggeration to say that both my wife and I are familiar enough with this park’s many paths and walkways to be able to navigate it in the dark. As such, one may be forgiven for believing that my intimate familiarity with the sights of this park robs me of my photographic muse.

But - perhaps paradoxically - not only does my familiarity not diminish my desire for picture taking, it — if anything — amplifies my ability to tune out distractions and focus entirely on what intuitively catches my inner eye. Familiarity, in other words, somehow (for me) breeds detachment. A detachment (i.e., an "objectivity") that, in turn - and involving yet another seeming paradox - enhances my subjective artistic/aesthetic sense. Despite frequenting this park dozens and dozens of times over the years, I have never failed to see something entirely new, or failed to reinterpret—contextually and photographically—something that I may have seen and photographed many times before.

Perhaps the most visible benefit of my frequent visitation of Great Falls (at least, from the point of view of the consumers of my photography, namely my family;-)...is that sometimes (but just sometimes;-), I manage to leave the park with images that actually look like something that was photographed in the park (rather than my usual "abstractivization" that robs photographs of all possible clues as to where they were taken; see previous blog entry).

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Not Taking Pictures of What We're Taking Pictures Of

Brooks Jensen, editor of Lenswork, recently posted a humorous podcast entitled "That's Not What We Do" in which he recounts an incident while shooting in a park with a friend. He and photographer Joe Lipka were photographing at Fort Warden, WA. At some point, Joe went to the tourist center and got noticed by the woman at the service counter, who inquired about what he and Brooks were doing. Upon explaining that they were both photographers, the woman suggested they talk to the park manager, who was interested in buying some tourist shots to sell. Joe politely explained that neither he nor his other photographer friend take those kinds of pictures. Seeing that the woman was puzzled by his answer - after all, he is standing there with a bunch of camera equipment; what would all that gear be used for if not "taking pictures"? - Joe offered a the following line (that I suspect is familiar to most fine-art photographers placed in a similar situation): "We make pictures that don't look like pictures of what we're taking pictures of." I only wish I were there to see the look of confusion on the poor woman's face!
I've already blogged about my personal favorite story of this type, namely the one about Brett Weston returning from a trip to London with a handful of pictures of rust from the London bridge. Here are a few from my own archives. Any one of my numerous trips to Great Falls State Park in Virginia typically result in shot after shot of totally "unrecognizable" shots of rocks; big rocks, small rocks, rock formations, you name it. "Where were these taken in again?" I'm usually asked.
Last year, in the autumn, when my family and I all went to Cox Farms for hay rides and pumpkin picking, "daddy the family photographer" was busy clicking away with his camera, but not necessarily at the kids or the rides they were going on. Among the more recognizable shots I came away with that day was this one...
...which at least has the virtue of being recognizably "something" (if not exactly declaring, "I was taken at Cox Farms!").
When we took a similar family outing to a local apple orchard for apple picking, daddy got two shots of an old barn (recounted in a previous blog entry) and this "Shot Taken While Apple Picking" shot...
And then there are my "beach" shots. Sand, water, waves, toddlers frolicking on the shore, sunbathers,...? Nah! Sissy stuff for fine-art photographers ;-) Here's a keeper from last summer's sojourn to a beach in Key Biscayne, Florida:
...which I was "lucky" enough to find just inside the entrance to an out house. And, speaking of outhouses, here's one of my favorite shots from a trip my wife and I took to Hawaii to celebrate our tenth anniversary in 2006 (this one from a Oahu beach outhouse, though whether any "beach" is evident in the picture, or any hints of a beach in Hawaii, I leave up to the viewer to decide):
Oh, and the ripple-triptych at the top of this blog entry was a quick series taken a few weeks ago at Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden, though - again - I'll admit that deducing that it was taken at Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden may not be that - Ahem - obvious. Then again, with some of my shots, such as the ones in my Micro Worlds portfolio, most people are mystified even after I explain what the shots are "shots of"! Par for the course, I'd say, for a fine-art photographer ;-)

