Comments about oreilly Ten Photo Assignments:

A number of years ago I took a photography class at my local arts center. I quit after a few sessions because it was unorganized and tried to appeal to too many levels. As an alternative I decided that the best study for me would be to read more books on the topic and practice. Ten Photo Assignments by Amanda Quintenz-Fielder looked to be the best of both worlds: Ten advanced exercises in photographic technique and principles, in a book format. One important note to take care of right off the bat: If you don't have a digital SLR camera, this book probably isn't for you. If you're a raw beginner, this book probably isn't for you either. You'll need some gear, a little bit of understanding of that gear, and some patience to work through the assignments in the book.

The first six assignments deal with the technical aspects of these cameras, focusing on features your point-and-shoot or camera phone don't have. You might also need to get ready to spend money on equipment you don't have, such as a light meter or extra lenses. I believe the Quintenz-Fielder's intent is to have you master the technical matters first so they don't impede your artistic eye as your skills develop. I can understand that but admit I had to improvise a bit due to lack of equipment.

The remaining chapters address composition and light, and provide a good introduction to working with both to create great photographs. There are lots of resources online and elsewhere on composition (think: rule of thirds), but the two lessons on light are more unique based on what I've seen.

In my opinion there are better books and resources on photography than Ten Photo Assignments, though perhaps not as thorough. If you've got the gear and want to learn how to use it better, then working through this book may be a good exercise for you. If your interest in photography aren't great enough to invest that kind of money or time, look toward other sources.

Note: I wrote this review for O'Reilly's Blogger Review Program.

Comments about oreilly Ten Photo Assignments:

This is a superbly fash­ioned instruc­tion course for those who want to go bey­ond pho­to­graphic snaps and start to think about what makes a photo par­tic­u­larly remark­able. Although it won't provide a simple for­mula to turn you into a pho­to­graphic expert, what it does do is provide a series of 'assign­ments' focus­sing of par­tic­u­lar aspects that can be explored to both enjoy get­ting deeper into the pho­to­graphic exper­i­ence, but also mov­ing bey­ond the snap­shot. Ten Photo Assign­ments looks to aspects such as light­ing, macro-photography, expos­ure and the vari­ous ways that the com­pon­ents of a good digital cam­era work together to cre­ate the image.

The author takes you through a recipe-based approach, lay­ing out the spe­cific com­pon­ents that you will work with in each of the ten chapters, then com­bines these with a straight­for­ward object­ive. The sub-exercises in each assign­ment lead you through con­struct­ive hands-on examples that build towards the object­ive. This is a par­ticu­alry use­ful approach as it allows for a nice self-paced approach. The chapters are aug­men­ted with com­ments that look at the indi­vidual steps and explore what you should be find­ing through doing.

You have to com­mit to this book and it also requires a fair bit of pho­to­graphic equip­ment to engage with it prop­erly. How­ever, the res­ults are quite pro­found and this is a super mini-course in mov­ing your pho­to­graphy from purely ama­teur, point and snap to begin­ning to con­sider more soph­ist­ic­ated com­pos­i­tion and a more pro­fes­sional approach to your cre­at­ive art.

This is not a manual inten­ded for the cas­ual user and as such I would aim it towards someone who is engaged in the pho­to­graphic art and famil­iar with the vari­ous aspects of manual man­age­ment of your cam­era. I would highly recom­mend this book to just such a person.

Comments about oreilly Ten Photo Assignments:

Requires a reasonable amount of equipment over and above just a camera (lenses, colour meters, etc) but for anyone serious about improving their photography this book would help. The content covers how to get the best out of your camera and moves on to how to compose great photos. Everything is well explained in simple steps. Especially nice is the focus on experimentation and learning from mistakes.