Best fashion photography books according to redditors
We found 46 Reddit comments discussing the best fashion photography books. We ranked the 26 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 46 Reddit comments discussing the best fashion photography books. We ranked the 26 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
Coco Rocha is one of my favorite models. She was an Irish dancer before going into modeling at a young age (16 I believe) so her background in dance helps her incredibly in her modeling! She created and modeled for her book of hundreds (if not ~1000) unique poses meant for artists
Edit: Rocha was an Irish Dancer, not a ballerina.
Edit: For those of you interested in the Study of Pose book: https://www.amazon.com/Study-Pose-Poses-Coco-Rocha/dp/006232814X
I was accurate, she did capture 1000 poses for this book.
Most of these are more Image than Text.
Hedi Slimane: Anthology of a Decade
Rick Owens
Ann Demeulemeester
Dries Van Noten
Pharrell: Places and Spaces I've Been
Supreme
Raf Simons
KAWS
Hedi Slimane: Rock Diary
Undercover
Alexander McQueen: Savage Diary
Yves Saint Laurent
Vanity Fair 100 Years: From the Jazz Age to Our Age
Louis Vuitton: Art, Fashion, and Architecture
Chanel: The Vocabulary of Style
Dior Couture
Tom Ford
Unlabel: Selling You Without Selling Out by Marc Ecko
Sneaker Tokyo vol.2 'Hiroshi Fujiwara'
Bape
Hiroshi Fujiwara: Fragment
There's a book that explains what is worn underneath.
My several month old list: Fashion Podcasts and Interviews
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I've been collecting a few podcasts to listen to in my spare time and came across an enormous amount when searching both on /r/malefashionadvice, /r/malefashion and /r/femalefashionadvice.
I thought it'd be nice to share a few I've found which were interesting and which other people can enjoy.
I know my fashion interests can definitely skew to the boring, so if you have any more suggestions please comment below!
Podcasts & Youtube:
Others:
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Sources and thanks to:
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/u/setfiretoflames booklist Well Regarded Fashion Books: A Community List
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Hey, want to get a nice coffee table book? Let’s make a list of some of our favorites.
Note: I don’t own all of these, some are off friends’ recommendations, and some are for books that haven’t even come out yet. They are mostly in Amazon links for ease of use, but none of the links are affiliate ones (and any that are found in the thread will be removed).
Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty
Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style
Ann Demeulemeester
Blue Blooded
BEAMS: Beyond Tokyo
The Carhartt WIP Archives
Dries Van Noten 1-100
Hiroshi Fujiwara: Fragment
Maison Martin Margiela
Margiela: The Hermès Years
Martin Margiela: The Women’s Collections 1989-2009
Rei Kawakubo
Rick Owens
Rick Owens: Furniture
Take Ivy
Undercover
Vintage Menswear
Yamamoto & Yohji
Yohji Yamamoto
This one. Picked it up a few years back
http://www.amazon.com/Study-Pose-Poses-Coco-Rocha/dp/006232814X
You can pre order it there.
is 1000 poses by Coco Rocha. Which is really 100000 photos, as they were all taken in a rig with 100 dslrs in it.
I have to stabilize and output all 1000 of those starting tomorrow. Not at all excited.
The Ultimate Sneaker Book is a good one. I’ve been meaning to get it myself
Ines de la Fressange wrote a book about men’s style tips called The Parisian Field Guide to Men's Style, however I didn’t really like it that much because it mainly focused on menswear and seemed incredibly limiting outside of that. It basically made it seem like style rules can’t be broken in a sense.
There’s also Massimo Osti’s, the creator of Stone Island and pioneer of modern day technical clothing, book Ideas From Massimo Osti, which I think focuses on his legacy and where Stone Island is now.
Edit: And of course you can’t forget the legendary Anthology of a Decade by Hedi Slimane.
Edit 2: I'm also forgetting the famous How To Be a Man by the late GQ legend Glenn O'Brien, as well as Men and Manners and Men and Style by David Coggins.
This is an interesting question. Please take with a grain of salt.
Depending on how big the shoot mostly dictates how I work with directing the model. Say, if it's on a small shoot for a magazine publication on location. I'll pick a place I find interesting, and then just go. I really like to take my time to discover a new environment. It's refreshing to not know what you might stumble upon on the next corner. I soak it in, get to know the subject, and work with them on finding what about the place inspires us and having it speak in the work. On a big shoot, everything is more planned out to the number of outfits, what you're selling, the general places in the location, etc.
Some models don't need direction from me. They understand the vibes from the simple mood board and the type of music playing on set. They can work their environment and props. I really only feed them suggestions, or i'll say STOP! RIGHT THERE! And the model just knows to work in slight movements rather than bigger ones. Those are great models. Most importantly, they're imaginative individuals.
