Filmwasters
Which Board? => Main Forum => : Late Developer July 17, 2016, 01:32:35 PM
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I only subscribe to one monthly magazine: Black and White Photography (the UK one - which is delivered to my door) but I pick up Leica's "M" magazine (which is every 2-3 months) from the London "City" Leica store which is 10 minutes from where I work. I like to see latest exhibition listings and get inspiration from the portfolios posted. I tend to avoid the ones where gear reviews and adverts make up the majority of pages.
How about the rest of us? What is it we're looking for in photo magazines?
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None, zero, nix. I used to in the old days (pre-internet) and continued up until the digital revolution with Black and White Photography (I still have the first 50 or so copies if anyone understands their value). But roughly since about the time the Online Photographer and Strobist blogs started up, (2005/6 thereabouts) I think I've only bought two photo magazines (and only because they contained shots of my own). Almost everything I read is online.
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None. but I don't read online mags either. I just look at others' pictures.
When my interest started (early 90's) I bought Amateur Photographer and Practical Photography to learn about technique and gear. But all that made me do was buy expensive gear.
So now I just look at pictures. And as many members of this forum can demonstrate, it's the picture maker that counts - rather than the light-tight box which matters. But it took many years and quite a lot of expense for me to realise that truth.
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I get 'Black and White' the Uk version every month almost out of habit. I've got pretty well all of them stored in the shed but seldom revisit them. As a magazine it spends half it's time annoying the heck out of me but them I'll stumble across some excellent work and I forgive it! What annoys me is that a number of the pictures I'm sure started life deliberately as colour and looked better for it but were desaturated to increase the publishing opportunities.
Aside from that one I do like the recently relaunched Professional Photography. Nice reviews of the welll known talent and the voyeur in me likes to see the lightrooms and darkrooms of the featured photographers. About a third of it doesn't get a second glance as it is aimed at the business end.
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I used to get a lot but I haven't bought a photo magazine for months.
And it doesn't help that the place where I got them has begun shrinking their inventory massively.
Now all they have are Practical Photography, one issue of B&W UK, Shutterbug, Canon user, Nikon User, Le chasseur d'images (which hasn't evolved beyond the 1980's photo club level), the new Réponses Photo (which is so bad since the publisher decided to fire the entire staff to save a few bucks) and Photo (France).
I used to love the special editions of Réponses Photo which contained a very detailed and specialized subject in every issue... but they've stooped to the "how to use your DSLR" level... really bad. I used to love View Camera, Creative Photography (formerly creative darkroom techniques), PDN from time to time and a few others...
I guess I'll have to settle on what I can get at used book sales.
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I subscribed to View Camera too, but when it expired I didn't really miss it.
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I subscribed to View Camera too, but when it expired I didn't really miss it.
View Camera is the magazine I buy most often. I like the mix of technical and non-technical.
Online I used to read Square (http://www.squaremag.org/) religiously and BLUR (http://www.blur-magazine.com/) occasionally, but not in a long time. BJP (http://www.bjp-online.com/), too.
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B&W if I'm bored, like now, sitting in another airport. Otherwise I tend not buy any these days.
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Is it just me or the magazines used to be a lot better a while back?
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I don't read any.
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Is it just me or the magazines used to be a lot better a while back?
If you're speaking of magazines in general and not photo magazines specifically, the answer is yes. As an example I recently bought my son a subscription to Thrasher because he had gotten his first board and I remember reading it all the time back in the 80s. When the first issue arrived I was astounded at the advertisement to article ration. I suppose they need to do whatever they can to survive in a digital world, but it certainly made reading the printed magazine an incredibly annoying experience. Or maybe I'm just getting old...
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And they used to have good writers like Stecyk back in the days.
I sometimes go to the skateshop to pick up one of the free magazines they have and every time I read them I'm appalled at the level of writing in them. Stories fit on less than a page, photography isn't as good as it used to and lots of ads (which is expected for a free magazine).
But even the ads don't have the edge they used to. I sorely miss the days when Jim Phillips was doing graphics for Santa-Cruz and all their ads, and Craig Stecyk wrote plenty of adventure stories and did all the advertising for Powell-Peralta and their Bones Brigade.
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I was an Aperture Magazine (http://aperture.org/magazine/) and Diffusion Magazine (https://diffusionmag.com/) (not sure if they still publish the journal) subscriber some years ago, but not now. One of the online periodicals I usually like to view is the Kat Kiernan's Don't Take Pictures (http://www.donttakepictures.com/) bulletin.
I know this next is not a magazine, but I follow with a mix of curiosity, interest and fascination Sandy King's Yahoo group Carbon Transfer Printing (https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/CarbronTransfer/conversations/messages/6935).
