Digital Masters: B&W Printing Book Review

The Book Review

Rating 8 out of 10

Digital Masters: B&W Printing by George Dewolfe is in short a step by guide to creating a black and white 'masterpiece'. This book covers everything you need to know to create it.
This book is divided into 3 sections (Black and White, Image Workflow and a Conclusion) as well as a glossary, index and portfolio.

The first section in this book is about the key qualities that make up a black and white photo (tone, luminosity, luminance, sharpness,softness,edges, depth, contrast and brightness) with great attention paid to the difference between Luminance and Luminosity. The difference between what is visually perceived by us and what is actually seen (recorded) by the camera.

The second and the largest section is about Image Workflow. It describes how to design a workflow, how to setup your software, how to input your images on a computer, how to make global and local adjustments to a photo, how to optimize and fine-tune an image, setting up your workstation and last but not least printing and evaluating your print.

The final section and the shortest section is all about photographing the known and unknown, honing your skills as a photographer and accessing and practicing your mindfulness.

I particularly enjoyed the 2 pages on exploring tonal values in the first section and chapter where George DeWolf converts famous paintings into grayscale and looks at how the tonal values are distributed.


Top things I learnt from this book

• To make global adjustments then broad adjustments and then local adjustments when your editing a image.


• The difference between Luminosity and Luminance.


• How to outline in Photoshop to accentuate the depth of individual objects.


• And finally how to create a 'Masterpiece'.
  

A few minor criticisms

• He devoted a entire chapter to inputting your photos onto your computer, this is so basic as to be inappropriate in a advanced book like this.
  
• The book uses Lightroom and Photoshop exclusively with all his detailed explanations of image adjustments being done in Photoshop or Lightroom. As well as an entire chapter being dedicated to customizing Lightroom modules. This is not very helpful to those who use other photo editing programs.


• The screen shots which show an image together with the Lightroom controls side by side results in the control panel being so small as to be unreadable. This adds to the growing frustration of a non-Lightroom user trying to decipher & translate what is being done.


• Throughout this book he is constantly promoting his 'magic' plugin, this gets very annoying after a while. He tries to persuade you that your photographic life depends on getting his plugin.


• And finally the book states on page 71 that the plugin costs $19.95 but when you visit George DeWolfs website the price actually is $90.00.
  

My Rating 8 out of 10

I found this is a good yet challenging read at times. I am giving it 8 stars because I found it difficult to read at times and because of George promoting his plugin excessively. Regularly now I go out to take photos specifically to be converted into black and white. This book feels good to the hands with a nice tactile finish on the front and the back of the book and the printing quality is excellent. This is a great book for anyone wishing to learn more about Black and White photography with lots or little experience.

And if nothing else this book offers some great black and white photos throughout the book to motivate you. You really could buy this book just to see the photos.

Check out the Digital Masters: B&W Printing at Amazon where it is 25% off.

Have you read any great black and white digital photography books lately? Give your recommendations in comments box. I'm Looking forward to discovering some other great black and white digital photography books!

Complete Guide to High Dynamic Range Digital Photography Book Review

Over the weekend I sat down with the Complete Guide to High Dynamic Range Digital Photography- one of my many unread photography books that have been sat on my desk for a while. This book was recommended to me by a Friend and thought that it was probably time that I checked it out for myself. I’m glad that I did.


So What is High Dynamic Range Photography (HDR) ?

According to Ferrell McCollough the author of this book, HDR is the process of taking several photographs of a scene at various exposures, then merging them into one file. So the entire photograph can look crisp and detailed, from highlights to midtones to shadows - and photographers needn't sacrifice any part of their image.


The Book Review

10 Out Of 10

The Complete Guide to High Dynamic Range Digital Photography is the easiest way to to master this exiting relatively new technology with this thorough easy to follow and visually stunning guide book. This book covers everything you need to know to produce great HDR photographs, from how to take great source images to how to merge and tone map your photos.


Sections in the book cover

1. HDR Photography: An Overview (chapter explaining technical details of how HDR works)

2. Equipment, Controls, and Technique (raw vs jpeg, exposure compensation and using a Tripod and more)

3. Merging and Tone Mapping (conversion options, tone compressor vs details enhancer etc)

4. HDR Software and Post Processing (All the major software packages are examined and their virtues compared, The Creative HDR Look and lots more)

5. Capturing Great Source Images (Judging Contrast, Number of Images and Bracketing Amount, Histogram analysis, Ghosting + more)

6. Flash Merging, Architecture, and Panoramas (a shorter chapter on Flash Merging, Architectural HDR Photography and Panoramic HDR Photography)

7. Single Image HDR Photography (shortest chapter on Single Image Tone Mapping and Graduated ND Filters vs HDR)

8. Advanced Image Analysis (I think this last chapter should really be named extras or others as this is not really that much about analyzing images). The chapter includes Black and White HDR Photography, Night and Low Light HDR Photography, Macro and Flowers.

