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My new "Abandoned Southern CA" photography book is out!


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I have a new book out entitled "Abandoned Southern California." It is crammed full of colorful photos of abandoned locales and general weirdness, scheduled for release of December 9th 2019. This is my first book of night photography images! I can't wait for this to come screaming into the world. Pre-orders available now on my www.kenleephotography.com and Amazon! I just got this in the mail today and had to share.

 

"Abandoned Southern California" book available on Ken Lee Photography website!

 

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Congratulations, that's got to feel wonderful to have a way to share your Art with everybody.

 

I checked the link and watched the slideshow a couple of times. I want to look at it again!

 

Very beautiful work, extraordinary in all aspects - respect.

It took a chunk of my life to get here and I am still not sure where "here" is.
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Your photos are always great, it's cool to see them out in the world...sometimes I see a photo credit (can't remember where, maybe Chromecast images?). Hope you're at least getting some residuals :)
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Your photos are always great, it's cool to see them out in the world...sometimes I see a photo credit (can't remember where, maybe Chromecast images?). Hope you're at least getting some residuals :)

 

I do have my images on Chromecast, although they have this amazing habit of choosing the photos I like the least.

 

I would say that residuals have probably paid for 3/4 of my superyacht, thanks.

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Congratulations, that's got to feel wonderful to have a way to share your Art with everybody.

 

I checked the link and watched the slideshow a couple of times. I want to look at it again!

 

Very beautiful work, extraordinary in all aspects - respect.

 

Thanks! There's three galleries (as of now) as well. It's a new website, and I like the way it displays the photos. Some photography sites mangle images rather badly, but this one seems to display them nicely. Thanks again.

 

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Looks great! Night photography and history - a creative combination.

 

Hey Mike, thanks. It's a good combination, I think.

 

The next two books will have more personal stories and adventures infusing the history and night photography aspect, I think. I have two more books that I am working on that will be published by the same book company. I do have some quick stories about the photography in the newest book, but I think putting a little more of that in might be interesting. We'll see how it comes out. I'm still going on lots of photographic journeys and photographing images for these upcoming books, and consequently, neither book has fully taken shape yet.

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So I just gotta ask if you have the same experience I do...every time I finish a book, I say "I'm not gonna go through THAT again!!"

 

But then must have some kind of author's amnesia, because I always end up doing another one. I'm working on book #44 at the moment. I just KNOW that when it's over, I'm going to say "I'm not gonna go through THAT again."

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So I just gotta ask if you have the same experience I do...every time I finish a book, I say "I'm not gonna go through THAT again!!"

 

But then must have some kind of author's amnesia, because I always end up doing another one. I'm working on book #44 at the moment. I just KNOW that when it's over, I'm going to say "I'm not gonna go through THAT again."

 

Great question. And you know how I love discussing creative processes too...

 

So my answer is no. But to be fair, writing what you write and writing this are verrrry different. This is mostly about the photos, and I came in at just under 6000 words. And 6000 words of a non-technical nature is so much less.

 

That said, when I was told about the word count, I initially thought, "Oh, that's nothing. I can knock this out of the park in a short while. So I gave myself just a few months. And that was a mistake. I kept writing and rewriting that, and the whole thing was considerably more effort than I would have thought. The publisher had given me an example of a book that they had published that they had held up in high esteem. It was very matter-of-fact and strictly historical. I strayed from that, but later, found myself wishing I had strayed more.

 

So my takeaway from doing this was: "I can do better than this. I can write more vibrantly. I have stories to tell. I can tell more about the experiences and adventures. First time was good. Next time, I'm gonna crush it."

 

The other thing is this. 44 books is amazing. 44 quality books is beyond amazing. This is why I keep insisting that "Craig Anderton" is a collective. :D How can any one person do everything you do? This must require so much commitment and effort.

 

I have committed to two more books with this current publisher. They specialize in historical books, but lately, have been branching out into books about abandoned places. And to add to that, my book is night photography in abandoned places. But they're expanding into this area more because it's an area of growing interest, even from people who are not actively doing night photography, urban exploration, or whatever. They're interested by history and creative photography and travel, and that's fueling the growing interest.

 

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This is mostly about the photos, and I came in at just under 6000 words. And 6000 words of a non-technical nature is so much less.

I'm jealous!!! Book #43 was 55,000 words, but it was the artwork that really took a lot of effort...278 illustrations. However they were mostly screen shots, which is a lot easier than hanging out in the desert at night, and waiting for the Perfect Moment. :) Even screen shots have issues, though. With so many "dark" looks to programs these days, I often had to bump up the brightness and contrast just to make sure they'd look good if someone was reading on a smart phone.

 

One of the BIG problems with doing eBooks is accommodating different formats. So far I've just been doing downloadable PDFs, but am trying to plan ahead in case they end up on iTunes or Amazon or whatever. Basically your choice in fonts is Arial or Times Roman, you can't have page numbers or refer to them, and all images have to be in-line (no text wraps). It removes the art of the layout completely.

 

I think eBooks are designed mostly for text-based romance novels...maybe I should write trashy, sexist books like "as he slipped his solder-burned hands up her quivering motherboard, she yearned to have his hard drive's gold-plated edge connector insert into her waiting PCIe slot. 'I want you...now,' she whispered breathlessly, having used iZotope RX7 to reduce her breath noises by up to 20 dB." I'd probably sell 1,000 times as many books. :) Then again, I think it will be impossible to ever outsell Mats Nermark's book about guitar preamps, "50 Shades of Gain."

 

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This is mostly about the photos, and I came in at just under 6000 words. And 6000 words of a non-technical nature is so much less.

I'm jealous!!! Book #43 was 55,000 words, but it was the artwork that really took a lot of effort...278 illustrations. However they were mostly screen shots, which is a lot easier than hanging out in the desert at night, and waiting for the Perfect Moment. :) Even screen shots have issues, though. With so many "dark" looks to programs these days, I often had to bump up the brightness and contrast just to make sure they'd look good if someone was reading on a smart phone.

 

Wow. Even the illustrations are a lot. I had about 140 photos. Now, 140 photos may not sound like a lot, but when you consider that they are all long exposure photos, all are illuminated during the exposure with a handheld light source (which usually necessitates at least several attempts), require hours and hours of driving to remote, abandoned spots, and requires hours and hours of research in finding those spots, it's a bit of an undertaking. But I love it.

 

 

I think eBooks are designed mostly for text-based romance novels...maybe I should write trashy, sexist books like "as he slipped his solder-burned hands up her quivering motherboard, she yearned to have his hard drive's gold-plated edge connector insert into her waiting PCIe slot. 'I want you...now,' she whispered breathlessly, having used iZotope RX7 to reduce her breath noises by up to 20 dB."

 

Haha! Now, I'll be honest...you grabbed my attention! Is there a market for this? :D I'll bet if you wrote some of the instructions like this, people might have the sequence seared into their memory!

 

 

I'd probably sell 1,000 times as many books. :) Then again, I think it will be impossible to ever outsell Mats Nermark's book about guitar preamps, "50 Shades of Gain."

 

No, but practice makes perfect.

 

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