What Makes Great Photography

Book excerpt: Why are some photographs so much more effective and powerful than others? What Makes Great Photography showcases 80 outstanding photographs from the first daguerrotypes to today’s digital masterpieces and by photographers as diverse as Alfred Stieglitz, Diane Arbus, Ernst Haas and Don McCullin. Val Williams highlights the elements of each photograph that distinguishes it from its peers, such as composition, colour, texture and fidelity to subject, explaining just what it is that makes it so great. Her insightful text will open your eyes to the defining qualities of the key photographs of every period and genre, from portraiture to landscape and from photojournalism to the nude.