In an era during which everyone with a cellphone lays claim to being a photographer, there’s still immense pleasure in enjoying the art and skill of those who are true professionals. Regular readers of my work know I place great store in vintage work by the likes of Seneca Ray Stoddard, Katherine McClellan and many others.

I also eagerly await new publications by the likes of Nathan Farb, Carl Heilman and their contemporaries. With this review, I acknowledge the presence of a new contributor to the field, Russ Hartung. Let me give this disclaimer right away. I have known Russ for decades. However, my exposure (pun, maybe intended?) to him has been outside his camera work.

His first book is titled “Adirondack Solitude: Peace and Stillness in the Adirondack Wilderness.” The photos feature places to which he retreated for reflection and solace. Most were taken within a couple of hours of his Plattsburgh home.

My first exposure to Adirondack photography came with seeing a book by Eliot Porter. His mix of small detail and larger panorama helped ignite my penchant for not just touring the mountains by automobile, but hiking frequently enough to enhance appreciation of details one misses when speeding by at even thirty miles per hour.

Hartung’s images remind me of Porter. (Incidentally, both trained as physicians before embarking on photography.) Details can include rusting farm equipment, spotlights on selected wildlife and focus on a solitary birch. A luna moth fills almost one entire frame, while a loon moves through another. Eagles star in three pictures, one outlined almost as in an Audubon print, but he also gives space to the more humble snapping turtle.

Then there are the panoramas. Splendid views from atop Hopkins and Goodnow Mountains are notable, as are others from nearby Catamount and Silver Lake Mountains. He offers perspectives of Whiteface and Algonquin from a distance, the latter creatively framed between a set of foregrounded boulders.

Seasonal variability gets marked by trees dusted with powdery new snow and, of course, the inevitable fall foliage samplings. The latter sees representation via a hillside of blazing color, and as a single maple leaf.

Some images are vivid and sharp and bursting with color. On other occasions, he makes use of mist, haze, and cloud cover to produce more muted effects. He writes that he especially savors early morning pictures. Moody shots at dawn are noteworthy, especially one showing the a red sky and misty valleys from Pharaoh Mountain.

It’s clear that to enjoy solitude in some of these places, one has to begin sooner in the day than I do. This is part of the professional photographer’s tool kit, the willingness to rise at very early hours, likely many times, in order to capture the exact right exposure. (I suspect doing so at twenty below on Moose Pond almost guarantees solitude.) Creative use of depth of field is another part of that tool kit. That’s on display when Hartung centers upon a blue heron with the background almost entirely blurred. Sharp focus in a sweeping view along the Ausable River with foregrounded flowers and distant mountain silhouettes was a favorite. So was one from Pok-O-Moonshine capturing nearby trees and the long view with equal sharpness.

Reviewers always feel obliged to offer a few corrective measures. The caption on a scene near Henderson Lake incorrectly notes Vice President Teddy Roosevelt was here when he learned President McKinley had been shot. Actually he was at Isle La Motte in Vermont, but was here a week later when notified of the chief executive’s worsening condition. And I wish Hartung had provided information on the equipment he used for his work.

Neither of these caveats impeded enjoyment of the book. My list of favorite photos changed upon a second perusal. Perhaps that’s as it should be, as I plan to peruse it many more times in the future. On one thumbing through the book, I focused solely on Hartung’s primary theme. His photos made me better appreciate my own opportunities for solitude. I join him in feeling fortunate to live in a region offering such rich experiences.