When I first read about this book I wondered how a HDR photography would take 174 pages to cover. But I soon realised that this book covers everything about HDR and that 174 pages for everything about HDR isnt much. I particularly enjoyed the page on Extreme Tone Mapping in the last chapter as this really opened my mind on how creative HDR can be.


Top Things I learnt From This Book

• The technical details of exactly how HDR works
  
• That you can have shadow in your photos and have an HDR image
  
• That you can have black and white HDR images
  
• That HDR can help reduce noise in photographs.
  

My Rating 10 Out Of 10

I found this book an enjoyable read and I think it fully desrves 10 stars. I now feel confident in producing good HDR images. Regulary now I take several photos of some scenes to see what that they would look like combined in a HDR image. The book feels nice to the hands and the printing quality is excellent. This book is an ideal starter book for anyone interested in HDR images, experienced photographer or not, it will guide you through the world of HDR. This is a book that will remain on my book shelf as a useful reference book for years to come as I continue my journey through the world of HDR.

And if nothing else, this book offers some fantastic inspiring HDR images to motivate you that really will motivate you. I think it is even worth buying the book just to see the excellent HDR images.

Check out the Complete Guide to High Dynamic Range Digital Photography at Amazon where it is 35% off. Furthermore if you would like to see the potential of HDR photography check out my post 25 Stunning HDR Photos

Have you read any great digital photography books? Give your recommendations with your reasons why in comments box. I'm Looking forward to discovering some great digital photography books.

5 Items Every Photographer Should Carry In There Camera Bag

1. Spare Memory Cards - Memory cards are available in a wide range of capacities ranging from 256mb to about 16gb. But even if you are lucky enough to have a large capacity card say 8gb it is still a good idea to purchase another one because what if you lose it?, what if it is stolen? So it better to purchase at least one extra memory card to stay on the safe side.

2. Spare Batteries- You never know when your batteries will run out on you. Even though batteries don’t tend to run out that quickly nowadays, it is still a great idea to carry an extra battery. For instance if you were taking photos all day or for when you forget to charge the batteries the night before. So always carry a spare!

3. A UV Filter - These are thin glass filter designed to screw onto the end of your camera lenses. They filter out all the harsh UV rays of sunlight. They will allow your camera's sensors to record truer colors and details. They are the best £10 insurance policy you can provide for your camera lenses. They not only protect your lens from scratches and dust but they can save a lens or two. In fact they have already saved a lens of mine, the filter shattered instead the glass in the lens.

4.Circular Polariser Filter - Do you like shooting water scape's, sunsets or other sky/water involved scenes, if the answer if yes then a circular polariser is essential. If it is no it's still worth getting one. In appearance they are similar to UV filters but they are much darker in color, usually a darker deeper blue. Lots of dust particles in the air are constantly reflecting the sunlight. This causes your eyes (and your camera) to see the light reflected back, and not the true, deep lovely colors of the sky.
The same is true with light reflecting off of water particles. Polarisers eliminate these reflections and they allow your camera to record the true blues, greens and purples of the water and sky. Polarisers also eliminate the harsh rays reflecting back from the sand. I wrote a more detailed review of the circular polariser.

5.Tripod - Well it isn't strictly speaking a item to put in your camera bag. But it is the key weapon against the devil(camera shake). A Tripod could mean the difference between a great photo and a horrible blurry one. If you want to completely eliminate camera shake then use your cameras self-timer or purchase a cable release.

Buy one; but if you do find yourself without a tripod, you can improvise by resting your camera on something flat. Or by finding something to lean on such as a wall or a lamp post. If there is nothing at all to lean or rest on then stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and tuck your elbows into your body. These tips are not as good as using a tripod, but are better than nothing.

Circular Polarizer

I recently purchased a circular polarizer for my camera (Hama Circular Polarizer Filter 55mm) and it's great.
You've seen all those photos on magazines with lovely blue skies, you've probably wondered how they managed to do it. This is where the polarizer comes in, it darkens blue skies turning them a lovely deep, rich blue.
Polarizers are also great with greenary, making leaves less shiny by removing the reflections.

They are also great for removing reflections in water. If for instance you were shooting a river scene and you wanted to see the river bottom, a polarizer will allow you to do this. It does this by removing the reflections in the water.

Even if you are not shooting in any of these situations polarizers will enhance the colour saturation with almost any subject making the colours looking more intense. Polarizers are the second most used filters simply because the effects they create can not be replicated digitaly yet.

You are probably now thinking 'I bet this mother of all filters is really expensive'.
But it is not, I bought mine for just £20. Here is the filter i bought a Hama Circular Polarizer Filter 55mm. It did everything I hoped it would do (everything above) and the cherry on the icing was that it was £10 cheaper than Jessops own brand and £20 cheaper than the same one in Jessops.

Some other Circular Polarizers.

More info on Polarizers