Other models need more communication. They don't know what to do. They've ran through their go-to poses and looks and when you tell them to stand in front of this wall, they're deer in headlights. So I try to find ways to help communicate the idea I'm trying to get across. Stories, words, anything. I try to get their mind in an atmosphere where they can bounce ideas and not feel stupid about it. You, as a photographer, need to have some idea of what you're trying to capture in that moment. If you don't, how will your subject?
A story, Ryan McGinley had to direct 20 models and make it look like they were a big group of friends. He just told them to play ring around the rosie, and high five each other and just do silly things. Cedric Buchet treats music as his religion on set. It needs to be always on. He believes it creates the vibes he needs.
Every photographer will find ways to get what they want, without telling them what they want. It'll be more genuine, and more importantly, fun.
My approach and the influence I've been exposed to believe not to have people pose. Now there's nothing wrong about posing. I rather just have them always move, and my job as the photographer to click the shutter and capture that moment. A pose gives you 1 photograph. Moving gives you like a thousand. It's worked for me.
But if you're set on posing, this book might give you some ideas. It just recently came out.
http://www.amazon.com/Study-Pose-Poses-Coco-Rocha/dp/006232814X/ref=zg_bs_2030_1
Coco Rocha is pretty damn good at poses:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpocKl5ncGk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfl5ZCUgQYM
SHORT ANSWER: Inspire the subject, have them move, snap more. You and your wife need to communicate your collective ideas across.
Hope this helps.
Well, those are fake.
The real images are in this book.
Ok well for general books I'd really recommend "100 designers 10 curators" as it helps flesh out a lot of different brands. (Most you will never see ever again)
As far as some of the bigger ones
i know there are more undercover books but i think they're pretty much impossible to find for a decent price so you're going to have to PDF find them.
this dries one looked really interesting if it's the same one i remember seeing in person.
rick has an absolute ton of books and magazines about him.
the terry jones id one are generally the cheapest but never have too much meat. they're pretty though and make for good decorations.
Nick Knight has tons of video on Showstudio and you can find a few interviews with Solve Sundsbo online.
The others not so sure. Steven Meisel is notoroiously secretive.
I bought a good book a few years ago :
https://www.amazon.com/Worlds-Top-Photographers-Workshops-Advertising/dp/294037824X
It's pretty insightful but might be slightly dated now.
I've always enjoyed Alexi Lubomirski's channel on youtube. He's working for major magazines.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCNhmdvSnRNmuxTIYFybk5A/featured
Especially his 'Mini Photo Tutorials'
Well I guess I found this pretty late, so if it's still open, I'd love to enter!
I've never had the chance to go to Japan, but from what I've seen and heard from friends that have, it's almost like a dream world. What I love most about Japan, honestly, is their fresh view on the world. They have a very different way of seeing things and it's truly inspirational. The entire country, Tokyo especially, is a mecca for high fashion. As a photographer, I'd love to do more research on photography works by Japanese photographers & fashion photographers. I have been yearning for more inspiration, and I feel like that's exactly what I need. A few I've found on Amazon.jp are 1, 2, and this one is kind of fun.. 3. Honestly, if you see something that you think may be better suited for me, I'd also love a surprise. Thank you SO much for this contest. I am not able to escape the US just yet, and having a piece of Japan (even if it does come in a little box) would mean the absolute world to me. <3
"Wings" has been done to death. Air Force 1 is my favorite.
Any true sneaker head and poster lover should check out Scoop Jackson's Sole Provider which features a ton of classic Nike/NBA posters.
no worries. what specifically are you after? i can probably point you in more exact directions but you're asking a lot at the moment. i doubt there's any one [set of anything] that covers all of nike. even the stuff i have, which isn't much, is generally covering multiple sports or product lines.
for example...
the nike bible mags i mentioned are japanese releases and if you're not old and living in japan you won't have much success finding them now. they do get bought/sold on the secondary market. i'd ask gusto.
for basketball, this book was the best i knew of, but it doesn't cover colourways nor all models, just many of them.
for old jordan colourways, the best reference i knew of was one of the sole collector issues (cant remember which issue offhand sorry but early). years later they produced a "nike bible" type issue, but it missed so much :(
nike sb once published "every sb sneaker ever" on the website. it missed many sneakers and colourways.
for nike air max day, nike themselves published many "history of airmax" stories/etc but also they missed sneakers too.
the jordan encyclopedia that got published on kickstarter has all of the jordan colourways i think, but they have tiny pics and not much detail.
so if you can narrow down what you're after, i can probably assist. just "all of nike" is a big ask.
I think the coming advice here will be more productive than my own, a lot of great advice on this sub, but I'd get that ISO down, no need to be at 1000, it's grainy in comparison to ISO 100 or 200. The lower the better in, generally, in terms of image quality, but it will also give you better latitude with your lights. You could instead be at ISO 100, a shutter of 1/250 or something. You're basically shining a bright light on your face and an ISO of 1000 is going to make that brighter. Like, ISO's give you more light as you go up. You'd use 1000 in a dark room, not a well lit one.
