Cringe at the forced poses, bad hair, and matching outfits--all prompting us to look at our own families and celebrate the fact that we're not alone. Nothing says awkward better than an uncomfortable family photograph!

    Here, Mary Street Alinder--who collaborated with Adams on his memoir and was his assistant in later life--is not reticent about the major emotional episodes in Adams's life, including his marriage and extramarital affairs, and his not-altogether-successful fatherhood. She explores the major artistic influences on his work and gives in-depth profiles of the significant figures in his circle. She also explains the technique and style Adams developed to obtain his unique vision, as well as his uneasiness at becoming a commodity. Ansel Adams: A Biography is an intimate and provocative portrait of the world's most famous photographer.

    Posing is truly a crucial skill that photographers need to have in order to create great photographs. If you're looking to improve your ability to pose your subjects--whether they're men, women, couples, or groups--best-selling author and photographer Lindsay Adler's The Photographer's Guide to Posing: Techniques to Flatter Everyone is the perfect resource for you.In the first half of The Photographer's Guide to Posing, Lindsay discusses how the camera sees, and thus how camera angle, lens choice, and perspective all affect the appearance of your subject. Lindsay then covers the five most important things that ruin a pose--such as placement of the hands, and your subject's expression and posture. If you can look out for and avoid these five things, your skills (and your images) will quickly improve. Next, Lindsay dives into -posing essentials, - outlining her approach to start with a -base pose, - then build on that to create endless posing opportunities. She also discusses posing the face--with specific sections dedicated to the chin, jaw, eyes, and forehead--as well as posing hands.In the second half of the book, Lindsay dedicates entire chapters to posing specific subject matter: women, men, couples, curvy women, families and small groups, and large groups. In each chapter, Lindsay addresses that subject matter's specific challenges, provides five -go-to poses- you can always use, and covers how to train the eye to determine the best pose for your subject(s). In the final chapter of the book, Lindsay brings it all together as she teaches you how to analyze a pose so that you can create endless posing opportunities and continuously improve your work

    200 color photos.

    Common scenes -- tiny figures on a beach, a porch railing against a storm-darkened sky, a blue raft against a summer cottage -- all are transformed by the poignant light of the Cape and the photographer's subtle and luminous vision. This exquisitely printed book captures every nuance of color and light in that unique juncture of sky, sea, and land that is Cape Cod.

    Whether you're an experienced enthusiast or toy camera neophyte, you'll find Plastic Cameras: Toying with Creativity chock full of tantalizing tips, fun facts and, of course, absolutely striking photographs taken with the lowest tech and simplest tools around. I got me a Holga. Now What? Holgas need a little TLC before they're ready to go out in the world and start snapping. Plastic Cameras: Toying with Creativity digs through all the different Holga models available, lays out thier advantages and quirks and helps you get up to speed on all the prep you'll need to do to jump in on the toy-camera revolution. What should I Feed my Holga? Holgas, Dianas, other toy cameras can use many types of film. Plastic Cameras: Toying with Creativity, lays all their pros and cons on the line letting you get some images you want, and some you could just never imagine. Can Holga come out to play?Plastic Cameras: Toying with Creativity will help you steer your way through all the details and quirks of taking wonderful and weird pictures with your toy camera. We'll explore possible subjects and the best way to shoot them and play with all sorts of techniques from vignetting, to multiple exposures, to panoramas, close-ups, movement, night photography, flare, flash, color and more. For the Intrepid Holga-ographerFor the Holga master, we've diagramed and described advanced toy camera modifications and introduce you to a variety of problems, solutions and inventions born from toy cameras' "limitations." What Next?From negatives to prints or pixels, we help you navigate your post-shooting choices.Don't ForgetThe Diana, Banner, Action Sampler, Photo Blaster, and Lensbaby are all toy cameras with their own loveable qualities. We'll look beyond the Holga to show a whole wide world of toys. Artists Artists in this book include: Michael AckermanJonathan BaileyEric Havelock-BaillieJames BalogBetsy BellSusan BowenLaura BurltonDavid BurnettNancy BursonPerry DilbeckJill EnfieldAnnette FournetMegan GreenWesley KennedyTeru KuwayamaMary Ann LynchAnne Arden McDonaldDaniel MillerTed OrlandRobert OwenBecky RamotowskiNancy RexrothFrancisco Mata RosasRichard RossFranco SalmoiraghiMichael SherwinHarvey SteinGordon StettiniusMark SinkKurt SmithSandy SorlienPauline St. Denis;-p r a b u!

