Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs by Ansel Adams
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Book Reviews of Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs
Book Review: A charming insight into the soul of a great photographer
Summary: 5 Stars
There are many great books about photography, of which this is just one, but there are relatively few books about how to be a great photographer. On the latter topic this book is exceptional.
Ansel Adams was clearly both a gentleman and a gentle man, who lived to create great images for the pleasure and education of others. We are exceptionally lucky that he left us both his wonderful pictures, but also a few books which explain not only how, but also why some of them were created.
This book covers a photography career of over 60 years, taking 40 of his greatest pictures, and describing how they were made. Although much of the technical advice is still valid today, a lot of it requires on the fly translation from the language of large format cameras and glass plates to the world of digital SLRs, with tiny sensors and vast memory cards. That exercise might put some people off, but it makes you think harder about his advice, and that's a good thing.
However, where this book really scores is with the human stories of how and why Adams made certain pictures. Two examples stick in my mind.
Firstly, how one of his iconic views of Yosemite was made after a day's hard hiking with a full size view camera, large wooden tripod, and just twelve glass plates. He suspected that he had wasted the first eleven, and had just one left for a favourite view of Half Dome. He took extra care with that one, and the results are still thrilling 80 years on.
Then there's his tale of photographing 50s Californian farming families. This is a charming insight into how a great photographer of people develops both trust and ideas, lubricating both with an appropriate supply of beer. You suspect these days were not so hard for Adams as the great Yosemite hikes.
"Examples" also contains some remarkable philosophical insights into the process and role of photography. The one which now sticks foremost in my mind is that enthusiasm for a subject will not create great photographs - you have to visualise the image and its impact mentally, then make it. This is perhaps the single most powerful piece of advice in the book.
In 1935 Adams was concerned that the advent of 35mm would result in a vast number of bad photographs. Yet he was keen on the new medium, because he could also see its benefits. The same page could be written ten times over about digital photography, but you know that had Adams lived a little longer he would have been a keen PhotoShop-er.
This is a good book on photographic technique, but there are others. But there are few books which give such an insight into the soul of a great photographer.
Book Review: An Essential Insight
Summary: 5 Stars
Heralded as perhaps one of the most influential conservation photographers of all time, Ansel Adams for many has existed only as a name attached to brilliant, vibrant and expressive landscape photography. Perhaps if you have read his three-party series, "The Camera," "The Negative," and "The Print," you are familiar with Adams's technical thought processes. With "The Making of 40 Photographs," we gain insight into Adams' creative process. And for many of us who aspire to create brilliant nature photography, it is this insight that is most valuable.
"The Making of 40 Photographs" seeks to answer that question we all ask when we see a tremendous photographic print: How did the photographer take that photograph? But, "The Making" does far more than that. It seeks to explore not only the individual creative process, but the growth of the art form and the important historical transition of its wide acceptance as true art in his discussions of the f/64 Group.
As far back as 1980, Adams even goes so far as to predict digital photography as the next big step, referencing what he calls the "electronic image." This is a valuable insight, as many today challenge digital photography and question its detrimental impact on the photographic arts.
Any photographer who wishes to learn more about this master and explore his or her own potential to create brilliant images must read this book.
Book Review: Superb Case Studies
Summary: 5 Stars
If you want to learn photography and you would prefer to learn (or supplement your learning) by intensive case study, this is the book for you. Ansel Adams is a master at controlling composition, light and perspective, and he conveys his unique methodology admirably in this book. This book covers much more than his epic landscapes -- there are a lot of still life, portrait and architectural case studies. And he's not just discussing the zone system, but also everything else involved, including packing the right equipment, leaving at the right time, and hunting down the right subject. And above all, patience and persistence. The photos themselves are reproduced with admirable tone, sharpness, and contrast, as they are in all the books in this series. And although there are only forty of them, each case study runs two or three pages in addition to a full page photo. And if you like this, check out Ansel Adams' classic three part intensive introduction to photography, in the same series as this book: The Camera, The Print, and The Negative.Book Review: Very educational and enjoyable
Summary: 5 Stars
These days it is easy to do your own color printing, but, what makes a good print? I think I do, but am always looking for help in understanding ways of how to get there, how other people do it and how I could improve. Who could be a better example of a printer than A. Adams? No one, that's who. In this book he tells how he visualized the photo he wanted, and the print before he took the photo. And then his craft in printing it. He also talks about the circumstances around the making of the photo, location, time of day, camera, lens, film, exposure, etc. And all very lucid and enjoyable to read. His other book on printing is also good but in it he concentrates on the technical aspects of printing, i.e. developers, papers, burning and dodging, water baths, drying, mounting, etc.Book Review: Excellent study
Summary: 5 Stars
Don't mistake this for some coffee table book. Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs is a rich study into the lighting, problem solving, development and other technical data associated with making these images. The book also reveals to what extent Adams worked in formats beside 8" x 10"; specifically, 35mm and medium format.
If you take time to read and re-read the examples and practice like application, you will come out a better photographer.
Adams is very frank as to his relationships with other photographers and the various movements/philosophies of the day. The book is as much a lesson in artistic independence as it is about technical accomplishment.