Andrew Brooks Photography

Artist Research: Andrew Brooks

         Andrew Brooks is a Manchester based photographer who seeks to portray the world in all its natural and architectural forms through a series of panoramic images. Brooks experiments with his photographs from multiple perspectives and different placements within the same frame to create the best panoramic view of the nature and cityscapes he captures. He states that his objective is not to capture the imagine in one shot but to collect as much detail in one image and then piece the various images together. He spends hours perfecting these photographs, combining at least forty, sometimes hundreds of individual images to construct the perfect picture. Brooks explains that he uses his photography almost as a way of traveling, providing a new perspective for how he views the world. In pictures of New York and downtown Manhattan, he states that we rarely find photographs that accurately depict the immensity of the geography. He comments that in one photograph he increased the size of different objects between thirty and fifty percent to emphasize the architectural splendor of the frame that would otherwise go unnoticed. Detail is crucial to his photographs and Brooks takes pride in meticulously piecing together his works of art.  

Artist Research: Ansel Adams

        Ansel Easton Adams was born on February 20, 1902 in San Francisco, California, which later sparked his interest in what are now his famous photographs of the Yosemite Valley.  He began to learn about photography after his Aunt Mary gave him a copy of “In the Heart of the Sierras” which portrayed photographs by George Fiske that sparked his interest to visit the Yosemite National Park, where he received his first camera as a gift. His disapproval of the uniformity of the education system led to him leaving school in 1915 to educate himself. Originally trained as a pianist, he continually alternated from his career as a concert pianist to his one as a photographer. When he joined the Sierra Club, dedicated to preserving that wonder and resources of the natural world, at age seventeen, he became interested in photographing nature in all is simplicity and perfection. He used his photography to not only promote the objectives of the club but also to bring environmental issues to light in a new and inspiring way. Adams later invented the zone system as a technique to allowed for translation of light into specific densities on negatives and photo paper, which gave photographers much more control over finished photos. His photos are known for their demonstration of depth of field, specifically in nature.