Intro to Photo Books

Following are a few contemporary, historical, and student examples of photography books, to view as you begin considering your own photo book project, as well as some questions to consider as you plan for your mini-book.

William Klein, Life is Good and Good for You in New York (1956, Photography Magazine)

• Klein LIGAGFYINY

Matthew Connors, Fire in Cairo (2015, SPBH Editions)

• SPBH Book Page, Fire in Cairo
• Flip-Video, Fire in Cairo
• ICP Feature video, Matthew Connors / Fire in Cairo

Jim Bertram, Symmetry (Spring 2020 Advanced Digital Photo Student, semester project)

• Symmetry Blurb Book (click thumbnail for flip preview)

Kris Graves, A Bleak Reality (2018, NotWrong No.1)

• A Bleak Reality on Kris Graves’ site
• A Bleak Reality Photoeye Bookstore page

Robert Frank, The Americans (1958)

• The Americans book-flip
• The Americans, National Gallery of Art

William Klein, Life is Good and Good for You in New York (1956)

• William Klein, Life is Good and Good for you in New York book-flip

Erik Kessels, Image Tsunami (2016, Editorial RM)

• Erik Kessels, Image Tsunami book-flip
• Image Tsunami book description

Irina Rozovsky, One To Nothing (2011, Kehrer Verlag)

• One to Nothing book-flip
• One to Nothing on Kehrer Verlag

Isabel Miranda, DTX (2019, Blurb)

• DTX Blurb Preview (Spring 2019)
• One-Way Mirror (Spring 2021)

Doug Johnson, Faces | Places (2022, in progress)

• Faces/Places .pdf draft

 

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Some Questions to Consider for Your Mini-Book

• What size/aspect ratio will you choose for your book? Take a look at Blurb’s options, as this will be one of the first decisions that you’ll need to make. A square book works well if you are displaying single images in both vertical and horizontal format, as it treats them equally.
• Will your book include text? If so, what will be the relationship between image and text?
• What will the layout of your book be? Will it follow a consistent pattern, or will there be several types of spreads in the book? Will it be crowded like William Klein’s book, or more airy, allowing for negative space / whitespace? Will it make use of double-page spreads? Single images with a blank page opposite it for breathing room?
• What will your cover look like? Will it contain an image? An image that wraps around the entire cover, front to back? Just a solid color and a title (or not), so that it remains mysterious until opened? What about the spine?

 

Steps to take to Start Your Mini-Book

• Create a Blurb account (consider using a non-MassArt email), and order a paper sample pack (*2022: currently out of stock).
• Create a dedicated Lightroom Collection for your book, and begin to gather your image files there.
• Start a Google doc or Word Processing doc with any text you plan to use for your book.
• If you plan to use text, check out Adobe Web Fonts.
• Watch the  Lightroom Book Tutorial.