Pixiq

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My Book:
Experimental Digital Photography
Is Being Reprinted

Almost exactly one year ago, May 4, 2010, my book, Experimental Digital Photography, was published by Lark Books (which is part of Sterling Publishing who owns this PIXIQ website). When I first proposed the idea for this book (my third book on digital photography), the editor and I were unsure if there was enough interest to justify a book. However, to our delight in just a year this book has sold out and is now in its second printing.

In addition 247 libraries in the US and around the world have a copy of my book. Click this library link to locate a library near you. It is also available for sale in 27 countries outside the US on every continent (except Antarctica :). Plus it is being used as a text book in college courses.

And since I started writing articles about experimental digital photography here at PIXIQ.com just a few months ago, over 23,000 people have read them and another 230+ people have become fans of my 'page' for this book on Facebook. Who would have thunk it?

Almost from the moment that I bought my first primitive digital camera in 1998, I started experimenting. After taking tens of thousands of pictures, I felt very strongly that because digital photography had new capabilities, it was the perfect medium for exploring very new ideas in photography. For creative and adventurous people, digital photography allows experimenting like never before -- and no special or expensive camera is required.

I was also concerned that photography had become too software oriented -- as every book, for example, that covered experimentation talked about software manipulation rather than photographic effects. I wanted to write a book that dealt almost entirely with photography as photography and then took photography to new heights.

My main insight has been to use slow shutter speeds, as this area of work was virtually ignored with film photography -- since although it was possible, it was time consuming, expensive and very unpredictable making pre-visualization almost impossible. Yet now with digital I can take candid photos, in unfamiliar situations and lighting, and within a few minutes be able to get usable shots -- which would have been impossible with film.

And there are so many areas for digital experimenting: light painting, camera painting, night photography, and the full range of slow shutter speeds from 1/4 of a second to 20 seconds -- the effect of each shutter speed setting quite different from the next. And to add icing to the cake: with practice almost all of this can be done handheld with digital -- adding another capability. [See my related articles here at PIXIQ about handholding and shooting at slow shutter speeds.]

And this kind of imagery has a depth to it. I make the additional point in the book, that this is not just an effect or an eye catching gimmick -- it relates to ideas that have been part of art and photography for a very long time: a quest to create pictures that depict motion and a sense of motion.

To my delight a seasoned long term photographer, Wayne Cosshall of Australia, gave my book the following review at the Digital Image Maker website:

Rick Doble’s Experimental Digital Photography is a timely and excellent book for loosening people up and helping them to break out. The book focuses on the more expressive and creative forms of photography, from using slow shutter speeds and creating extreme blur to night and low light photography.

Organised into nine chapters, it covers:
Getting Started: the technical side of experimental photography
Shooting at slow shutter speeds
Movement
Light and white balance
Night and low light photography
Experiments with light
Building your imagery
Saving and editing your images
Judging images and finding your voice

Filled with stunning images, mostly Rick’s but also including profiled work by others, the book is a feast for the eyes and so can be both read as a book and flicked through for inspiration at other times when you are feeling creatively constipated. The first chapter shows you how to use the camera controls for the most flexibility, as used in the later chapters. The book then gets into blur and movement and really pushing your ideas of what an image is.

The book does an excellent job of covering the types of experimental photography that Rick obviously enjoys. He is passionate about it and this comes across in the book and is contagious, making you want to go out and try things.

Come join the fun and the joy of experimental digital photography.

NOTE:See a list of my other articles here at PIXIQ. www.pixiq.com/contributors/rick-doble

See the listing for my book on Amazon:: Experimental Digital Photography.

Join me on Facebook. Become a 'fan' of my Facebook page on Experimental Digital Photography. Click on the 'like' button at the top of the Facebook page.