Sunday, March 02, 2008

Wittgenstein's Sublime Dialectic

"1 The world is all that is the case; 1.1 The world is the totality of facts, not of things; 1.11 The world is determined by the facts, and by their being all the facts; 1.12 For the totality of facts determines what is the case, and also whatever is not the case; 1.13 The facts in logical space are the world." - Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico - Philosophicus)
Wittgenstein devoted his life to understanding "language games," as logico-cognitive attempts to make sense of the world. There is no essential type of language for Wittgenstein; language consists of multiple games in which meaning (of words and sentences) depends more on their relationship to other language games than on a one-to-one correspondence of the words and sentences of any one language to reality. "What can be said at all can be said clearly, and what we cannot talk about we must pass over in silence...It will therefore only be in language that the limit can be drawn, and what lies on the other side of the limit will simply be nonsense." - Ludwig Wittgenstein (Preface to Tractatus)
Language can only describe facts about the world, not the physico-logical structure the underlies those facts, or that defines the world out there. Indeed, the world - as itself - cannot be described at all; it can only be pointed to, or shown implicitly and indirectly, and always in relation to other self-consistent "pointers." "Feeling the world as a limited whole -- it is this that is mystical" - - Ludwig Wittgenstein (Preface to Tractatus, 6.45) Mysticism, for Wittgenstein, is a kind of knowing that transcends prepositional logic and knowledge; a sense that despite the "fact" that the limits of the world cannot be articulated in any language, those limits nonetheless exist and can be known. Science and all conventional forms of language, however, must by their nature remain silent on the deepest truths about the universe. At best, they are signposts towards the sublime.
The word "sublime" means, literally, "up to the threhold" (sub = "up to" and limen = "threshold"). "Sublime" therefore means "up to the boundary, but no farther"; referring, in Wittgenstein's world, to taking meaning right up to the limit of what can - and cannot - be thought, and language to the interface between the representable and nonrepresentable. (A fascinating book, by the way, on precisely this notion of "representability of the sublime" has recently been written by James Elkins: Six Stories from the End of Representation: Images in Painting, Photography, Astronomy, Microscopy, Particle Physics, and Quantum Mechanics, 1980-2000; highly recommended). And from these thoughts - these pointers to the sublime - it seems to me, emerges a deep yearning for photography and art...for what is art if not an attempt to communicate meaning beyond what is possible using conventional language? The precise meaning may not be conveyed (indeed, it is unlikely the artist fully comprehends that which he or she is trying to communicate), but the meaning of art lies in this attempt to communicate something beyond the categories imposed on the world by words and sentences alone.
In the end, of course, I always fall back on the sage words of Ansel Adams: "When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence."

Saturday, January 26, 2008

Hawaii: Visions of Primal Serenity

I've recently self-published a book of photographs of Hawaii, taken while my wife and I were celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary back in the summer of 2006.

Hawaii is an indelible part of me. More so even than my blood, my skin, or any of my physical possessions, for these are all far more transient and ultimately communicate far less about who I really am. But the depth and timelessness of my affection - my reverence - for these sublime, preternaturally beautiful islands, speaks volumes about the nature of my soul.

I visited the islands for the first time in the early 1980s as a beginning graduate student in physics. As soon as I stepped off the plane, and saw the gentle giant green mountains, the billowous clouds serenely floating over them, the deep inviting aquamarine blue water lapping the ragged shore - its dull roar echoing somewhere off in the distance - and tasted that intoxicatingly sweet scented tropical island air, I knew my soul had found its home. It is sublime, it is mysterious. There is an abundance of raw wild energy; and an immersive transcendent tranquility that subsumes all.

God, Yahweh, Buddha, Brahman, Tao, Ein-Sof, or whatever other linguistic "label" one is comfortable in using to refer to the infinite, attains a physically manifest luminous form in this paradisical oasis. Hawaii is magic.

At the end of the book, I've included a section of much older images, taken during my first series of visits to the islands between 1982 and 1988. The time I took to design the layout of the book, and to select the images for it, gave me an opportunity to compare my "eye" and aesthetics as they are now to what they were about 25 years ago; and to reflect on my own evolution as an artist (as well as to learn something about the creative process in general).

Something immediately struck me as I was viewing my large collection of "old" and "new" shots. The much older shots, which were all taken at a time when I was (possibly) a technically proficient photographer but had not yet matured as a "fine-art" photographer, were technically well executed "depictions of what I happened to be looking at" at the moment, in this case being Hawaii. While most are better than standard postcard fare (at least I hope so ;-), the truth is that, if I give an honest self appraisal of my earlier work, I see "scenes of Hawaii" and little more. Yes, they're pretty; yes, a few might (and do!) look nice on a wall. But they are pictures of Hawaii and little else. It is not false modesty for me to assert that any technically competent photographer, with a requisite skill level, could easily have reproduced (indeed, surpassed) many of my earlier photographs. So how are the new ones different; and in what way do I think they are "better"?

Well - jumping 25 years or so forward in time (and, in my case, about 75 thousand or so more images, give or take a few thousand, film and digital) - what I see myself doing more and more of (at least trying to) is incorporating the scenery "out there" into my bag of photo tools that I use to express what I feel "on the inside" when otherwise looking at the scenery. This represents both a subtle and profound shift.

