Beyond Words will be holding a temporary shop at Stills Gallery, Cockburn Street, Edinburgh from 2 to 30 August. If you're going to be in town then, Neil has told me that he will have copies of my book on display, should you wish to have a browse (and hopefully buy a copy or two).
Iceland book progress
Yesterday I paid the final balance due for the printing of my second book. The book should be here by the end of October and I will be illustrating a sample copy of it - possibly around August time. I've prepared a little video of the proofs for the book. Please accept my apologies for my self-depreciating humour - I often like to tell everyone how brilliant I am (clearly a joke), but some folks tell me I'm hard to read and they don't often know when I'm joking or not, so thought I should let you know that I'm really not being serious at all : ). You can view the video here:
[vimeo 45629937 w=400]
Below is the specification that has been printed onto the top of the slip-case design they've sent me for evaluation. The color is not the final choice - it's just a sample, completely empty, nothing printed on it, so I can get a feel for the quality and weight of the final product.
Below is the slip-case design, and to the side you can see the book as it is slipped into the side of the case.
Iceland book update
I've just created a dedicated Facebook page for my forthcoming book 'Iceland - A journal of Nocturnes'. You can view it here and there is more information on the intro by Ragnar Axelsson as well as the image selection in the book. Last week, the art work for my Iceland book was finalised.
There's been a bit of adjustment to the entire content from its inception which has been fascinating for me to observe. Any creative project seems to take on a life of its own and this book has taken shape in a way I wasn't expecting. What was going to be a simple monograph has turned into a journey through Iceland's landscape - as my friend Mike Green (who has helped review the content) says - it's like a photographic day, taken over several years.
Now that the art work and content of the book is now complete, I should feel as though the book is finished, but I know from experience that nothing is ever finished. The book is a stepping stone of sorts - maybe a document of my experiences to date venturing around the Icelandic landscape.... let me explain.
When working on new images, I don't often see that they will become part of something later on. I could easily have assumed that once I'd been to Iceland, there was little point in returning again. But I have done, on four occasions and created new work on most of those trips. Each time I've returned, I feel I've learned a little bit more about the Icelandic landscape, and also myself as a photographer. I also discover that my previous images of Iceland seem to take on a new meaning for me. It's like I'm able to look at them a little differently, all because I've had a new experience. The newer work seems to affect my impressions of what I think of my older work.
Everything is fluid and always in a state of 'transition'.
It is only as time passes, that we can review what we've done and see parallels, or themes that cross several bodies of work. As much as I feel that my Iceland book is simply a document of my experiences to date, I know that it has come together over almost a decade. By looking back I can see there was a clear path that led from my first Icelandic outing to where I am now. I wish it was so clear to see the path ahead.... and wonder what the final book will be the catalyst for?
I'm extremely excited about this as I hadn't envisioned creating a first book, let alone a second book. Things just seem to take their own course, and when you figure out how to do something first time round, it's much easier the second time.
I'll be announcing a release date, and also a very strictly limited edition of the book that will come with three prints (to make up a beautiful triptych) in a few months from now. The edition will be limited to 45 copies only and the prints will not be available as single prints with other editions of the book, so stay tuned to my monthly newsletter for the first word on this.
I should also mention that there is also going to be a book-launch & print exhibition to coincide with the release of book. More to follow on the dates and venue (in Edinburgh) for this soon.
Photographs not taken
A degree of restraint is what's required, I feel. This week I bought a copy of Will Steacy's 'Photographs not taken', which promises to be an interesting account of images that photographers chose not to take.
Like music where the space between the notes is just as important as the notes, the space between taking images is just as important as the making of an image.
With so much image proliferation happening right now, I have a wonder if what we're doing is polluting our visual existence with too much sensory overload?
I know for myself, I need space between shooting because in the quiet moments, when images aren't being created, I can reflect, consider and simply enjoy what is around me - I have to live in the moment just as much as I may feel I wish to document it.
An image should exist because it has a reason. In the film Amadeus, the King says to Motzart that he didn't care for his opera because 'it has too many notes', while Motzart responds with 'but I used as many notes as it required'. Our own work should be similar - we should create what we need to create to tell our story, and no more. Having a sense of restraint is a quality rather than a hinderance to our own development as photographers, so long as we're in control of it and can moderate it.
But I often wonder if what I'm doing is going down a path of less creativity. As beginners, we tend to photograph everything, and anything. As our craft develops, we start to become more aware of what we're doing, and inevitably more selective. We focus more on certain things and discard others. I feel that sometimes I restrict myself too much; I have built up a lot of experience of what I feel does not work, so I don't shoot it - which in itself is limiting as I may find new opportunities if I did.
As time goes by, I become more and more restrictive - the number of images is reduced down and down, while I seek something that is really worth telling.
But as much as this is a process of pushing myself forward, aiming to create more finely-tuned, stylistic work, I'm not entirely sure of where it's heading. Maybe all that will happen is that I will create less and less, until ultimately, I create nothing at all?
I degree of balance is required.
