An amazing book. Seriously. I rarely write reviews, but this book has me really enthused and I felt obliged to post something (and forgive me if this review is a little long). Photo Idea Index: People is a totally different animal compared to other books about digital photography (and I own an embarrassingly large collection of books on the subject). The author went out and shot about five hundred photographs just for this book. All kinds of different photos using just three different people as subjects. And, according to the book's intro, he presents each one of these photos in hopes of inspiring related picture-taking ideas in the reader's mind and to demonstrate how much can be done with how little. The book covers a lot of ground through topics such as: how to make the most of a pocket camera and natural light, trying out different lenses on a digital SLR, experimental shooting techniques (the author even takes his camera underwater with one model), getting your model to relax, act up or even to put on some costume-types-of-things, and also computer-related subjects such as converting images to amazing black-and-white images and going for contemporary fine-art or commercial looks. So, are these 500 photos any good and do they give the reader ideas? Yes and YES. Believe me, practically every one of the book's photos grabbed my eye, begged for a long look and got me excited about trying out something similar with my own camera. The book is about 90% photos and 10% text (the photos are mostly displayed without text, and the last couple pages of each chapter contain captions for all the images cover details about how the photos were shot, what was done on the computer, and maybe some behind-the-scenes stories). I honestly have no complaints about this book except that I had to wear my reading glasses to read the slightly small text. Photo Idea Index: People radiates enthusiasm and a "can do" mentality. I feel very fortunate to have found it. Also, this book has two companion volumes (one about Places and one about Things) that I have ordered but not yet seen. If they are anything like this one, then I'm going to be one happy reader/photographer.