The Afronauts, the widely acclaimed photo book by Cristina de Middel will be available on iPad and iPhone. De Middel received many offers from publishers to reprint this sought after photo book, but she decided against it. Now it will be available for any one who has either an iPad or an iPhone. It is interesting to see a growing interest in digital photo books.

The studio responsible for the production states on their site that they recreated the book for the iPad and iPhone in stead of simply providing an eBook or PDF:

We wanted to develop The Afronauts from scratch, that’s the reason that this book is not a PDF or EPUB3. Behind it there’s Objective C (iOS programming language). Our mission was to think the book again taking advantage of all the features iPads and iPhones give us.

The title will be available from April 17.

Great list by Oh Top Book blog includes an award for the best photo book overlooked by the Photo-Eye lists…

The best photo books of 2012 chosen by photographers, critics, etc.

On December 14 and 15, Athenaeum Bookshop will be your host at Van Zoetendaal Gallery. Petra Noordkamp and Willem van Zoetendaal have selected 50 of the most remarkable photo books published in recent years. From 12 am to 7 pm, you are invited to view and buy these books to add to your photo book collection.

On both days, at 1 and 4 pm, you will be able to talk to a photographer and/or a graphic designer about their own favourite books or about their recent publications.

Van Zoetendaal, Oude Schans 67-F, Amsterdam.

Ik ben jou (‘I am you’) by Milou Abel

I saw her work at the Dutch Doc Award 2012 in the Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam earlier this year among the work of Anouk Kruithof, Bertien van Manen, Paulien Oltheten and other nominees. Milou Abel made an intense portrait of a woman she met in her hometown Utrecht.

There was quite some discussion about the documentary nature of the work of the shortlisted photographers. Pauien Oltheten received the award. I believe she is the most conceptual of the nominees. May be the jury wanted to make a statement.