The Photographer's Mind: Creative Thinking for Better Digital Photos

Abstract

The source of any photograph is not the camera or even the scene viewed through the viewfinder--it is the mind of the photographer: this is where an image is created before it is committed to a memory card or film. In The Photographer's Mind, the follow-up to the international bestseller, The Photographer's Eye, photographer and author Michael Freeman unravels the mystery behind the creation of a photograph. The nature of photography demands that the viewer constantly be intrigued and surprised by new imagery and different interpretations, more so than in any other art form. The aim of this book is to answer what makes a photograph great, and to explore the ways that top photographers achieve this goal time and time again. As you delve deeper into this subject, The Photographer's Mind will provide you with invaluable knowledge on avoiding clich?, the cyclical nature of fashion, style and mannerism, light, and even how to handle the unexpected. Michael Freeman is the author of the global bestseller, The Photographer's Eye. Now published in sixteen languages, The Photographer's Eye continues to speak to photographers everywhere. Reaching 100,000 copies in print in the US alone, and 300,000+ worldwide, it shows how anyone can develop the ability to see and shoot great digital photographs. Written by the author of The Photographer's Eye. Provides you with invaluable knowledge on avoiding clich?, the cyclical nature of fashion, style and mannerism, light and even how to handle the unexpected. Contains over 400 breathtaking images from real photographic assignments, with schematic illustrations of how and why the images work. Selected Images from The Photographer's Mind Bathed in light: composition, pose and lighting all move in the same direction--up towards the sun. A hidden landscape: inside a conch shell, but with none of the clues to suggest what it might be. A moment: the culmination of seven minutes and almost forty frames. Another Moment . . .: but an uncertain one. Amazon Exclusive: A Letter from Michael Freeman on The Photographer's Mind Dear Amazon Readers, Well, I’ve written and photographed many books, and I was a little shocked when last month the 150th one appeared. A third of these are about photography, and you might think that’s rather too many for one person to write. I mean, don’t I have anything better to do? Valid question, but I like books--no, more than that, I have a strong belief in them--and as my work involves a lot of travelling, I have a great deal of time to think and write when I’m on the road. In fact, I’ve always spent a little more than half of each year travelling, and usually on long trips. Five or six weeks at a time is my ideal, though it’s sometimes longer by necessity. This isn’t packaged tourism, of course, and many of the places I’m in are a little quieter and more remote than you might expect. Perfect for thinking about writing, and this writing is also about what I’m doing--shooting. Two and a half years ago I published The Photographer’s Eye, a book which at its core is about composition. This evolved from a much earlier book, long out of print. It always seemed to me that the word "technique" was usually being applied to the wrong things in photography. Technique was taken to mean twiddling knobs and working the controls, not to mention the arcana of imaging software.