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Capture the Magic: Train Your Eye, Improve Your Photographic Composition
In Capture the Train Your Eye, Improve Your Photographic Composition, author Jack Dykinga uses a structured approach to teach the art of creating interesting, well-composed images. This book provides solutions to problems that often get in the way of producing great photographs and emphasizes the importance of training the eye to exclude the extraneous. Examples of strong images are juxtaposed against flawed images, illustrating how to create a successful composition. Topics covered include light and shadow, lens choice, framing, negative space, and many more.
In this book, author Jack Dykinga encourages us to look at photography as a way to communicate. Dykinga says, "Photography is a marvelous language that crosses linguistic borders as a universal, powerful, and direct communication. As photographers, we see something we find interesting and simply want to share it." Readers will learn new ways to create interesting and powerful compositions that communicate their intended messages.
Filled with beautiful color images throughout, the book is sure to inspire, teach, and motivate photographers of all levels.
In this book, author Jack Dykinga encourages us to look at photography as a way to communicate. Dykinga says, "Photography is a marvelous language that crosses linguistic borders as a universal, powerful, and direct communication. As photographers, we see something we find interesting and simply want to share it." Readers will learn new ways to create interesting and powerful compositions that communicate their intended messages.
Filled with beautiful color images throughout, the book is sure to inspire, teach, and motivate photographers of all levels.
- GenresPhotographyNonfictionArt
188 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
October 5, 2019
What I enjoyed most about this book is Dykinga's description of his thought processes as he explores a scene seeking to find a composition. I didn't always agree with him on some of the creative decisions he made but I suspect that Dykinga would think that is a good thing - we have different tastes as individuals after all. Nevertheless, some of the images in the book are stunning and therefore motivating.
January 26, 2015
Photos are incredible. Page 33 provides the secrets.
December 26, 2018
This was one of the first photography books I've read that didn't overwhelm me as I was reading. The author's main goal was to get the reader to think about "seeing" when taking pictures. He spoke of how he came to configure his photographs and what tweaks he made to bring him to the finished product. There were only 1-3 paragraphs on each page so I felt like I was learning but really able to enjoy the beautiful photography that was displayed as well. The author is accomplished free-lansing with National Geographic, etc. The more the book went on, the more I wanted to get outside and take some photos and really "see" the composition. This will remain one of my favorites of the photography how-to books I've read.
May 1, 2022
This book had some good points but ultimately the formula for each page was 1 sentence worth reading and then a bunch of sentences explaining the thought process behind the image.
This was fine early on but soon became repetitive once you realize there's a common theme for the technique. So after about the 30th page it just felt like the rest of this book was to a) meet page count and b) just talk about the pictures taken for no reason at all
This would've been a better blog post
This was fine early on but soon became repetitive once you realize there's a common theme for the technique. So after about the 30th page it just felt like the rest of this book was to a) meet page count and b) just talk about the pictures taken for no reason at all
This would've been a better blog post
January 1, 2024
A good photography book, the author not only show us good photos, but seeks to explain his creation process from the moment of researching the locations, to the patience of waiting for the best light or improved conditions. Also he makes a point about to be able to react to difficult problems in order to obtain good photos.
September 30, 2017
One of the best photography books I have ever seen.
Filled with clues to make my photography better.
Filled with clues to make my photography better.
October 20, 2025
Throughout the book you get a very good idea what you need to look for when composing your image.
September 15, 2014
Award-winning American photographer Jack Dykinga argues, "not everything we wish to photograph is visually pleasing. In order to communicate effectively, we must learn to compose and craft our images. And we need good composition."
Dykinga, who has a background in photojournalism and focuses on nature and landscape photography, uses a selection of his stunning photographs to explore "certain primal human biases that we collectively respond to: things like color, fire, water, movement, chaos, or perfect order", and to explain how he has "exploited this commonality to increase potential to reach viewers", thereby achieving strong visual images.
Without going into too much technical detail, he touches on key factors such as design, direction, framing, light, juxtaposition and negative space; always describing his thought process, the circumstances and the things he tried when taking the picture. In some instances, this meant waiting for hours or returning to the subject matter another day.
