Monthly Archives: April 2011

Tomorrow’s books

Well done, Al Gore!

Al Gore’s new interactive book – click the right arrow to view.

Following up on his movie about the environment, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, Nobel laureate Al Gore has published an interactive book named ‘Our Choice’ which can be downloaded from Apple’s App Store for $5. (Not via iBooks). It is simply superb and you would expect no less from a member of Apple’s Board of Directors. Whether you agree with the content is not the point here. This is a peek into the future of books and I recommend its purchase with great enthusiasm. The level of interactivity – photos, charts, videos, voiceovers – is beautifully done.

The application used to design and create the book was created by a couple of Apple engineers (no surprises there!) at a business aptly named Push Pop Press and the exciting part is that they hope to release a Mac desktop application which will allow anyone to emulate the technology in Gore’s book. Imagine the possibilities with photo books – clickable voice overs, pictures which enlarge and fold out when clicked, videos in ‘how to’ manuals, you name it. It should work well for both the art and technology sides of photography.

I can’t wait to get my copy, which will put the simple eBooks I have created to shame. Click ‘My Books’ at the right to see these.

Update:

Sadly Push Pop Press has been acquired by scummy Facebook and the book app will never see the light of day. Look here for more details.

Kevin Moore

A photographer-artist.

I came across Kevin Moore’s work when he left a comment on a piece I had written detailing my open heart surgery on the HP DesignJet printer, which may have brought another one of these wonderful beasts back to the land of the living.

Any photographer commenting here and leaving a web site URL will have me checking out his work and I loved what I saw of Kevin’s oeuvre.

Here are a few words from Kevin on his history and goals:

About Me:
In my photography I am trying (like I think we all are) to be unique, and original. I am also trying to emulate the emotions I feel for my photographs and relate them to my audience through the compositions, tones, contrast, and focal points of my subjects. I will be having my first show including my photography and paint on canvas works here in Seattle sometime in June or July.

I was born in Hope, Rhode Island outside of Providence and am currently residing in the beautiful northwest city of Seattle. I have worked with many mediums and on many surfaces over the years, and am using my combination of experiences in both art and life to express my artistic desires. Not only is beauty in the eye of the beholder, but it can be found in every facet of one’s life. I was going to suggest opening your eyes, but then I realized beauty also lies behind closed lids. I hope you enjoy my works.

Some of my favorites from Kevin’s elegant site:

From the series ‘Smoke and Mirrors’

From the series ‘Civilized Decay’

From the series ‘Civilized Decay’

From the series ‘Manipulated’

From the series ‘Paint on Canvas’

Kevin has limited the number of images on his site and has done a superb job of design. I think you will enjoy them.

Jackson Square

Not a square, but quite lovely.

Jackson Square is a small area one block north of the Transamerica pyramid in San Francisco. It’s home to high end decorator, architect and antique businesses. It’s really only a couple of streets and alleyways, not a square, but there are many gems to be spotted there.

Jackson ‘Square’.

All of these were snapped within a minute or two.

All on the Panasonic G1 with the kit lens, ISO 320.

David Hobby

The power of the web exemplified.

Perhaps the greatest change wrought by the internet on commerce is the destruction of the middleman. That mostly means the high street retailer. From tires to books to eyeglasses, no store is required. Just a warehouse, a good web site and UPS.

One example of this is in the work of the photographer and lighting expert David Hobby, who levered his redundancy pay into a successful website which addresses photographic lighting and is now making good money from taking his lecture show on the road. Congratulations! Embrace change or be killed by it.

For more from Slate click the picture and be sure to view the embedded slide show.

Click the picture for the story.

Silentuk – Urbex

Simply outstanding.

A friend in the UK sent over a link to the Silentuk blog which specializes in urban exploration. The sort of work featured here recalls earlier efforts by a US master of the genre, Jonathan Haeber, and does a wonderful job of creating a record of man’s creations which are otherwise lost to his fellow man.

The reportage they have just done on the defunct Royal Mail underground railway is to die for. An extraordinary effort just to access the system, the high risk of detection and the accompanying superb photography all speak loudly to why we take pictures. They write that the system was originally built in 1855 before the days of electricity and was pneumatically powered! Shades of Dante’s Inferno. Electrification of the system illustrated was undertaken in 1915 and speaks to the great age of civil and electrical engineering.

Click the picture for the story.

There’s one photo in the large collection which speaks to the quintessential English delicacy. Tea. Here it is:

Be sure to visit the Silentuk blog.