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Is it just me or the magazines used to be a lot better a while back?
Years ago (pre-digital), I used to buy Amateur Photographer and Practical Photographer quite regularly. Both contained a fair bit of advertising which, understandably, helps keep the price down. However, they did seem to have more of an eye for tips on how to take photographs than devoting column inches to gear tests.
I'm not sure if this is "better" but it was certainly "better" for me as my primary reason for buying magazines is to get inspiration for places to visit and things to see and photograph - as well as learn techniques for shooting things with which I'm unfamiliar.
These days, I'm becoming quite picky about the paper magazines I buy so I'm grateful for pointers and links to online magazines. I like squaremag and have recently started to read "f11 magazine": http://www.f11magazine.com/ (http://www.f11magazine.com/)
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I used to buy Amateur Photography intially but my staple magazine became Photo Techniques.
AP introduced me to Marsten & Heard, AW Young, Phototec Group and I regulary used to travel to their shop in Birmingham to stock up on paper. I even bought some light stands and carried them home on the train.
http://www.photomemorabilia.co.uk/Phototec.html (http://www.photomemorabilia.co.uk/Phototec.html)
Now I occasionnaly buy B&W UK if there is something of interest, or I need something to entertain on holiday.
Mike
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I think B&W UK was much better when Ailsa was the editor...
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I think B&W UK was much better when Ailsa was the editor...
Agree - but it's one of the few that seems to have done its best to limit the advertisement content, though that seems on the increase over the past few months.
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None here.
They all look the same after a while so I don't read them.
I read and look at tons of photos/images, but it's all online.
I do look at and read photo books....
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I think Lenswork is the photography magazine that publishes the most beautiful work (and is the most lushly printed) http://www.lenswork.com/ (http://www.lenswork.com/)
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I think Lenswork is the photography magazine that publishes the most beautiful work (and is the most lushly printed) http://www.lenswork.com/ (http://www.lenswork.com/)
By quirk of fate, I'd forgotten about Lenswork but got a reminder the other day that my online subscription was due. I must start downloading more of their articles, etc on my tablet. I prefer the printed magazines but they are hard to find in the UK and the online service is much more convenient - though the website can be a pig to navigate.
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As a member of the RPS I receive a copy of their Journal every month. From what was a badly designed and printed periodical it has now become a very readable, well designed and printed magazine which I look forward to landing on my doorstep.
I also subscribe to 'On Landscape' online magazine which has some very interesting articles, including film and scanning.
Following on from the earlier Ailsa reference, amongst others she now edits the new Lee Filters magazine and the most recent edition features Leon
http://www.leefilters.com/images/pdf/Xposure-05-Spreads.pdf (http://www.leefilters.com/images/pdf/Xposure-05-Spreads.pdf)
Paul
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I didn't know about this one...
Looks better than what we can find on the stands.
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Thank you for the leefilters link! That magazine looks very good ... an excellent combi of photography and marketing.
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I think Lenswork is the photography magazine that publishes the most beautiful work (and is the most lushly printed) http://www.lenswork.com/ (http://www.lenswork.com/)
By quirk of fate, I'd forgotten about Lenswork but got a reminder the other day that my online subscription was due. I must start downloading more of their articles, etc on my tablet. I prefer the printed magazines but they are hard to find in the UK and the online service is much more convenient - though the website can be a pig to navigate.
It's funny, I used to work in Anacortes (where they're based), but while I was between cameras. I didn't find their magazine until I after I moved away. If I had only known.
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I'm interested in what other folk read and I've had a nose at most of the titles suggested. I don't want to say I don't like the style of a particular magazine which others have praised, but many of them, to my eye, appear to be over cooked, with most looking like an ad for post manipulation software. The colours are un-naturally rendered (viewed on an Eizo monitor) and draw attention to themselves, rather than the picture. My eye lands on the falseness which glares the most, rather than the subject of the composition. Or am I just an old dinosaur in a post-PS world?
Having said that, I'm really pleased that I have discovered Square - thank you whoever mentioned it.
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Yes, David, you are a dinosaur - but I do happen to agree with you :o
Thing is, it's a bit like looking at "thumbnails", the ones that jump out at you tend to be the ones you click on and view full size. I really don't like HDR processing unless it is done so well that it's all-but invisible. It's probably why the bulk of the stuff I look at / read is B&W - the colour mags / websites can be a bit too zingy.
Square Magazine can be very good.
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another vote for lenswork. lots of photos and interesting interviews. was a while since I read it though.
I usually buy a photography mag when traveling, as I normally don't have much time to read.
ohyeah, the german photoklassik is a pleasure to read too. (swedish is close enough to get a gist of it haha)