We need to monitor ourselves and our behaviour, know when we are simply shooting too much garbage - and it is garbage, because it's produced with less consideration and less thought behind it (and we know it too - don't we?), and know when we are not shooting enough because we're putting up barriers that stop us from being creative at all.
I think Will Steacy's book is about this, but much more too. I think it's really an interesting view on what made photographers - and she interviews plenty - decide not to shoot something. It isn't always down to 'because I didn't like it'. There are more reasons to this I'm sure.
But I think for me, it's a chance to reflect on my own motivations and to question why I choose not to make images.
I'll let you know what I think of Will Steacy's book once I'm finished with it, but if you'd like to buy a copy, it's pretty inexpensive at just £11.25 from Beyond Words
Between Maple and Chesnut
Today I received some foil-stamping samples for the 2nd book. Again, I feel that things are progressing, and one 'idea' is slowing morphing into something more 'real'. Whether it's making images, and having visualisations of what it is you want to create, or whether it's visualising the choice of wall paper for your home, we all have to dream in order to see where it is we're going.
But with anything you're working on, you have to keep on the ball about the entire process. Creating a book is a long, long process and there has been so many emails between Darren - who's creating the press ready file, and myself. And the printer hasn't been involved so much as yet, but I've maybe emailed them so much now, I'm losing track!
But today I posted off sample Inkjet prints for each of the images in the book to the printer. Darren had advised this for the first book - his reasoning being that although everyone may be colour managed, you really need to send of hard copy prints - it's the only real way to make sure the printer sees what you're seeing.
Anyway, I'll be heading off to South America in a week or so's time. Plenty of time to get lost doing photos, conducting photo safaris, and meeting Easter Island statues. But little time for work on the book. So I'm hoping to have everything wrapped up on the book front next week.
Image selection for forthcoming book
Just back from the isle of Harris, after a workshop. What a nice group I had! Thought I'd share the image selection for my forthcoming Iceland book. Click to enlarge.
Be back in a few days, after I've had some time off. Away to St.Kilda in a week's time to do a personal photography project. More to come on that I hope.
Feel the need to go exploring in a different direction. Thinking of Ladakh for August. Portraiture images only.
No landscapes.
Been too long doing landscapes and there's a whole big world out there. Been speaking to Matt Brandon and Gavin Gough in Asia - both very fine photographers and worth looking at their sites. I think some time out there later this year may be on the cards.
What are your inspiration plans?
New e-Book - Personal Exposures
Last thursday I released a new e-book and notified everyone who subscribes to my monthly newsletter about some special offers on the entire set of 10-ebooks that I offer.
The special offer was a great success and finished last night at mid-night. If you'd like to be kept up to date on new workshop announcements or special offers, then please do subscribe to my newsletter - which you can do on my home page.
Over the past four years, I've been writing on this blog about the photographic process - which I feel is mostly to do with ourselves, rather than the equipment. It's been a really enjoyable process - putting to words, what I've been feeling and thinking.
So I felt it would be really nice to collate some of the best entries from this blog into an e-book. Inside, you'll find entries about finding inspiration, ways to approach editing your work post-shoot, the use of ND-grad filters on a range-finder camera, working out the dynamic range of a scene for correct exposure, and many other distractions from every day life :-)
I have to thank Mike Green (who has a very interesting blog) for suggesting it. I was talking to him just a few weeks back about some new e-Books that I'm writing. They're quite intensive to complete, because there's a lot of 'soul' being put into them - a lot of though to how best to describe some technical and logistical information. Mike asked me if I was ever going to do a compendium of entries from my blog. I didn't really think I've ever had much to say (feign mock modesty, etc, etc - I know I perhaps have too much to say at times). It was only when I went through my blog and had a look at what I've covered, I realised there was a lot of material, buried here, that if it was put together into a nice presentation, could make for a really nice e-Book.
I think it's turned out to be more than just a collation of blog entries though. The entire e-Book, in some ways, feels like something that is greater than the sum of its parts.
If you're interested, you can get it here.
Book design complete
A few days ago, I was down in Nottingham, working on the final press book design for my 2nd book. If you've not been reading my blog of late, then maybe you don't know that I'm planning on releasing a 2nd book this Autumn / Winter. The book is about Iceland and it's mostly a monograph, but it does have a few stories and experiences from my time shooting there.
I'd like to say a big thank you to Darren Ciolli-Leach at 22:22 Design for his invaluable assistance and experience. Darren has been instrumental in turning my mockup's into something more professional looking. He says - in his own words that he's a 'font-aholic'. I particularly like the fonts that he suggested for the book covers.
I'm intending to release the book in a few variants:
1. Basic edition
2. Book with special limited (to 300 copies only) slipcase.
3. Book with slipcase and limited edition print (125 copies only)
4. Deluxe version with slipcase and three prints that make up a triptych (45 copies only).
There will be more details about the book and my special guest photographer who has written the preface for the book in this month's newsletter (due out on the 27th).
If you don't subscribe to my newsletter, than you can do it on my home page. Each month I always notify people of new workshops and special offers firstly through the newsletter, so it's a good idea to subscribe if you want to be one of the first to know about workshops before they sell out, for instance.
