equipment

I was happy to see a book that covered many styles of lighting and styles of photography. As a semi-professinal, i am asked to shoot many types of photographs, and this book has given me excellent tips to "upgrade" my photos. The portrait and fashion section was especially helpful. AA+++

Ok, I'm sorry, but I gotta tell you this book is way out of date and doesn't have very many low-budget ideas. I made myself read this book cover to cover because I really needed to learn some lighting techniques fast. Well, when I was finished, I was impressed with the author and her friend's work, but I didn't know much more than I did before picking up the book.

It's almost as if the author has put together a personal portfolio accompanied with some bragging and some stories. The thing that bothers me is that the title "The Lighting Cookbook" seems to suggest that it's like a reference guide for the average Joe that's easy to use, like a real cookbook. Not so. I don't know how many times I've flipped through this book looking for a "recipe" to use for my lighting needs and I always end up putting it back on the shelf.

The "recipes" are too specific and based on things that most people will never do. When's the next time you plan on shooting some pictures of beakers filled with green liquid on top of a piece of plexiglass? Never you say? Ah, too bad because it's covered in this book.

The reason I said this book is out of date is because most people (that aren't stuck in the past) are moving on to digital. We're not using these insanely expensive "view cameras" that only big companies can afford. I've got a top of the line prosumer digital camera and there's not much in this book that even applies to shooting pictures with a regular camera.

The cameras that they use are not the only rediculously expensive items. The lighting equiptment that they use in all the indoor recipes are equally out of the question for most people. It would cost thousands and thousands of dollars to buy the "ingredients" to these recipes. A photographer like the author probably doesn't have any problem affording this equiptment because she's a pro, but what about your middle class audience?

I'd like to say that I really hate to be negative about anything. I like to give everything I'm reading the benifit of the doubt. That's why I read this whole book. When I finished, I placed it on my shelf and it pisses me off every time I look at it. Today, when I typed in "lighting" and it came up as one of the three most popular, I had to say something because I know that regular people like me are buying this book because they think it has the answers to their questions. Well, my friend it doesn't and I just thought I'd warn you.

As I finish this review I find myself asking a certain question. Who is this book for? It's not for regular people or beginners, because they don't need to take glamour shots of jewelry. So, I started to think that maybe it was for people that own a photography business and own all of this expensive equiptment, but wouldn't a professional photographer who owns their own business already know how to use their own equiptment? I don't know. Maybe it's for rich people that own a hundred thousand dollars worth of equiptment, but don't know how to use any of it and have no creativity.

Since reading this book, I've gone on to learn way more by flipping through catelogs and websites.

Let me say that I do give this book two stars instead of one because it features some great inspirational photography and is probably useful to some small group of people out there.

If you are interested in doing mainly portrait photography, but need to learn more about how to properly and effectively do lighting setups, this book is an excellent place to start. The book has several diagrams of exactly how the lights were setup, along with actual photographs that were taken using each setup.

It talks briefly about how to deal with different types of people, and includes a short part on photographing pets as well. There are also sections on lighting still life photography, although this is not the main focus of the book. If people portraits are what you are interested in doing, this book will be an excellent reference. However if you are more interested in photographing still lifes or pets, I'd recommend that you either find another book, or use this in addition to another resource.