There are literally hundreds of books on digital photography on the market currently. Some of them are very theorethical, some of them cover only one very particular area of technology while others provide just a basic hintbook for novices. Stephen Johnson’s book is intended to give a big overview of the area and improve your photography skills in the process – a bold claim. Can the book fulfill it?
Stephen Johnson starts the book by looking at the evolution of photgraphy and digital photography. He explains things like how a CCD functions and how photography evolved. He also looks at aperture and shutter time quickly, altough I would have liked more in-depth treatment here.
The second part is targetted at classic photographers who make the switch to digital. It shows you the differences between regular film and digital sensors, and also looks at the changed in the image processing chain(aka workflow).
After that, the book moves on to basic digital camera techniques that can be used to increase focus, depth of field and contrast(very interesting…don’t know why he calls them basic). The techniques are outlined only, however – you still need to do quite a bit of research on your own to use them. It also contains a chapter on using scanners to digitalize film…
The fourth part looks at postprocessing images in Photoshop. It contains useful hints on histograms(photograph bright, for example); and also has good chapters on restoring ancient images and fixing color cues. Stephen Johnson also takes a quick stab at duotones for increased greyscale resolution in printing – could come in handy one day!
The fifth part looks at color management and archival. While most of the advice on color management requires advanced hardware, the book also looks at basic methods that don’t require external hardware.
The sixth part of the book is an example portfolio – nice images, good for ‘nicking’ a few compositional tricks.
The seventh and last part is a smorgasboard of different topics. You get a look at what Steven Johnson considers good composition, a look on image ethics and an introduction to his (questionable) DRM wishes and digital camera photo ethics.
Stephen Johnson on Digital photography is well-written and printed on very nice paper. The image examples look good, the text is easy to read and the Parker 45 works well.
Overall, if you want a book that just gives a howto on digital photography, this tome will dissappoint you. It contains good hints and advice on photographing better, but goes far beyond this, giving you a detailled overview of the field of (digital) photography. If you are interested in seeing behind the scenes, buy this book by all means – the Amazon price of about 27$ is more than worth it!
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I’ve read this book too, and I can recommend it. But as mentioned it’s not a simple “how-to”.