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13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
A rather quirky monochrome workbook, 19 Jun 1999
By A Customer
Amongst some aspiring photographers working in the monochrome field this book, and its author, seems to have acquired a status verging on the mythical. 'Elements' is a strange hybrid of picture-book, technique manual and autobiography, and anyone coming to it for straightforward photographic advice and ideas way well find themselves a little confused.Thornton is beyond doubt an accomplished photographer, and a master of darkroom and chemical techniques, but two things bother me. First of all, I simply don't rate the photographs very highly. They're good, certainly, but they don't move me in the way some other landscape photographers' work does. Second, I find the egotistical tone a little hard to deal with. Far from _clarifying_ the process of making quality mono prints, Thornton mystifies it, his exotic chemical formulae reading like a wizard's potions.Ultimately 'Elements' is a Zone System manual, but you'll find few references to the work of Ansel Adams. As an instruction book it is obscure where Adams's series 'The Camera', 'The Negative', 'The Print' is clear and illuminating. As a picture book it is dispensible where Adams's work is unforgettable. And the autobiographical stuff? Sometimes interesting.I'm actually glad to have this book - Thornton's advice is often top-class, and he's doubtlessly tried more film/developer combinations than most people. But read Adams first, go out, shoot loads of film, develop, print, shoot some more, and only then come to Thornton to get some ideas for different approaches. 'Elements' is a great book, but a photographic bible it ain't.
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