[Leica] Leica books (long)

[nandomm@redestb.es (Fernando Moreno)]

1. Leica books:
Nathan, I agree with you. Eastland's book was also my first Leica book, and
one of the most interesting ones, both for beginners and more experenced
Leica-philes. I also have Brian Bower's "Leica M photography" (nice book,
also), and Günter Osterloh's "Leica, advanced school of Photog." (this one
deceived me a bit; many pictures seem to be 30 years old).

2. Technical books:
Some of my favourites:
- - "Larry Bartlett's B&W photographic printing workshop" (Fountain Press
1993), it's great if you, like me, develop your own film and try to get the
best possible prints.
- - "Belichtungsmessung" (light measurement), by Adrian Bircher, Verlag
Photographie 1989. For this one you'll need an average level of german.
Very good, deals with the basics of light, films, measurement, contrast
control, characteristic curves, zone system...
- - There's another one from the same publisher, also in german, which I
don't have yet but looks very interesting: "Kontrastbeherrshung in der
Schwarzweissphotographie" (contrast control in B&W photog.) by Henk
Roelfsema.

3. Two books from my Nikon-era:
- - "Mountain light", by Galen Rowell, and "Nikon guide to wildlife photog.",
by B. Moose Peterson. Both heavily Nikon-oriented, but good reading,
though; I learned a lot about how this pros succesfully face different
lighting situations.

And "The negative" by Ansel Adams. I had always regarded this book as
old-fashioned, but I had a look recently and it looks very instructive, if
you're interested in learning the basics of the zone system, exposure,
curves, etc.

4. On the artistic side, one of my favourites is Jeanloup Sieff, "40 years
of photog."
 I recently bought another book after visiting Jim Marshall's site (b.t.w.,
thank you Hans Pahlen for the link) about his rock photography. The title
is "Not fade away", all B&W pics of the all-time-greatest rock stars. All
taken with his (4) Leica M4s. More info on this in Jim Marshall's website
(see Hans Pahlen's links), where you can also see an image of Jim carrying
4 Leica Ms at once in Woodstock.

Another Leica M photographer I like a lot is Jeff Dunas. Has anybody of you
one of his books? I visited his site but didn't find much about books. Some
of his photos appear in Leica catalogues, and several from his Laura Morton
series were featured in Leica's website some time ago, maybe you remember
that.

I've seen in some catalogues the titles "Leica Gallery I and II", and was
thinking of getting them. Thay're a bit pricey, though, so I would like to
hear any opinions from owners out there before ordering, anybody?

I find this book-thread very appealing. Hope many of you contribute with
your views.


Fernando Moreno, Madrid
nandomm@redestb.es