Large format photography (4x5 and larger) has become an esoteric medium for art. Among today's working professional photographers, only a small fraction uses this format and even fewer exclusively. As a result, for a photographer contemplating an entry into this format, very few resources are readily available. Given this climate, Jack Dykinga's book entitled "Large Format Nature Photography" comes as a boon - it is the closest that most will come to peering into the mind of a working photographer.

At the outset, Jack Dykinga makes it clear this is not a book about the technical details and how-to's of large format equipment and photography. Rather, it is a commentary of this photographer's style and approach to making sensational images using large format equipment. In the process however, he does briefly discuss some of the technical advantages of working with 4x5 equipment. This book provides a light but excellent introduction to the possibilities from this medium. Cameras, lenses, films, exposure considerations, carrying gears are all discussed in this book. The unique advantages of camera movements are illustrated through images. The equipment discussed are ones that Dykinga has used at one time or another. Finally, in a chapter on photographic career, Dykinga describes his business approaches to selling large format photographs. If you have ever used large format equipment to make images of nature, you will appreciate just how difficult it must have been to make so many outstanding images published in this book.