As for my current book, the limited edition print versions of Loch Lurgainn are almost sold out now, so if you were thinking of getting a copy with one, then time is running out :-)
More cover mock-ups
I'm heading down to Nottingham on Monday to work on my 2nd book layout. Darren has been sending me some ideas on the cover and slipcase, and these have been feeding back into my own mind and resulting in more changes.
The choice of a font, can really make a huge difference to how a books is received. We conjure up expectations based on how the cover of a product looks, and in these mock-ups, the font is more 'modern' than the one's in the previous mock-ups.
I find this all very exciting, and full of surprises. I've been living with the previous mock-up in my mind for some time, and was imagining the book sitting on my bookshelf, and now, what was becoming 'real' is now becoming fiction for me again... something fluid, changeable. It makes me wonder just how different the book will actually look once we've got the design complete, which I would imaging, should take a few more weeks of fine tuning once Darren and myself have gone through setting up the initial look.
The other good news is that the preface has been written by my very special guest photographer. More news about this at the end of the month in my monthly newsletter.
Book Review
Every now and then, I'm informed about a review of my first book. Noeleen Hargan has written perhaps the most objective review of my book that I've read so far. I say this, because in her review, Noeleen considers what I had to say in my text and she gives the reader an idea of what to expect, if they were to purchase the book.
This would seem to be an amazingly simple objective that a reviewer should have - to give the reader an idea of the content of the book. But as I said a few months back - I don't tend to read the reviews now, because most of them lack research - it's clear to me from the content of the review that they haven't read the text (I'm sure this is very common - and one of the many reasons why authors don't read reviews!).
Anyway, I felt that Noeleen's review of my book was very considerate. She's clearly read the contents, thought about it, and makes some points based on what she's read. Noeleen has kindly allowed me to reproduce it here for you all to read.
The lure of endless possibilities
Book review: Bruce Percy, The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples. Half Light Press, Edinburgh, 2011.
No, a photograph is not a simple visual report of “what was there”. In Bruce Percy’s words, photography is “an emotional response to what we see and feel”. His first book, The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples, its format and title paying homage to Ansel Adam and Galen Rowell, lends substance to this view.
The book’s 40 images are each accompanied by a one-page commentary providing insights into the image-making process. While the locations vary from the photographer’s Scottish homeland to further afield – Argentina, Bolivia, Cambodia, Chile, Ethiopia, Iceland, India and Nepal – before long, the book’s underlying question becomes clear: Why this photograph?
The backstage insights shared with readers include descriptions of the setting in which each photograph was created. Percy talks about his fears and worries, mishaps and coincidences, makes technical and compositional observations, and interprets the sense of his work while reflecting upon the role of emotions and the unconscious in image-making. Above all, he tries to convey to readers what drew him into an image, why that particular image was made, how he feels when he has made a good image.
Percy loves the fact that photography in general “gives us a reason to get out there and experience new locations and new people”. The “endless possibilities” offered by photography are themselves a source of inspiration, he feels. At the same time, he knows that “one of the biggest mistakes a new photographer can make is to keep moving and not spend enough time in one location”. Slow down, he seems to be saying, and think about what you are doing, why you are doing this. Or at least, this is what he seems to have said to himself at some point along his own photographic journey.
Percy knows the joys of making landscape images “at an unearthly hour, in the silence, just you and your camera.” Perhaps this is one reason why his photography often has a mystical, meditative quality about it. These days, he tells us, he is striving for an “otherwordly” mood in his photography, along with simple shapes and tones.
One unexpected component of the book is the portraiture. Until now, I had associated Bruce Percy exclusively with evocative landscapes, but now am intrigued by his assertion that “portraits should be landscapes in their own right”. He sees portraiture as “very similar” to landscape photography. As he puts it: “I’m looking for an aesthetic that is pleasing in terms of composition, light and tonal balance. But I’m also looking for a spirit, and that is not too different from landscape photography after all”.
Knowing what you’re looking for may well be half the battle or more, but photographers keen to make the most of photography’s “endless possibilities”, should perhaps take their cue from Percy’s account of finally succeeding, on his 4th attempt, in making the sunrise image he wanted at the Laguna Torre in Argentina’s Los Glaciares National Park. As in the legend involving his namesake Robert the Bruce and a spider, Bruce Percy simply tried and tried again.
But perhaps some of the book’s assertions shouldn’t be taken too literally, such as “there appears to be no such thing as bad weather”. Try telling that to a sodden, bedraggled group of photographers from Italy, on a week-long trip to the Highlands, while they are sheltering from the Scottish wind and rain under a low stone wall near Rua Reidh lighthouse;-)
The Art of Adventure – 40 Photographic Examples is an absorbing read for anyone interested in photography, and a compilation of beautifully-reproduced photographs that you will want to look at over and over again.
Review © Noeleen Hargan, 2012
The original review can be found at Noeleen Hargan's blog here: http://www.respirolestelle.it/html/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=240:recensione-the-art-of-adventure-bruce-percy&catid=34:recensioni-letterarie&Itemid=55
And of course, if you want to buy a copy of the book, you can find it at the Half-Light Press website.