When Camera Owner was launched in 1964 from 27 Whitfield Street, London,[1] edited by Alec Fry ARPS[2] previously of Amateur Photographer magazine,[3] it offered pictorial 'how-to' articles for an audience ranging from the keen amateur to the dabbler with no interest in technical jargon; it was subtitled ‘The Teach-Yourself Photo Monthly’.[2]
From Issue #8 of February 1965 South African photographer Jürgen Schadeberg, picture editor of the influential Drum magazine in the 1950s, took over as picture editor, exercising a stronger design and a bolder use of pictures. By Issue #10, in April 1965, Fry moved on to establish Polysales Progress mail order firm, and Schadeberg took on the editorship.[4]
In July 1965, Bill Jay[5] had contributed two articles to the magazine and by December of the same year he took over as Editor. His aim was to promote British photography as a serious art form to rival the U.S. Aperture and Norman Hall's Photography, and the Swiss Romeo Martinez' Camera.[6] He instituted book reviews in 1966 (for example, of John Szarkowski's The Photographer's Eye, July 1967) and interviews (including with Aaron Siskind and David Douglas Duncan).[5] Magazine content emphasised the aesthetics of photography over technique, and Jay encouraged his readers to initiate 'postal circles' by circulating a boxed print by mail to a group for feedback.
Colin Osman,[7] himself a keen photographer, historian and collector of photography,[8][9][10][11][12] and owner of Coo Press, a publishing house with a long and lucrative history of racing pigeon publications, bought the failing Camera Owner from the publishers Davpet Ltd. for £1 in 1966.[13] Jay remained as editor and continued to change the style of the magazine,[14] so that it attracted more serious readers and contributors, amongst them young British photographers like David Hurn and Tony Ray-Jones.
Jay gradually transformed the ‘hobbyist’ Camera Owner during 1967, with the word ‘Creative’, in a smaller font, being placed above the title ‘Camera Owner’, and ‘Owner’ reduced, by December, to a smaller font so that ‘Creative Camera’ dominated the masthead.[2] With the reorientation of content that Jay had introduced, the journal finally became Creative Camera alone in February 1968, continuing with that title through more than 30 years of publication.[15]