The scenery, in an important sense, has become an integral part of my photographic toolkit, as important as - and distinct from - my usual assortment of purely technical tools (such as camera, lenses, filters, and so on). The scenery itself is no longer the core "object of focus" for my other tools. It has become an essential part of my toolkit.

It no longer really matters to me, in the deepest artistic sense, whether I am in Hawaii, or here in Northern VA, or Florida or anywhere else, in particular. My "goal" as a photographer is no longer to "show someone what I'm looking at." Rather, my goal is to communicate - express - a bit of "what I felt" when taking a picture to someone viewing the resulting photograph or print. I am much less concerned with whether the viewer "likes" what he or she "sees" - or identifies, objectively - in a photograph; and much more interested in conveying a feeling, a mood, a state-of-mind and/or heart, that persists even as viewer steps away from the image.

What is of lasting value (to both the viewer as an "involved interpreter and recipient" of an art work, and the photographer as its author) is not the fact that a particular photograph contains, say, a recognizable image of a "door," but rather the subjective emotional impression that the image of the door imparts to the viewer both while the viewer is actively viewing the photograph and afterwards, when the physical photograph is transformed (during the act of viewing) into a hybrid objective-subjective memory in the viewer's mind. It is my feeling that I am trying to convey; not the "object" that I took a photograph of to express that feeling.

What the viewer objectively "sees," of course, is the "object" (or objects) in the photograph; just as what I objectively "see" before I press the shutter is the (almost, but not quite identical) "object." Art, when it happens, depends on the simultaneous appearance of two transformative acts: (1) the photographer uses "objective reality" as an implicit tool to craft and communicate certain elements of his own - inner, subjective - reality; and (2) the viewer sees past the "objects" in a photograph and feels something - a residual imprint, perhaps - of what is, objectively speaking, not physically present, but hints at what the photographer felt while taking the photograph.

Of course, the degree to which the viewer "feels" what the photographer does (or what the photographer wishes to express) is impossible to measure. That is as it should be, for were this to be possible, art would be reduced to an "objective" science, which would be a pity. While I would certainly be delighted to know that someone resonates with one of my photos for exactly the same reason as I (or at least, in the same way I remember resonating with a "scene" while capturing it with my lens), it is not imperative that this is the case.

In truth, at this current juncture of my ongoing evolution, what I strive for in all my work is to convey the simplest feelings of calm. I understand that each viewer will take away from my images what he or she is predisposed to feel. Perhaps some find disharmony in what my eyes sees as serene patterns. But even in these cases, if viewers react more on an emotional level to my photos (even if the emotion they feel is different from the one I wish to convey) rather than in some detached, emotionally sterile or empty, fashion, I am still partly satisfied as an artist. For my goal is never the object, but a feeling.

So, getting back to the Hawaii book, why include my old pictures at all? Collectively, these early images define the first real "breeding ground" for my art. For it was in Hawaii that I first turned my camera onto something that I was truly impassioned about. Rather than taking the "same old" tired shots of "emotionally inert" subject matter (that may nonetheless have been a part of an otherwise valuable learning experience in a photography workshop, for example), I found myself taking shots in Hawaii for reasons that emerged quite naturally out of my own soul. In short, somewhere in the mists of time, lost among these old photos, is a magic Borgesian moment - well-defined but impossible to directly point to - during which I was born as a photographer.

Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Landscapes of the Soul

"The physical object, to me, is merely a stepping stone to an inner world where the object with the help of the subconscious drives and focuses perceptions, becomes transmuted into a symbol whose life is beyond the life of the objects we know." - Clarence J. Laughlin, Photographer (1905 - 1985)

For all those who've expressed, privately and publically, an interest in seeing some of my images in print - apart from my contest-winning Sudden Stillness book, to be published in short order by Envisage Press - I offer the following. A self-published collection of photos, entitled Landscapes of the Soul: Reflected Shadows of Self.

The book consists of four visual landscapes: Water Flow, Entropic Melodies, Spirit & Light, and Micro Worlds. Each offers an interpretation of spirit made manifest, and is introduced by a short essay. There are a total of 120 pages, 52 duotoned images, four essays and a short introduction.

Water flow shows glimpses of dynamic processes at work; though the processes themselves understandably remain hidden.

Entropic Melodies hints at the boundary between life and death. (A few images from this series appeared in a portfolio in issue #41 of Black and White Magazine.)

Spirit & light reveals the physical magnificence and splendor of sacred spaces, as created by human hands, though the spiritual object of devotion lies only in the heart of the observer. (Some of these images were featured in Lenswork Extended Edition #71 (July-August 2007)

Micro Worlds shows the extraordinary resplendent beauty that may be found even in abject banality, but only if the self recognizes that it is its own landscape of the soul. (These are taken from a growing series I'm still working on, and have previosuly featured in an on-line gallery.)