    He believes that we are born with spiritual connections to one or more angels, and if we want their help in life we need to be open to receiving their assistance.

    And yet, when she finally does have something like that life, as a wife and mother in 1980s London, she is the one blaring music from her room, necking vodka and valium and making an almighty mess of her home and family.Cleaning other people’s houses, eventually, is the only option left. At 50 years old, post rehab, living alone in a Hackney bedsit, Michele finds herself finishing her working life as she had begun, “in a dumb job that you do when you can’t really do anything else...”This is a remarkable, powerful, and often unbearably funny memoir in which cleaning and getting clean intertwine as a strange and magical form of redemption. Michele Kirsch is a Nora Ephron for the modern age.

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    It is hard enough to find thesequalities in trained photographers with the benefit of schooling and mentors and a community of fellow artists and aficionados supporting and rewarding their efforts. It is incredibly rare to find it in someone with no formal training and no network of peers.Yet Vivian Maier is all of these things, a professional nanny, who from the 1950s until the 1990s took over 100,000 photographs worldwide—from France to New York City to Chicago and dozens of other countries—and yet showed the results to no one. The photos are amazing both for the breadth of the work and for the high quality of the humorous, moving, beautiful, and raw images of all facets of city life in America’s post-war golden age.It wasn’t until local historian John Maloof purchased a box of Maier’s negatives from a Chicago auction house and began collecting and championing her marvelous work just a few years ago that any of it saw the light of day. Presented here for the first time in print, Vivian Maier: Street Photographer collects the best of her incredible, unseen body of work.

    This work reveals the growth of an artist who saw no artificial boundary between art and the paying job and who succeeded in putting her indelible stamp on the visual imagination.

    Your secret can be a regret, fear, betrayal, desire, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything -- as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before. Be brief. Be legible. Be creative.It all began with an idea Frank Warren had for a community art project. He began handing out postcards to strangers and leaving them in public places -- asking people to write down a secret they had never told anyone and mail it to him, anonymously.The response was overwhelming. The secrets were both provocative and profound, and the cards themselves were works of art -- carefully and creatively constructed by hand. Addictively compelling, the cards reveal our deepest fears, desires, regrets, and obsessions. Frank calls them "graphic haiku," beautiful, elegant, and small in structure but powerfully emotional.As Frank began posting the cards on his website, PostSecret took on a life of its own, becoming much more than a simple art project. It has grown into a global phenomenon, exposing our individual aspirations, fantasies, and frailties -- our common humanity.Every day dozens of postcards still make their way to Frank, with postmarks from around the world, touching on every aspect of human experience. This extraordinary collection brings together the most powerful, personal, and beautifully intimate secrets Frank Warren has received -- and brilliantly illuminates that human emotions can be unique and universal at the same time.

    Step 1: Shedding Light on Light Sources Step 2: Conquer ISO Settings Step 3: Understanding Aperture/Depth of Field Step 4: Choosing a Shutter Speed Step 5: Composition Step 6: Tripods Step 7: Filters Heather Hummel Photography Spreads Pixel Dust on Land and Seascapes. Her photography has been on exhibit at Agora Gallery in the Chelsea District of New York City, C'ville Coffee in Charlottesville, VA and Valley View Hospital in Glenwood Springs, CO. Additionally, she licenses her photos through ImageBrief.

    WET DOG, by photographer Sophie Gamand, is a stunning and touching capture of this intimate moment. Elevating dog photography to the status of art, these expressive portraits of our canine friends mirror our very own human emotions.