Digital Photography All-in-one Desk Reference for Dummies (For Dummies (Computers)) [Englisch] [Taschenbuch]

This book is big enough and thick enough to deal with all the topics I wanted to read about. There's the usual material about how digital cameras work, and some helpful chapters on image editing, but the most useful parts are the photography chapters in the middle. These chapters seem to have been written by an actual professional photographer with tons of experience with digital cameras. There are tips about lighting, posing, shooting close-ups, and taking pictures for publication.

Everything is written with the special needs of digital cameras in mind. For example, I've had problems shooting sports photos because of the noticeable lag between the time that I press the shutter button and when my digital camera finally takes the photo. The author addresses this problem, along with many other digital camera peculiarities, such as the noise problems you get when you use higher ISO ratings to increase sensor sensitivity.

Even though some of the advice is fairly technical in nature, the author never resorts to jargon. Everything is explained quite clearly in terms that even a beginner can understand. I never really understood why selective focus was so difficult to achieve with a digital camera until I read the explanation here.

I recommend this book for all photographers, from beginner to advanced. The neophyte can learn how to vastly improve their skills, and even veteran photo hobbyists will learn something.

The emphasis on photography, rather than digital technology, is refreshing. Certainly, there are chapters on how digital cameras operate, and guidelines for choosing a digital camera. But the center of the book has solid chapters on good old fashioned photography, as it applies to digital cameras. There's a chapter on composition, one on close-up photography, another on sports photography, and a great travel photo section. The thick section of color photos are great, too. It's good to see color images in a book about color photography.

The sections on image editing are fairly complete and will get beginners started and more experienced people trying some new things. Both Photoshop and Photoshop Elements are covered, but there is a chapter that evaluates most of the popular image editors and compares and contrasts them. This book really is thorough.

However, if you want to buy this book, purchase it for its great coverage of digital photography. That alone makes this the leading digital photography book. The other chapters make it a useful "All in One" reference book.

The Taking Great Pictures chapters in the third book are the core of my curriculum for both the beginner and intermediate classes, as the content is easy to understand, explains photographic techniques clearly, and can be applied by any digital photographer. The beginner classes simply receive less challenging picture taking assignments, as they work with composition, close-ups, portraits, and sports photography. They also get a lot of use out of the section on scenic photography, as the landscapes here are spectacular.

The beginner classes stop when they finish the fourth book on the Basics of Image Editing. The more advanced image editing chapters, which use Adobe Photoshop Elements, are reserved for the intermediate classes. I do put both groups to work learning to restore old photos, because everyone seems to enjoy this.

All in all I have found this book to be a wonderful learning tool, and like it better than traditional textbooks for teaching digital photography.