Jay Maisel

Jay Maisel has been hailed as one of the most brilliant and gifted photographers of all time. But he is also much more than that&;he is a mentor, teacher, and trailblazer to many photographers, and a hero to those who feel Jay&;s teaching has changed the way they see and create their own photography. He is a living legend whose work is studied around the world, and whose teaching style and presentation garner standing ovations and critical acclaim every time he takes the stage.

In his first educational book, Light, Gesture, and Color, Jay put his amazing insights and learning moments from a lifetime behind the lens into a book that communicated the three most important aspects of street photography: light, gesture, and color. Here, in It&;s Not About the F-Stop, Jay builds on that success to take you beyond the buttons and dials on your camera to continue to teach you how to &;see&; like a photographer, and how to capture the world around you in a way that delights, intrigues, and challenges the viewer. Each page unveils something new and inspires you to rethink everything you know about the bigger picture of photography. This isn&;t a book about f-stops or ISOs. It&;s about seeing. And nobody communicates this, visually or through the written word, like Jay Maisel.

Jay Maisel, hailed as one of the most brilliant, gifted photographers of all time, is much more than that. He is a mentor, teacher, and trailblazer to many photographers, and a hero to those who feel Jay’s teaching has changed the way they see and create their own photography. He is a living legend whose work is studied around the world, and whose teaching style and presentation garner standing ovations and critical acclaim every time he takes the stage.

Now, for the first time ever, Jay puts his amazing insights and learning moments from a lifetime behind the lens into a book that communicates the three most important aspects of street photography: light, gesture, and color. Each page unveils something new and challenges you to rethink everything you know about the bigger picture of photography. This isn’t a book about f-stops or ISOs. It’s about seeing. It’s about being surrounded by the ordinary and learning how to find the extraordinary. It’s about training your mind, and your eyes, to see and capture the world in a way that delights, engages, and captivates your viewers, and there is nobody that communicates this, visually or through the written word, like Jay Maisel.

Light, Gesture & Color is the seminal work of one of the true photographic geniuses of our time, and it can be your key to opening another level of understanding, appreciation, wonder, and creativity as you learn to express yourself, and your view of the world, through your camera. If you’re ready to break through the barriers that have held your photography back and that have kept you from making the types of images you’ve always dreamed of, and you’re ready to learn what photography is really about, you’re holding the key in your hands at this very moment.

A master photographer's love affair with his home city.

New York has been the subject for countless photographs. But few have had a feel for the city that Jay Maisel has.

Jay has been photographing New York since the '50s. His home is located far downtown, but he has shot every part of the city -- from street level, looking down from rooftops and bridges. His aerial shots are moody, poetic, amazing by turns.

This book is filled with spectacular sights -- marathon runners on bridges, sunlight and moonlight reflecting off mirror walls onto the river, the awesome mass of skyscrapers bunched against blue skies. It's also about New York's people. It has the most surprising faces and details you'll see in any book about cities, gleaned from a lifetime of being on the scene.