Recent Book Cover Sales

A selection of book covers from the past few months....

Almost at the 500 mark now. I think a celebration meal may be in order when that day comes.

Leica M Monochrom. Part 4 - Flights of Fancy

I've recently embarked on a writing assignment that will hopefully teach readers a few basic tips and tricks and encourage them to play with their imagery. More news to follow...

I've been looking through various books and online sources to confirm to myself that photo manipulation is not confined to modern photography and the list of practitioners is vast. Its history is as old as photography itself and some of the work is amazing. It is interesting to read the various arguments between the purists (straight photography) and the pictorialists (anything goes photography). This week I discovered William Mortensen by following different threads and I think he's got to be added to my list of inspirational photographers. Apparently Ansel Adams took a definite dislike to his approach and strongly argued against his manipulated, stage and romanticist imagery. Check out Carey Loren's write up at   http://50watts.com/Monsters-and-Madonnas-Looking-at-William-Mortensen )

Other practitioners I've been looking at recently include the following:

Oscar Gustave Rejlander - composite/combination printing
Julia Margaret Cameron - staged photography
Francis James Mortimer - composite/combination printing
Henry Peach Robinson - composite/combination printing
Angus McBean - photo manipulation
Jerry Uelsmann composite/combination printing
Man Ray -experimental techniques


The Leica M Monochrom and me are now taking a slight diversion in approach. I'm still getting to grips with what it can do (I still make mistakes and I wish I could say every picture ever taken was amazing, but I can't), but it's time to take a little holiday in my world.

The Spitfire is 100% Leica M Monochrom. The remainder are appx. 70% Leica 30% Nikon. I've started building folders of Leica resources to incorporate into my imagery, but at the moment I don't have everything I need in those folders.

I'm working on it.

Publications

A selection of book cover sales from the last few months.

Published work

A selection of recently published work taking the total count to 375 book covers in 23 countries.

Published work. June 2012

Recent sales from Trevillion Images has taken me over the 300 book cover mark and my work has now been sold in 20 countries.

Watching the moon in the rear view mirror

So there I was, driving along the downs - one of the highest points on The Island - and I'm heading straight toward the most fantastic moon. The biggest, brightest I've seen in a long time. I swear you could have reached out and touched it, it was that big. I had no camera, nowhere to stop and traffic up me jacksy. When I got to the next junction I had no choice, but to turn and drive away. I watched it in my rear view as long as possible. 

Published work

A small selection of recent sales sold through Trevillion Images.

From small acorns.

When I took my leap of faith I only had a handful of book covers under my belt and, to be honest, I had no idea if I would still be doing this some years later and if I would still be enjoying myself. It's hard to remain positive in the beginning, especially when those bills arrive and you've only sold a few initial images, but the great thing about working in the creative world is that you can switch your mind off to all that outside-your-head-stuff. You can channel your energy, focus on someplace else. Eventually you start to realise that people are recognising the love and effort you've put into things and that spreads outwards and multiplies as people start buying and promoting your work.

Anyways.

That small acorn is now growing nicely and the shoots are looking healthy. I managed to pass the 200 book cover mark over the last fortnight. I reckon I can fix the first rung of the wooden ladder that will eventually lead up to the top of the tree where I'm planning a really cool, childhood-wowness, kinda house.

Published work

A few more recent sales.

Photo Manipulation

Being quite an avid fan of photo manipulation and having a background in graphic design, it is always interesting to see what may become of my images once a publisher decides to use it for a book cover.

Submitting work to a photo library is not quite the same as fulfilling a specific brief - I tend to create images mainly for myself, but hope that ultimately they get picked out, bought and used by art buyers. What happens next is usually beyond my control. Will it get the whole cover? A bit of a cover? Will it be tweaked or changed to become something different? Will one image be turned into two?

I just never know, but trust in the judgement of others.

A friend joked that I should have left the island out, but I liked the sense of adventure it represented.

Published work

Received my quarterly statement from Trevillion Images and have just managed to top my recent goal by reaching 151 book covers! Hoping to hit 200 early next year.