Stieglitz's Camera Work--Reprinted

[Jeremy]

After a pre-posting check with our veritable leader I thought I would make a post here on APUG about my work to have Stieglitz's Camera Work reprinted.

Well, the time has finally come and the first 4 issues are being offered to the public!

Just to give you a more detailed description of what I'm doing: I was able to gather a set of all 50 issues on loan and am in the process of scanning the issues and creating a digital master set to be uploaded to http://www.lulu.com for reprinting. With the availability of books with high quality (well, offset) reproductions of the illustrations

Seen here:

http://www.amazon.com/Alfred-Stiegl...6448812?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181005436&sr=8-1
http://www.amazon.com/Camera-Works-...6448812?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1181005436&sr=8-2

my main concern is the text (though every page in the original is accounted for!), so the books are being printed in b&w to keep the costs down. They will be released in volumes of ~300 pages (which is 3-4 issues depending on individual issue length) with a cost of $19.99/volume.

I am asking you to spend a little bit of money and invest the time to read Stieglitz's Camera Work: Issues 1-4

If you have any questions feel free to ask them here or PM or email me privately. As all of the issues pre-date 1923 there is no copyright infringement as it is not copyrighted material, it is in the public domain (this fact was cross-checked with the Library of Congress).

(http://www.lulu.com/content/879217)

 

[Chazzy]

my main concern is the text (though every page in the original is accounted for!), so the books are being printed in b&w to keep the costs down.

So the color of the original illustrations will not be reproduced???

 

[Jeremy]

So the color of the original illustrations will not be reproduced???

Correct, there is zero color used in the printing of these books.

Also, the printed page looks much better than the "Preview" pages provided; I have my copy in hand and it looks much better than I had hoped for!

The illustrations are still lacking in depth, but as I stated above, the Taschen and Dover books do a much better job with the illustrations than I could do AND keep the volumes affordable. To be honest, I could make the volumes ridiculously expensive with off-set printing and still never approach the quality of the original hand-pulled photogravures.

 

[JG Motamedi]

Thanks Jeremy!

I have placed my order and look forward to seeing the other volumes as well as the Collodion Journal and the Phila. Photographer.

Great work.

jason

 

[Peter Schrager]

great idea jeremy. you is amazin!!
best, Peter

 

[doughowk]

Thanks for your efforts. Looking forward to getting the book.

 

[athanasius80]

Well there goes another paycheck. Thanks Jeremy!

 

[mtbbrian]

Speaking of Stieglitz..
I am reading
The Moment Of Seeing: Minor White at the CSFA, and it mentions something that I beleive is attributed to Stieglitz.
"The Theory of Equivalants"
Is that something Stieglitz came up with or was it someone else?
I haven't found any good information on this theory, that is why I am asking here.
Brian

 

[Kerik]

Excellent work, J. I'll be ordering one.

 

[RobertP]

here here...I'll be placing an order also

 

[JHannon]

I just ordered one. Great work!

 

[jp80874]

Not mentioned yet, but one more reason to thank Jeremy by purchasing this is that we can see this version. When my Taschen copy arrived I was so disappointed to see how small it was, 5 ½ x 7 ¾ inches. Jeremy’s work has grown to 8 ½ x 11. Thank you sent to Lulu by Paypal.

John Powers

 

[doughowk]

Received today the Lulu book, and its very well done. Interesting to see the arguments that were then current - such as whether photography should include manipulated images with Steichen saying all images are manipulated - unless we can create a machine that does it all. Shall be interesting reading.
Thanks, Jeremy

 

[athanasius80]

Got it today, can't wait to buy the next installment!

 

[Jeremy]

Speaking of the next installment, does anyone have any suggestions for improving volume 2 (issues 5-8)?

Jason suggested a title page separating each issue which I will implement.

Any other ideas?

 

[athanasius80]

A title page would be nice. A full table of contents or index for the complete run would be quite helpful too. So when is Vol. 2 ready?

 

[Jeremy]

A title page would be nice.

done and done

A full table of contents or index for the complete run would be quite helpful too.

hadn't thought about that and i'm wondering if the usefulness of it is worthwhile in the face of indexing 50 issues. also, the sheets in my book aren't paginated so i'm thinking of adding running page numbers for each volume (so there would be 2 page numbers on each page), but the more i think about it the less i like the idea

So when is Vol. 2 ready?

the 2nd volume is nearing completion, but i am considering releasing them once a month/every 6 weeks/every 2 months. this is not the only digitization project i'm working on (2 others are in the works). Thoughts?

 

[jp80874]

I love the idea. I love the text. Is there anything you or Lulu could do to improve the quality of the photos? I can probably go find those pictures in other books, but if possible an improvement would be nice. Thank you for doing this.

John Powers

 

[Jeremy]

I love the idea. I love the text. Is there anything you or Lulu could do to improve the quality of the photos? I can probably go find those pictures in other books, but if possible an improvement would be nice. Thank you for doing this.

John Powers

John,

The short answer is no. I tried out a couple of different settings buying a couple of copies and while the text has been spot-on every time the quality of the images is too variable. There is the option to raise the image quality, but it requires printing with color inks (so you'd have color problems) and EVERY page has to be printed with the color machines and this increases the book price to a level I find unacceptable. Finally, even with me raising the book price and printing in color I still wouldn't get the quality in the offset printing books I referenced in the original post (and you can get the Taschen for under $16) so I find it a wash and am concentrating on the text.

 

[jp80874]

Jeremy,

Thanks for trying. I have the Taschen and several books of photographers of the time. I really like what you have done. Let us know when the next one is ready.

John

 

[Gene_Laughter]

On a couple of the sample pages of images there were noticable Moire' patterns. Do these patterns exist in the reprint of 1-4?

Thanks,

Gene

 

[jp80874]

Jeremy,
When ever you release the second vol. don't be concerned if first vol. buyers don't jump immediately. They simply may be away on vacation and won't know. I leave tomorrow for two weeks, another APUG friend is taking his family to the mountains for three weeks. This is a great project.

John Powers

 

[JHannon]

Got my copy, great job! I am waiting for the next....

 

[clay]

The images do not show the pattern you refer to. They are not photo-quality, however. But certainly good enough to use with the Taschen book at your elbow for some better looks at some of the winners.

On a couple of the sample pages of images there were noticable Moire' patterns. Do these patterns exist in the reprint of 1-4?

Thanks,

Gene

 

[Tony Egan]

Speaking of Stieglitz..
I am reading
The Moment Of Seeing: Minor White at the CSFA, and it mentions something that I beleive is attributed to Stieglitz.
"The Theory of Equivalants"
Is that something Stieglitz came up with or was it someone else?
I haven't found any good information on this theory, that is why I am asking here.
Brian

Brian,
"Equivalence" was a Stieglitz concept built on further by Minor White. This article may be of interest to you:

http://www.jnevins.com/whitereading.htm