The Photographer's Playbook: 307 Assignments and Ideas

by Jason Fulford (Editor), Gregory Halpern (Editor), Mike Slack (Photographer)

The best way to learn is by doing. The Photographer's Playbook features photography assignments, as well as ideas, stories and anecdotes from many of the world's most talented photographers and photography professionals. Whether you're looking for exercises to improve your craft—alone or in a group—or you're interested in learning more about the medium, this playful collection will inspire fresh ways of engaging with photographic process.

Inside you will find advice for better shooting and editing, creative ways to start new projects, games and activities and insight into the practices of those responsible for our most iconic photographs—John Baldessari, Tina Barney, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Jim Goldberg, Miranda July, Susan Meiselas, Stephen Shore, Alec Soth, Tim Walker and many more.

The book also features a Polaroid alphabet by Mike Slack, which divides each chapter, and a handy subject guide. Edited by acclaimed photographers Jason Fulford and Gregory Halpern, the assignments and project ideas in this book are indispensable for teachers and students, and great fun for everyone fascinated by taking pictures.

Genres: Photography, Art, Nonfiction, Reference, Art and Photography, Education, Design

427 pages, Paperback

First published June 30, 2014

About the author

Jason Fulford (born in Atlanta, 1973) is a photographer and cofounder of the non-profit publisher J&L Books. Fulford’s photographs have been featured in Harper’s, New York Times Magazine, Blind Spot, and Aperture magazine. He has published many books of his work, including Raising Frogs for $$$ (2006), The Mushroom Collector (2010), Hotel Oracle (2013), and Picture Summer on Kodak Film (2020), as well as coedited The Photographer’s Playbook (with Gregory Halpern, Aperture, 2014). He is a 2014 Guggenheim Fellowship recipient.

Reviews

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great ideas and advices. i am already doing two of them - Daily Destination & Alphabetology
Check my website - www.alexogica.com

[Carl O'Day · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a great book for someone stuck in a photographic rut… The 300+ exercises are all different and designed to challenge you creatively. One of the things I really enjoyed is that net every assignment involves a camera. Several of the exercises are writing or drawing based. While they won’t directly improve your camera skills, they will stretch your creative muscles in interesting ways.

Other good things about the book:
*Every exercise comes from an artist – this contributes heavily to the variety of content.
*The artists featured provide valuable input and insight – they don’t just rattle off something to go do
*The exercises are meant to be done one off – one is not dependent on another
*You will learn as much about the craft of photography as you will improve your photographic skills

The only improvement (IMO) is that the exercises could have been organized by topic. Instead, the table of contents is ordered alphabetically by artist last name. Great if you are looking for someone specific, but not as helpful if you are looking to flex a particular creative muscle.

You can read a more detailed review of The Photographer's Playbook here.

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[Jyv · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book appears to be aimed at students and teachers of photography. Either way, it, like many other photography ideas books, assumes that you are either a student, or unemployed, with all day every day to spend on taking photos. I would love a book for the weekend and after work hours photographer. Anyway, just one example of a strange idea which assumes you have all the time in the world: ask your neighbours if you can go to work with them and photograph them for an hour. If you did that here you'd be looked at as if you're completely insane then avoided. Other "ideas" didn't seem to have anything to do with photography and some were just plain bizarre. "Drop out" was one. Great piece of advice, I don't think. I got perhaps three or four useful ideas out of the whole book before tossing it back to the library.

[Clicky Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a book filled with creative inspiration for photographers - but one which stands out head and shoulders above the rest. So many books of this kind, with 'ideas' and 'assignments' are full of the same old drivel... 'shoot only with one lens', 'use contrast', 'look for shadows', 'think about symmetry' - written as if they are speaking to children, or people who have never used a camera before.

In contrast, The Photographer's Playbook contains a substantial list of tips, insights, challenges, and musings from teachers, students, and real masters of the craft such as Stephen Shore. Rather than 'take three photos of something orange!', the book includes a whole assortment of different entries that make you stop and think. Some are very practical, whereas others are more philosophical, and some are downright strange - but it is a great resource for those photographers who expect a bit more.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book to read for inspiration and improvement.

