It’s been a long time coming, and with COVID shutting down my previous publisher’s photography division, this feels like it’s been an even longer time in the making – but we got there in the end…
And, I’m really excited to bring you the culmination of decades of shooting incredible places, in a format that might surprise.
Iconic Images | Deconstructed.
I’ve wanted to produce a coffee table book for years, but it always felt like it would be missing something – a part of my character, how I work, the things I share in the real world – if I wrote it in the same way as everyone else out there.
So we worked back from that, in all 250 pages of this hardback edition.
Together with our new publishers, Dashbook, I’ve designed a way to not only deliver a collection of stunning views that can be enjoyed in their own right, but also an in-depth deconstruction of every image with the complete recipe of how it was made, and how it can be captured by you too.
With a foreword by my friend and landscape legend Joe Cornish, along with support from Rafael and the team at Capture One, I’m really proud to be able to finally bring this whole thing to life.
And our first edition has some extra surprises for those who want a collector’s copy before it hits the bookshelves…
The Genesis
This book began with the conversations that happen after I share a photograph.
“How did you get that?” – a question I’ve been asked continually throughout my career; it’s also the reason this book exists.
The easy answer is to share the camera settings. They’re useful, of course, but dialling those same numbers into another camera on another day won’t explain why that particular photograph works. The more interesting part is how I arrived at those choices, given the place I was standing and what was happening around me.
By the time you see a finished image, most of that effort has disappeared. You can’t see the work involved in gaining access, or the composition I gave up on when the light went elsewhere. An adjustment in the edit might look obvious once it’s done, but what made me decide the photograph needed it? Those are the things I wanted to explore properly.
Teaching has reinforced how much there is to share in that process. Explaining a decision means examining it yourself, including the choices that have become instinctive. It also means being honest about the compromises. Knowing what you wanted is one thing; understanding what a place actually gives you, and working with it, is a huge part of making an image.
That became the premise for What the f/?: a return to photographs I care about and to open up the thinking behind them. I wanted to give the reader enough context to understand how each one came together, and enough detail to question the decisions along the way.
I also wanted to preserve the pleasure of simply looking. A photograph deserves a moment before someone starts explaining it. Finding room for both was central to the book from the outset.
Sharing these views has always been a privilege. This felt like an opportunity to go further – to share what making them has taught me, and let you decide what to take into your own photography.
Essentially, What the f/? brings together some of my favourite landscape and cityscape photographs from around the world, with the stories and decisions behind them.
Of course, doing things “the normal way” has never been my thing – and that’s where Dashbook come in.
Yes, in the future, the book will be available through standard channels – local bookstores (yay!), amazon (booooo!), along with other sales routes around the world.
But this presented an opportunity to have a unique “edition one” – where everyone could be a part of it.
Whether it’s your name in the book as a thank-you for being an “edition one collector”, or the exclusive fine art print that we’ll ship along with signed and numbered copies of the limited collector’s edition – there’s a format that should work for everyone as part of the launch:
But don’t delay – this edition closes strictly in 45 days’ time (Christmas Eve, to be precise!) – after which point, it’ll go to a standard edition with no special treats…
So if you want to be a part of the first edition, get featured in that special print run, and support the project more widely – here’s your opportunity, just click here to go to the pre-order page on dashbook now.
(And of course, if you just want to own a pretty cool book full of epic views from across the world, that’s OK too – it’s the same link.)
To those who buy a copy – thanks for being involved in my random way of sharing what I see with the world.
I hope you enjoy exploring the images as much as I enjoyed making them!
