Least crappy general interest photo mag?

[squirrel$$$bandit]

I'm sick of having to look at the internet every time I want to read about photography and camera gear. I bought a Shutterbug last year and it was pretty awful...but that was last year. Maybe it's better now?

Is there anything out there? I would love the equivalent of Sound On Sound, the recording magazine, for photography. Friendly tone, lots of cool technique tutorials, reviews of both hardware and software gear. It would be nice to have reviews of stuff besides freaking DSLR's...like of rangefinders (obviously) but also Lomography stuff, large and medium format, film, etc.

Is there anything>

 

[ferider]

The only one I kept is "American Photo".

Roland.

 

[kshapero]

There was about a 2 year run about a year or so ago when Shutterbug ran a lot of great rangefinder reviews. What happen Roger?

 

[jky]

The only ones I bother with now are BW magazine & BW Photography (I think that's what it's called). PDN and another photo mag geared towards pro photogs are a couple of others I'll perouse through...

 

[nikon_sam]

I'm down to just two...B&W (US Version) and View Camera...
I got tired of all the ads and product placement even in the articles...and then the articles like "How to shoot like Ansel Adams" or "10 Places you need to Photograph" all of which cost thousands of dollars to get to...
With all the advanced gear out there the mags have gone backwards in their articles and are catering to those with $$$ gear but use them like P&S...

 

[kshapero]

Unfortunately, probably the worst of them all is named, "Rangefinder".

 

[thrice]

There's a great mag called Soura, quite pricey but it's almost all photography. A little light on gear reviews etc though. Read about it here http://www.souramagazine.com/

 

[Peter S]

The only one that I think is halfway decent is the UK magazine Black & White Photography. Buying them in the store here in The Netherlands is extremely expensive so I took a subscription. www.thegmcgroup.com/ccp51/cgi-bin/cp-app.pl?&act=&aff=&pg=prod&ref=1003BW#Sub

Others I (used to) like are Photo and Chasseur d' Images, but they are in French so might not be up your alley.

In my humble opinion internet has taken over. The amount of information and friendly support, sharing of tips and tricks you can find in, for example, this friendly community cannot be matched by anything in print.

 

[shadowfox]

Let's see...

Maybe-subscription-worthy: Black & White Photography (UK version), not general, but quite a bit of variety of content.

Bookstore-perusal-worthy: Shutterbug, PDN, Pro Photo, Soura.

Sometimes-buy-worthy: View Camera (getting harder to get in bookstores here in the US), Photo Technique, B&W and Color (both by the same publisher).

Library-fodder: Pop Photo (the only photo magazine they have at my local library)

Bottom-of-the-pile: Outdoor Photography (US version). Anything else that has "Digital" or "Photoshop" on the cover.

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

Thanks, I will check out B&W and American Photo. JPG isn't a print mag, is it? Maybe one of these days I'll get an ebook reader and will download it...but I don't wanna look at my computer any more than I already do, which is a lot.

I think I started a similar thread a year ago. I guess I was hoping that things had, um, improved...

 

[Ducky]

You are ecohing my feelings. 99% are just touting the latest and greatest only to do the same thing next month. I also do not like ads from major distributors who show an item and the say "call for price".
I rely on several forums, including this one, for opinions (some opinions are even valid).

 

[photogdave]

I used to like Camera Arts quite a bit. I think it may be subscription only now.

 

[Al Kaplan]

Rangefinder is pretty much a trade journal catering to wedding and portrait studios. It does have some interesting articles from time to time. It's what's known as a "controlled circulation" publication. Once you get on their mailing list you'll get it every month for the rest of your life whether or not you ever send them the check. It's free, Enjoy!

 

[-doomed-]

I think that in general magazines fail to deliver. Forget just photo mags , I used to read plenty of different car magazines and a few of them were good. As Double Negative said its reall all about selling ad space. Last shutterbug I read was when Roger reviewed the new summarits, and I've looked at a few other mags and thought they sucked too.

I get it though, most "hardcore" enthusiasts want more material reviewing new products without sugar coating them. They can t cater to those enthusiasts because theres that whole ad space thing again ,so they always pull back just when they should really hammer a terrible product(photography or otherwise) . You dont want to piss off your paying advertisers because without them your magazine will wither and die , so in lieu of pissing them off you can write substandard sugar coated crap that never fully answers whether something is good or bad.

 

[dcsang]

LensWork

Plain and simple the best and most portable magazine for photography/photographers - not a "gear head" mag but, instead, a magazine that emphasizes the photograph.

Cheers,
Dave

 

[nikon_sam]

I used to like Camera Arts quite a bit. I think it may be subscription only now.

Along with View Camera I used to get Camera Arts...later I dropped CA but still get VC...I think I started CA with their first issue...Do they still publish CA??? I have to find them somewhere in this house...:bang:


Never mind...I just checked Camera Arts website...they're still there...

 

[Jason808]

LensWork

Plain and simple the best and most portable magazine for photography/photographers - not a "gear head" mag but, instead, a magazine that emphasizes the photograph.

Cheers,
Dave

Seconded. And there are years' worth of podcasts available, for free. The Extended DVDs are fantastic. www.lenswork.com


Shutterbug used to be interesting for a short time a couple years ago, but now it's garbage. PopPhoto is just all about how to employ a gimmick or how to Photoshop your garbage. American Photo is just PopPhoto with more nudity. Black and White (UK), IMHO has declined. Content and articles used to run deeper.

 

[ferider]

American Photo is just PopPhoto with more nudity.

You should look past the cover. This one for instance was pretty cool:

Lot's of RF stuff, too.

 

[uhligfd]

Aperture and Lenswork are two worthy seeing every issue of. Subscribe and ENJOY!

The weeklies, grocery store rack type mags are all a waste of time, money and trees.

 

[snip]

Let's see...

Maybe-subscription-worthy: Black & White Photography (UK version), not general, but quite a bit of variety of content.

I have a subscription to that, I must say since I got that for Christmas last year (used to buy it ever so often before then) It has gone somewhat downhill.

Changing the name to "B+W Photography" wtf??? More and more run off the mill reviews of the latest and greatest digital SLR's, C'mon there are magazines specifically FOR that.. More and more ads it seems like and more and more articles being about faking it with computers rather than actual development practices. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but boring for me.

Having said that, this is still by far the best of them all.

//J