Reviews

Craft & Vision has just released their latest eBook: The Evocative Image by Andrew S. Gibson. It just came out today, so I haven’t had a chance to read all of it, but I really like what I’ve seen so far.

The subtitle for this new volume is “A Photographer’s Guide to Capturing Mood.” If you’ve attended one of my workshops, read my Digital Landscape Photography book, or looked at some of my critiques, you know that I place a lot of importance on mood in photographs. And I’ve thoroughly enjoyed Andrew’s previous eBooks on black-and-white photography, so I was anxious to read what he had to say about mood. So far, I’ve seen lots of interesting ideas, like this:

“One idea I’ve been exploring is that good photography (and moody images) is created on the ‘edges.’ Sunset and sunrise are edges—the border between night and day. Low light (many moody photos are taken in low light) is the edge between light and dark. The beach—one of my favourite places—is the edge between land and sea. A clearing storm is at the edge of rain and sun.

“There are edges in technique too. Try shooting at a shutter speed that is just a little too slow to get a sharp image. You’re at the edge between sharpness and blur, and exciting things can happen here.

“Wherever I look, more edges reveal themselves, and it’s at these edges that moody photographs happen.”

Nicely said. I hadn’t thought about “edges” in that way, but I certainly will now.

I look forward to reading the rest of the book, but I wanted to let you know about it as soon as possible, since for the first five days, until midnight February 28th, you can get this volume for only 4 dollars. Just use the code “EVOCATIVE4” on checkout. Or buy five Craft & Vision titles, including my December release, Light & Land: Landscapes in the Digital Darkroom, and get 20 percent off by using the code EVOCATIVE20. Here’s a link to the Craft & Vision site, where you can see excerpts from The Evocative Image, as well as all their eBooks.

I’ll be posting a critique tomorrow. Here’s a sneak peak at the photograph I’ll be reviewing, by Ken Hornbrook. I thought it might be fun to let you look at it now, think about the light, composition, and technique, and form your own opinions before reading what I have to say tomorrow. Until then…