[Tiffany · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was an informative read with about a dozen assignments I would like to do myself. There was a few interesting anecdotes and the six. I thought there would be more assignments for everybody to do but they seem more tailored to students at university, who have more time and energy to put into these rather than someone who does photography as a hobby.

[Alex Flinsch · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not a how-to or guide to photography, but rather a book of ideas that can be used to kickstart your creativity.

The best way to read this book is to open it to a random page, and follow the idea that you happen to land on. If you don't like that idea, just pick another page.

[lex · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sommige opdrachten zijn bizar ("spreek een vreemde persoon aan en fotografeer die voor een uur". yeah right), maar uiteindelijk wel genoeg gevonden waar je wat mee kunt. Het had wel veel baat gehad bij een categorisering van de tips. Het is nu een flinke klus om alles te lezen omdat lang niet alles je zult aanspreken.

['ö-Dzin Tridral · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this would be a most interesting book for students of photography who have time to experiment. Many exercises are given to helping students move out of their usual conceptual approach.

For me the most helpful aspects were the very short quotations that indicated a different way of seeing.

[Cristina Alvarez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Life changing

. Pay attention. Be curious. Notice the beautiful, the unusual. Observe the changes of season. Savor the moment walking to work, eating, or chatting with friends. Be aware of the world around you and your feelings.

[Mariana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Divertido y con interesantes reflexiones sobre la fotografía (o el acto de...).

[Saffron Long · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very helpful, I keep flipping through it to capture more ideas. Some are a little bit samey, though it’s definitely worth a look through to refresh your inspiration

[Nima · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's an amazing book, full of very different exercises by many talented photographers and creatives.. I gifted this book to a friend, but I want another copy for myself so I reordered it! :)

[Tdubs · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great treasure trove of ideas for photography projects.

[Cat · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun book to get out of my photography rut. Kept me sane during COVID with something to do!

[Sally Bozzuto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book! I use it often with students and clients. Many great assignment ideas from a diverse array of photographers and artists. Invaluable for anyone teaching photography.

[Philippe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I like to read the assignments out loud, in strings of ten or fifteen, in random order. It's fun. Also, I hope to reprogramme my subconscious with a solid collection of life hacks.

[Ev · Rating 5 out of 5]

love the ideas in it. i’ll probably make my diploma work in art school with a few of these prompts

[elia · Rating 2 out of 5]

this book would more likely to inspire my 18 years old self to write college application essays than me to actually go out and photograph.

[Hanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an ongoing source of inspiration. Whenever I find myself without any ideas or feel totally uncreative, I take a quick look into The Photographer's Playbook: 307 Assignments and Ideas and ideas just come popping into my head. Most of the assignments are not practical photo assignments like "Take a still life picture of a glass of water and create a perfect lighting situation", but little essays that might help you overcome certain fears when photographing or just some tongue-in-cheek ideas that might not even work as real assignments.
Great for anyone who's into (artistic) photography.

[Victor Deschamps · Rating 5 out of 5]

You would think there are a lot of books like this in the market but there aren't. I like its simplicity. You can always open a random page and find something to trigger an idea. Yes there is some pretencious advice but you can look through it.

[Autumn Kovach · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book I want to have on hand. It is full of prompts for mostly photography but also for writing and...life. It's like a whole community of photographers all in one book. I checked it out from the library so I'd like to have it in my library to browse when I need some inspiration.

[Kristina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Piece of genius.

[Kathleen Messmer · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is full of great ideas for assignments for yourself or, if you're a teacher, your students.

[dv · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful - and in in fact playful - resource of ideas and exercises (don't think about exercises for the beginner or the casual shooter, this is a serious book, edited by Aperture). Useful for the ever-learning photographer (and everyone who really loves photography will always consider himself a learner) and for the teacher. I've found a good number of nice exercises here, still have to try them...

[Stephen]

This is a great challenge book for photographers.