The Best Camera is an unusual book. It is a small book that measures 6" by 6" and is 95% pictures with only a few pages of words. It is also unusual from the fact that unlike most picture books or coffee table books it was not created using a high quality camera and enhanced using massive darkroom skills or digital enhancement via Adobe Photoshop. Instead all of these images were created using the 2 megapixel iPhone camera.
The Best Camera is the brainchild of photographer, director, and social artist Chase Jarvis who began using the iPhone camera as a visual notebook in coordination with his professional work. As he continued to work with the iPhone, he realized that photographs were really not about dynamic range and megapixels, but rather about stories and moments. So, he developed an iPhone app called "Best Camera," this book, and then he tied it all together with an online community called TheBestCamera.Com.
The Best Camera is a visual notebook or a photographic journal of the author over the past year. In fact, according to Jarvis, it is a look into how he processes the visual world around him. Each picture stands on its own merit and is a look at how he examines the world as he moves through it. It is a notebook, a sketch pad, and a camera all rolled into the one device that is always with him.
The Best Camera has around 200 photographs of varying subject matter, quality of image, and techniques applied to the image. The only writing with each image is a description of what it is that is in the photograph. The book is broken down into sections that kind of describe what the next set of images will be… sort of.
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