Your most important photography book

Books by: Richard Avedon, Mary Ellen Mark, David Allen Harvey, Michael Kenna.

Magazines: Aperture, View camera, LensWork.
 
Presently, it would have to be:

What Matters: The World's Preeminent Photojournalists and Thinkers Depict Essential Issues of Our Time by David Eliot Cohen.

There is also a website for the book: What Matters
 
Last edited:
"The Art of Outdoor Photography," by Boyd Norton. This book is what fully converted me to a rangefinder (yes, he uses SLR) and shooting film.
 
One of the first photography books I bought around 30 years ago The Basic Darkroom Book by Tom Grimm. I also have a basic book of photography by Tom but I can't seem to locate it.
 
It changes regularly. Currently Mapplethorpe's Some Women.

Before that it was Sally Mann's Immediate Family.

But I keep coming back to Graham Clarke's The Photograph.
 
Last edited:
Workers by Sebastiao Salgado
Japan by Michael Kenna
Himalayan Odyssey bij David Samuel Robbins
But it changes from time to time.


Tibetan Portrait by Phil Borges has had an influence on my work ever since meeting him in a remote Himalayan valley.
 
Forced to pick one title, it would have to be this one for me:

attachment.php

(That is, David Vestal's book, top. Bittman's is my top kitchen read)

Craft has been my main photo book since it came out, and it still serves as both decent reference and just plain interesting and inspiring reading. He covers only black-and-white here, but does so comprehensively: beginners can come to grips with the information here, while would-be old hands might pick up an extra pointer or two.

As far as books of photographs, there are too many "favorites" to mention, but one that I like leafing though from time to time is Sylvia Plachy's Unguided Tour. Beautifully quirky.


- Barrett
 
Vännerna från Place Blanche (The friends from Place Blanche) by Christer Strömholm. Made me wan't to buy a Leica and move to Paris. I have fulfilled half of that dream.
Jacob
 

Attachments

  • place_blanche_357.jpg
    place_blanche_357.jpg
    27.5 KB · Views: 0
Errance by Raymond Depardon is probably the most important book in my collection. Depardon's talking about life, doubts, travelling and photography. It's a must if you can understand french. This guy talks a lot in his books, and that's why he is my favourite photog... always nice to hear photographers talking about the way they feel.
 
I started reradinge the Time Life books - "Light and Film" I read for years.
Then after some years without photography "Andreas Feiningers books
And (sorry just the German Title) "Hollywoods Ruhm und Schönheit-The Kobal Collection"
and "LIFE at War"
 
The book that really pushed me into photography as an adult is "Shanghainese 1990-2000" by Lu Yuanmin. It's a very obscure book that I've seen once (the time I bought it, in Chinatown, Philadelphia). It moved me so much that the next day I was looking for cameras.

The book doesn't seem to be on amazon but I found this blogpost (in chinese) showing some pictures: http://blog.westca.com/blog_ShanghaiABC/p/55949.html
 
Last edited:
Right now:

Steichen: A Life in Photography

Always:

Graphic Graflex Photography: A Manual for the Larger Camera

(My copy is held together with packing tape and smells like Dektol.)

As a child:

The Amateur Photographer's Handbook by Sussman

(Started with it when I was 10 yrs. old.)

Chris L.
 
My favourites:

The 'best' one: Cartier-Bresson's Scrapbook
The most inspiring: Koudelka's Chaos
The best 'object book': Michael Kenna's Hokkaido

Arturo
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom