Surrey Landscapes by Nick Oakley | My Photo Bookshelf
I’ve lived in Surrey all of my life and explored this wooded county with and without my camera countless times, so when I saw Nick Oakley was releasing his Surrey Landscapes book on Indiegogo, I had to get myself a copy.
Author’s synopsis
This coffee-table book celebrates both the popular hot-spots and less well known corners of the county and is also a call from the countryside to those who want to see more. There are no other landscape photography books celebrating the breadth of Surrey’s natural spaces, so this collection of images, bringing together work from the last two years, is a perfect keepsake or gift for anyone who enjoys the county’s countryside and landscape photography.
My thoughts about the book
I was interested to see the locations featured, to both enjoy some landscape photos taken of places I know well and at the same time, get some inspiration for future photo locations I might visit. This book delivered on both counts. The photos featured in the book are great, capturing the Surrey landscape across all seasons and for each photo, Nick has included a paragraph of text describing the photo, the conditions or the location in more detail.
There’s a good mix of both popular and lesser-known locations and for the locations I wasn’t aware of, Nick included some high-level location information as well as a handy map of Surrey at the beginning of the book with each photo plotted. Keeping the location information high level was a good move in my opinion as he gives you an idea of the general area the photo was taken but to try and visit the exact same spot still requires a bit of exploring and effort on our part.
It’s worth mentioning that this book cost just £12 (£16 including shipping) and for a landscape photography book, that’s incredibly good value. The book is well-made, solid in construction and as mentioned before, full of great photos and useful information. My only negative point is the choice made by the author to print the pages with a highly reflective, glossy finish. I found this a little unconventional and quite distracting while reading the book.
That being said, the book was still amazing value and worth every penny.
The previous paragraph has been edited since the post was first published. I had assumed that there was a correlation between the glossy pages and the production costs of the book, suggesting that it was a quality issue. I have since been corrected by the company that printed the book that the glossy finish was a creative choice and not in any way down to price or quality. I stand corrected and have retracted that point. Check the comment below for more information.
I’m pleased I spotted this book when it went on sale and I will certainly use it to draw inspiration for location ideas around my home county.
Book Details
Hardcover
Size: 240mm x 240mm
Pages: Contains 45 colour photographs across facing pages
Availability at the time of writing: Still in print. Available from the author’s website: https://nickoakleyphotography.co.uk