Snow Monkeys by Martin Bailey
In the opening scenes of Ron Fricke’s masterpiece “Baraka”, the camera zooms in on snow monkeys soaking in a hot spring in Nagano, Japan. Ever since I saw the film almost 20 years ago I’ve been fascinated by the creatures. Upon opening up the second issue of Photograph Quarterly, Craft & Vision’s new(ish) photography magazine, I was thrilled to discover that the first featured portfolio includes images of snow monkeys. Japan-based photographer Martin Bailey captures the spirit of the monkeys and really gives a sense of their humanity (monkey-manity?). Also displayed are cranes, waterfalls and other aspects of nature that make me want to book the next flight to Japan – it is only a short flight away after all.
At 120 or so pages, this second edition of Photograph Quarterly is packed with fantastic imagery, a little technical talk, some tips on composition and a whole lot more. For me, the strongest part of the magazine is the featured portfolio section. The first half of each issue is simply photographs, backed up by revealing interviews with the featured photographers. The aforementioned Martin Bailey and his work from Japan, the Africa work of Andy Biggs and the portraiture of Chris Orwig are worth the price alone. Speaking of price, grabbing a subscription offers the best value giving you a 25% discount over individual issues and guarantees you’ll never miss out on a future offering. At only US$24 it’s great value and helps fund future issues.Click here to view more details
As far as I’m concerned the emphasis on photographs and the photographers who create them is a welcome change from so many other magazines where you have to hunt for the content that’s sandwiched somewhere among all the ads. Next time you’re near a bookstore or newsstand, pick up one of the magazines available and flick through. It seems that most of them are little more than catalogs these days, so it’s very refreshing to see Craft & Vision producing ad-free publications.
The second half of the magazine goes into detail on composition, using natural light – some great long exposure work by Younes Bounhar, a look at Lightroom, behind the scenes on a sushi shoot, a look at printing plus a couple more columns that I’ll leave as a surprise for you. All in all, Photograph Quarterly offers great value with its focus on the art and craft of photography. If you’re someone who likes buying these issue by issue, you can get issue 2 at this link but consider a subscription and help promote quality photography.
