This Land is a journey around the British Isles in images and words, a collaboration between Joe Cornish, widely acknowledged as Britain's finest landscape photographer, and leading countryside writer Roly Smith.

In it, they have selected 50 of their favourite landscapes, from the Scottish Isles to the Jurassic Coast and Snowdonia to the Norfolk Broads, and look at how these landscapes have been shaped over thousand of years by the British people.

Locally, featured areas include the North York Moors: Roseberry Topping; Rosedale and Rievaulx over to Swaledale in the Yorkshire Dales.

Joe Cornish tells Weekend about the book’s themes and how it was brought together.

Why did you decide to collaborate on a book?

Roly is a well-known writer, but I hadn’t met him personally until he proposed this collaborative project to me. His writing style is approachable, warm, accessible and ‘mainstream’ rather than highbrow. He has huge passion for countryside matters, and is dedicated to sharing that love and enthusiasm with as wide an audience as possible.

When did you first pick up a camera?

I was a late-starter in photography, relatively-speaking. Father’s instamatic at the age of 17, and I had my own first camera from age 18, when I went to uni. I probably knew I was a landscape photographer after I had been making pictures for a week or so. My introvert personality made me comfortable alone in the outdoors, and I was happy not to have to take on the fearsome challenge of photographing people (although I did do that also during my early career).

How did you whittle down the landscapes in the book to 50?

Almost every region of the UK contains many landscapes – places, prospects, vistas – that have visual, historical and other qualities to enjoy and explore. So whittling it down from the many hundreds to which we had been and studied was no easy task. The criteria were deliberately set to create balance; balance of region/nation, of landscape type, and of other narrative themes. But there is no denying that we both have a preference for wilder coastal regions and for mountains. We also decided to exclude urban landscapes, as we agreed that it was too difficult to incorporate such totally ‘humanised’ places.

What makes a great landscape shot?

If I could tell you what makes a great landscape photograph… I’d be a liar. I honestly believe art is beyond strict definition and formulation, and as soon as you think you have an answer, you find it slips through your fingers (as Stephen Hawking keeps finding as he searches for a Unifying Theory of Everything). What I will say is that a great landscape photograph is a rare alchemy of light, depth, space, form, colour, texture and visual story-telling. It distils an idea/s and/or emotion/s in a unique way that gives expression (perhaps counter-intuitively, given the subject matter) to something deeply human, to life…to soul. For my part, I am still seeking to make such a photograph, but hope to one day.

As to the book, many photographs within it gave pleasure in the process of their making, and I do not want to indulge in the favouritism of choosing one I am most happy with. But if we were to take an example of how elements came together, then the cover is a good enough example. This photograph was made from the summit of a hill south of Derwent Water in late-autumn. Having led a Lake District workshop all the previous week, the day our group dispersed (after breakfast) was a rare one of fine and rather settled weather, so what better way to follow a landscape photography workshop than by doing some… landscape photography? I love a hill climb, so after a number of happy morning and early afternoon hours beside Derwent Water itself, the climb was a proper way to get some exercise and maybe find an image. 450 metres of ascent, and the light was well, marginal… lots of cloud, but a few breaks as well. Winds fairly light. Having spent well over an hour hunting angles and viewpoints, and finally settling on one, I was rewarded with a late break in the cloud, and low autumn sunlight flooding over hillside woodland and distant slopes. All in all, a pretty sublime experience. By the time I was back at the car, after an eventful descent in which I lost the track and ended up on incredibly steep, rough slopes, it was virtually dark.

What makes the British landscape special?

I genuinely believe the majority of people have aesthetic and cultural ideas deeply embedded in childhood – if it is a fairly happy one – and so will find their own homeland more beautiful and appealing than any other. Sadly perhaps, I am your typical Average Joe in this respect. So I could talk about the layers of history, the geological variety, the traditional farming and land management systems, the mountain and moorland fringes, the fascinating tension and legacy of industry in places of great scenic beauty, the phenomenal coastline etc., etc. But really, the main reason it is so special for me, is that I am British.

I have grown up with an idea of the English and British landscape as something special, magical, a place of retreat, sanctuary, solace, redemption, and endless stories. It is the landscape of Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams, Christopher Wren, Capability Brown, John Constable, JMW Turner, Shakespeare, Robin Hood, King Arthur, Robert the Bruce, Grace Darling, IK Brunel, King Henry V, the pilots of the Battle of Britain, of Sir Francis Drake, Edward Thomas and TS Eliot, Wordsworth, Milton and Coleridge, of Jack Hobbs, Len Hutton, Ian Botham, Bobby Charlton and Bobby Moore, Steve Redgrave and Paula Radcliffe. Even the landscape of Robert Macfarlane. It is a landscape immortalised by such composers, storytellers, warriors, heroes and myth makers, our countrymen and women, and our contemporaries too. That inevitably colours any attempt at objective judgment, or analysis.

What's next in the pipeline?

Well, there are still places I’d like to visit for the first time, and many others where I hope to return. The landscapes of planet Earth are inexhaustibly fascinating and eye witness experience is still a wonderful privilege. There remain mountains in Scotland I have not discovered, and the valleys between them, and also in Wales. And perhaps most all there are the islands, places that are truly difficult to reach, all the more special because of it. So, all things considered I would probably stay in the UK; when all other considerations are accounted for our weather usually provides the most interesting light.

Joe Cornish Gallery, Zetland Street, Northallerton DL6 1NA. T: 01609-777404; W: joecornishgallery.co.uk

This Land is being launched at the Joe Cornish Gallery in Northallerton on Saturday, April 2. The launch is open to all and Joe and Roly will be mingling with visitors before and after their talk, which must be booked.