Ultimately, what I think could be valuable for you is to learn your camera some more, grab a book on photography and learn about it. Even a book like this https://www.amazon.com/Lighting-Glamour-Photography-Professional-Techniques/dp/B00A183A4E or this https://www.amazon.com/Successful-Glamour-Photography-Duncan-Evans/dp/0817459235 could be really helpful to you. Your phone is getting the shot because it's using complex algorithms to make it look better for you.
Also, cool makeup work, I wish you the best of luck, the more you learn the better it'll be.
Shoe a day calendar
https://www.amazon.com/Shoes-Page-Day-Gallery-Calendar/dp/1523503327
Edit: downvoting my gift suggestion? How rude!
-Brie Baker with all the ingredients to get started (Brie cheese, fruit, nuts, honey)
-Butter Bell with a loaf of locally made bread
-Mariposa Napkin Box with Weights and Cocktail Napkins
-Cocktail Shaker Set with Bitters, Stirrers, and a nice bottle of liquor
-Cool coffee table book (esp. if it matches a gift set mentioned above (The Art of Mixology or Magnolia Table) or it's hostess-themed, such as Kate Spade's All In Good Taste or Emily Post's Manners for Today)
-Guest Book for house/bathroom/guest room (and this is always fun because you can be the first one to sign it and everyone at the housewarming party can sign it/write a message). Look around Etsy for these...I'm not crazy about the ones on Amazon.
Hope this helps! Happy housewarming to your friend!
Just For Kicks. It may also be on netflix still. Bobbito has a book Where'd you get those.
The book Secret Life of Syrian Lingerie has stories of married couples in Syria using kinky objects and outfits to help with their sex life.
Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:
amazon.co.uk
amazon.ca
amazon.com.au
amazon.in
amazon.com.mx
amazon.de
amazon.it
amazon.es
amazon.com.br
amazon.nl
amazon.co.jp
amazon.fr
Beep bloop. I'm a bot to convert Amazon ebook links to local Amazon sites.
I currently look here: amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, amazon.ca, amazon.com.au, amazon.in, amazon.com.mx, amazon.de, amazon.it, amazon.es, amazon.com.br, amazon.nl, amazon.co.jp, amazon.fr, if you would like your local version of Amazon adding please contact my creator.
Here is a list of ideas in several price ranges:
Fashionary Essential Boxset
Fashion Sketchbook
Grace: A Memoir
WWD Subscription
Patternmaking for Fashion Design
Sneaker Freaker: The Ultimate Sneaker Book! https://www.amazon.com/dp/3836572230/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_5aeACbWH3KM12
Women In This Town is my all time fav. It's such a interesting quick little look into street fashion and people's personal styles.
Another great one is Fashionable Selby, it'll keep your eyes busy and also gives off such happy vibes.
Hmmm I could think of a few things, Something like This
Or
Or
And send me pics of you in it if you like
I worked for J.Crew for a couple of years and even before then, I was absolutely fascinated with style. What helped was learning about the nuances of fabrics, prints, and patterns. I started to appreciate clothing and started to see outfits as a system - different parts coming together to form an overall image. This approach works best with work clothing. I don't have the slightest idea of how to dress casually and in an edgy way. I stick to button down shirts in various colors and prints, well-fitted pants, and different shoes. I have A LOT of clothing, but I know how each item and its color, fit, fabric, and traditional use are all important elements in how it interacts in the outfit with other items.
If you like menswear, I'd start by reading the book "Fuck Yeah, Menswear".
http://www.amazon.com/Fuck-Yeah-Menswear-Knowledge-Gentleman/dp/1451672683
Read bobbito's book where did you get those
http://www.amazon.ca/Whered-You-Get-Those-1960-1987/dp/0972592032
As far as poses...it depends on the subject & what you're going for. If I'm doing a corporate head shot, that's very different than a model test. Keep things natural. I don't do a lot of "posing". I have them move around a lot during model tests. For "standard" portraits, have them sit up straight and look at their face. You can have them tilt their chin up/down or head to the side a bit as necessary.
For lighting...everything in my model tests is one big light. Usually in a giant softbox or octobox with a strobe. I'm a big fan of Rembrandt or clamshell lighting & I adjust from there. I also like using huge windows as a light source because it's soft and pretty.
But in general: keep things upbeat. Be engaging, be polite, be professional. Getting the model to connect with you is just as important as the technical stuff because if they're not into YOU as a person, it will show on camera.
Edit: Coco Rocha just put out an incredible posing book. She's one of the best in the business. http://www.amazon.com/Study-Pose-Poses-Coco-Rocha/dp/006232814X