However, he never preaches or gets lost in lengthy descriptions but lets his pictures 'do the talking'. He offers examples of successful images, offsetting them against less powerful ones to highlight the effect of a certain approach, or uses a series of pictures of the same subject matter to demonstrate the different results of various techniques, for example, shots of the same plant taken from different angles or at different times of the day.
This highly visual approach makes 'Capture the Magic' accessible to photographers of various skill levels and invites the viewer to study, evaluate and appreciate the pictures at his or her own pace.
Those seeking technical specifics such as shutter speed, aperture and lenses used can find these details compiled on the final pages under the chapter heading 'Technical information'. Dykinga also offers an overview on the equipment he uses and shares 'Lessons learned'.
Learnings aside, 'Capture the Magic' is worth a look just for its many beautiful nature photographs, mostly taken in American national parks or on assignments in South America and Africa.
Dykinga, who has a background in photojournalism and focuses on nature and landscape photography, uses a selection of his stunning photographs to explore "certain primal human biases that we collectively respond to: things like color, fire, water, movement, chaos, or perfect order", and to explain how he has "exploited this commonality to increase potential to reach viewers", thereby achieving strong visual images.
Without going into too much technical detail, he touches on key factors such as design, direction, framing, light, juxtaposition and negative space; always describing his thought process, the circumstances and the things he tried when taking the picture. In some instances, this meant waiting for hours or returning to the subject matter another day.
However, he never preaches or gets lost in lengthy descriptions but lets his pictures 'do the talking'. He offers examples of successful images, offsetting them against less powerful ones to highlight the effect of a certain approach, or uses a series of pictures of the same subject matter to demonstrate the different results of various techniques, for example, shots of the same plant taken from different angles or at different times of the day.
This highly visual approach makes 'Capture the Magic' accessible to photographers of various skill levels and invites the viewer to study, evaluate and appreciate the pictures at his or her own pace.
Those seeking technical specifics such as shutter speed, aperture and lenses used can find these details compiled on the final pages under the chapter heading 'Technical information'. Dykinga also offers an overview on the equipment he uses and shares 'Lessons learned'.
Learnings aside, 'Capture the Magic' is worth a look just for its many beautiful nature photographs, mostly taken in American national parks or on assignments in South America and Africa.
April 3, 2015
Very Nice Overview and a Challenge to Think
I like this book. It was different than I expected -- I expected something more genial and perhaps even scientific, but what I found was a call to search yourself as the photographer -- what are you trying to say through your picture? What do you want to share?
And it forced m to realize that I have been merely taking "snaps of stuff" instead of carefully thinking about why a particular scene attracts me and then how I might best show that to another person through photography.
Very good book, indeed!
I like this book. It was different than I expected -- I expected something more genial and perhaps even scientific, but what I found was a call to search yourself as the photographer -- what are you trying to say through your picture? What do you want to share?
And it forced m to realize that I have been merely taking "snaps of stuff" instead of carefully thinking about why a particular scene attracts me and then how I might best show that to another person through photography.
Very good book, indeed!
February 4, 2014
An excellent resource, it’s worth buying the book just to enjoy the photos, even if you’re not particularly interested in becoming a better photographer!
Read my full review at:
http://organizedassistant.com/2014/02...
Read my full review at:
http://organizedassistant.com/2014/02...
January 3, 2015
I liked this but I'm bummed I downloaded to my Kindle because the pictures are black and white :( I would have loved to see what he was talking about when he wrote about the details of each picture.
September 18, 2015
Wonderful photographs by a master landscape photographer. Was hoping for a bit more detail, but enjoyed the little that was given.
May 2, 2017
Really beautiful book , and I certainly found it interesting, as the author lives in Arizona and many of the images come from Arizona. That said, I didn't learn much from it, and landscape photography isn't a genre I do much of. Visually it's beautiful though. More coffee table than photography instruction manual. Nothing wrong with that!
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews