Reading : Fashion Photography.

This week I have been spending my time reading and learning about various fashion photographers. This has lead on from watching the documentary last week. I had been given Fashion Photography: A brief history, list of publications, and most influential figures in fashion and editorial photography edited by Monica Millian.

The book is not quite what I had expected. For a start the information had been collated from a variety of 'high quality' Wikipedia articles. This meant that I then had to double check that all of the information was correct mainly for my own piece of mind - it was all accurate.

The book started with a brief overview of photography in general and then specifically talked about fashion photography. I am not sure that the section regarding advertising needed to be as long as it is. Information on fashion magazines such as Vogue and Harpers Bazaar was particularly interesting to me as I am also a fashion writer and am of course very familiar with these publications.

I think that the chapter on 'The Pioneers of Fashion Photography' was a long time coming - it starts at page 79 (of 129). Some of the photographers I had heard of such as Cecil Beaton, Irving Penn and Richard Avedon but others I had not like Louise Dahl-Wolfe so at least this proved to be a worthwhile exercise.

All of the 'Fashion and Portrait Photographers of Today' were known to me but it was nice to refresh my memory.

Generally the book was helpful in providing a basic overview, I think for more detailed info I will have to look elsewhere. This was a useful starting point.