"To the vast majority of people a photograph is an image of something within their direct experience: a more-or-less factual reality. It is difficult for them to realize that the photograph can be the source of the experience, as well as the reflection of spiritual awareness of the world and of self." - Ansel Adams, Photographer (1902 - 1984)

My original intention for this project (when I started a few weeks ago) was to merely find an "easy" way to archive some of my work; for my own records. Indeed, I honestly wasn't expecting much by way of quality, although I grew increasingly intrigued by seeing references to the "quality of Blurb Books" on various forums and chat groups. Having my "test case" book in hand from this on-line publisher, I can now attest to its overall quality. Very impressive, actually.

Compared to the often less-than-stellar quality of books one sees even on the shelves at Borders, I have no qualms about offering the book for sale. While certainly not as good as fine-art prints (even the best books typically fall far short of that Holy Grail of course), nor even as good as the finest pigment-based ink jets I can produce for exhibits, the images in this volume stand on their own as beautiful book-form reproductions. Of course, the subject matter may not be to everyone's taste, nor the images themselves, but about that I have far less control;-)

For those who find my aesthetics pleasing, I am sure you would find this little collection of some of my recent images very enjoyable.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

George Barr's Stunning New Book on the Creative Process in Photography

George Barr's stunning new book - Take Your Photography to the Next Level - is an impressive debut for George in the world of art instruction in book form, and a "must-read" book for photographers at all skill levels. George is already quite an accomplished master of photography in traditional print and Blog forms. Indeed, according to his Blog, the idea for this book, and a bit of its substance (though markedly enhanced and expanded) came about partly from the many insightful entries he's posted on his Blog over the years.

Apart from his obvious writing skill, one of George's great strengths as an artist/communicator is his ability to articulate some of the core - and often mysterious - qualities that describe the process of art in general; and photography in particular. Though he doesn't shy away from philosophical issues (and addresses such questions as "What is a fine-art photograph?" head-on), he has a veritable wellspring of practical advice to impart photographers, ranging from complete novices to seasoned professionals.

That this book is special is immediately obvious. It is neither an all too common "How To.." instruction manual on what f-stop to choose or what lens to put on your camera, nor is it yet another "This is how it is done in Photoshop..." guidebook (though some allusions to both sets of "problems" are sprinkled throughout). What this book does, and does exceedingly well, is address the much more difficult subjective components of fine-art photography: the nature of creativity in the photographic process, where to "look for" images, and what to do when you find them (and when you cannot!), how to compose your shots and why, how to assess your imagery, and to learn to develop your own "style," and the differences between purely technical acumen and aesthetic vision.

Such matters are rarely if ever are given the attention they deserve, and if they do appear in other books - typically as short side-bars or quick asides - do so more as after-thoughts than substantive discussions. In fact, I know of only perhaps three or four other books (none of which are as well-written as this one, by the way) that similarly delve deeply into the creative and aesthetic parts of photography. It is thus a book that is long-overdue; and I am delighted that a photographer of George's unique blend of artistic skill and expository ability has taken up the challenge.

I am also impressed by the utmost care and attention that has been put into the design and content of the book. The image selection is excellent throughout; and (in another rarity for books in this admittedly small genre) include many "don't quite work" photographs simply because George wants to show what works, what does not, and why. Even the captions to the photos show a consistent deliberate attention. Each tells a succinct story about what is being shown, and makes a point all its own that compliments the accompanying text. If all one did was to skim the book reading its captions, and nothing else, one would arguably still learn a great deal of the subject. Another nice feature is that many of the sections include simple but marvelously effective sketches to illustrate the finer points of, say, cropping and composition. While most authors would have contented themselves to include an image example or two and leave it at that, George goes that extra step for the reader. Finally, there is also a generous selection of "portfolio" images, each accompanied by its own "story" of how it came to be, in two-page spreads that appear throughout the book. My personal favorite (and one that, as George reveals, turns out to be among George's all-time popular images) is Windowpane, that appears on page 193. Indeed, it is this particular image, that I first saw in Focus magazine a few years ago, that introduced me to George's photography, and compelled me to become an avid reader of his Blog.

If you are either a budding photographer who wants to learn about the "art" in fine-art photography, or a long-practicing photographer (perhaps even a pro), and are wondering where to look for advice to improve your own vision; or your skill level is anywhere in-between, know that there is no better place to learn, and no better guide to turn to for guidance, than George's superb new book. On the basis of this book alone, I'd say George is about to embark on yet another career track (in addition to already being a physician and photographer); namely that of well-known, accomplished teacher of fine-art photography. Well done George.