Photo by David Sparks
In support of the Sunday Support Group this week I thought I'd share a personal project by TOP reader David Sparks. Here's part of what he wrote:
I am an 80-year-old retired neuroscientist and a longtime lurker on TOP. My retirement hobby is nature photography, primarily bird photography. The stimulus for sending this note was your posts about the Sunday Support Group.
The project I just completed is a collection of photos of Black Skimmers, each of which is intended to illustrate historical quotes that describe the unique structure and behavior of this bird. The quotes are taken from writings of Charles Darwin, Rachel Carson, and from early articles in the archives of ornithology journals such as The Auk and The Condor. The quotes are prepotent. I selected the photos to illustrate the quotes. I thought the emphasis on the words would interest you with your love of writing. Quotes and photos were converted into a 44-page, 8x8-inch lay-flat book printed by Zno. Only a dozen copies were printed and given to family members and a few birding friends. Now I am working on two or three similar projects and trying to 'touch them every day.'
Here's a link to a site showing the cover and contents of the Black Skimmer project.
I wonder if the stuff I'm doing is of any interest to people who live in the real world of photography.
I enjoyed David's project, primarily for the reason intended—it let me "meet" a species I previously knew nothing about. But I think there are a couple of other reasons, just for me. I'm reminded of what I learned from Jiro Dreams of Sushi—"too much rice, and the rice wins; too much fish, and the fish wins." In other words, balance is key. In putting words with pictures over many years and observing many projects which do, I've learned that balance between the two is difficult to achieve. One or the other usually "wins." David's use of the quotes with pictures, for me, strikes a nice balance. The pictures amplify the quotes and the quotes amplify the pictures.
Finally, it's just nice to get such a clear window into something that someone else really cares about; I always enjoy that.
Mike
P.S. About Zno books: "In 2012 the photo book market was dominated by press-printed books. Professional photographers preferred a special kind of books called flush mount albums, also known as wedding albums, but they were expensive.
"Today we are the biggest flush-mount album maker in the world, and we make high quality albums with the lowest price and the fastest turn-around time. We make everything ourselves. Our mission is to make all things beautiful and make them insanely affordable.
"We've also grown to become a global company. Our product and design department is in San Francisco, California. Our manufacturing is in Shanghai, China. Our global delivery and warehouse is in Houston, Texas. We ship to all countries at low flat rate." (From the Zno website.)
Original contents copyright 2018 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.
B&H Photo • Amazon US • Amazon UK
Amazon Germany • Amazon Canada • Adorama
(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:
Rob de Loe: "This really is a wonderful project. The photography is terrific, and the text matches beautifully. The link you provided actually allows the reader to read all the pages. It's well worth the time. It would make me enormously happy to be producing work like this when I am 80."
Dave Burns: "I just received my first Zno book a week ago with photographs from my workshop in Cuba with Peter Turnley. I was surprised at the high quality given the price but I would definitely order again. Recommended."
UPDATE: Reply from David Sparks: " Thank you for highlighting the Black Skimmer project on TOP. I thank the authors of the comments for their generous remarks too. A sentence or two about the motivation behind my current projects follows. The general goal of my bird photography is to try to capture, in an unobtrusive manner, the beauty and uniqueness of the birds, and some of the characteristic behaviors displayed in their natural habitat. The Black Skimmer project and the other projects I am working on now is an effort to preserve some of the successful images in a format that will be more accessible to family and friends when I am no longer around. Unless I do something to give prominence to selected photos they will just remain part of the bloated Lightroom catalogs where they now reside."
Mike replies: Thank you for letting me feature it. By the way, I might point out that having it featured on TOP also bears out the wisdom of your program for "giving prominence to selected photos." Good job on that!
David: That’s a lovely, heart-driven project on a unique species of birds. I very much enjoyed paging through the online book. Thanks very much for sharing it with us David (and Mike).
Posted by: Ken Tanaka | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 10:16 AM
Very nice work by David Sparks. The photos are wonderful.
I am not in the same league, but also like to compose photobooks, mine with a firm operating in Brazil, Digipix. Here is a link to a proof of a PDF file of book describing a lovely location where we lived for a few years in Florida: file:///C:/Users/Luiz/Pictures/Photos_pps_13/%23304_ChampionsGate_fotolivro/%23304%20fotos/ChampionsGate%202016_21b%20PREVIEW.pdf
Being in Florida, it also has some birds on the story...
I hope your post will encourage other amateur photographers to print their books.
Also an incentive to Mike to keep working on his project.
Posted by: Luiz Barata | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 10:28 AM
Mike, please forgive this digression. There is one quote from David Sparks' inspiring book by William Beebe which brought to mind another Beebe quote about the extinction and preservation of all things but species in particular.
"The beauty and genius of a work of art may be reconceived, though its first material expression be destroyed; a vanished harmony may yet again inspire the composer; but when the last individual of a race of living beings breathes no more, another heaven and another earth must pass before such a one can be again."
William Beebe, The Bird, 1906
Photography has a way of linking us to other subjects.
George Andros
Posted by: George Andros | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 11:36 AM
That is very nicely done. Love the use of quotes. I probably would have tried to put things in my own words and it would not have been nearly as interesting and unique. I might have to steal the idea for a project of my own someday.
Posted by: John Krumm | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 11:55 AM
Fabulous! Recently I dipped my toe into bird photography; a colony of great egrets found the quarter acre tidal marsh behind our house, and visited regularly for a couple weeks. I rented a longer lens, and spent some wonderful time with them as they probably decimated the population of small fish in the area. Kudos, David, for the range of captures, particularly of the birds in flight. It looks like you were pretty locked in.
Posted by: anthony reczek | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 05:34 PM
What a bird! What a beak. Reminds me of holding chopsticks - the bottom one ahead of the other. I've been a bird watcher for many years, and I love this bird. Never seen it before. Who gave it that super-size beak? I feel an affinity with it. Thank you to David Sparks for the photos and for the introduction to the rhynchōps (what a name - rhinoplasty must be connected) and 'chops' - maybe you have to a UK person to get that?
Posted by: David Bennett | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 07:12 PM
Just SUPERB! Thank you for sharing your passion, and skill.look forward to more now that I saved your website.
Posted by: John Wilson | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 09:56 PM
Nice.
I hope you got much pleasure out of making it.
Posted by: Bill Mitchell | Monday, 30 April 2018 at 10:52 PM
I can only echo what has already been said. Well done David Sparks!
Posted by: Peter Barnes | Tuesday, 01 May 2018 at 04:12 AM