Product Description

For introductory and advanced courses in Photography. This best-selling introductory photography text teaches students how to use the medium confidently and effectively by emphasizing both technique and visual awareness. Comprehensive in scope, this book-features superb instructional illustrations and examples in its clear presentation of both black and white and color photography. London offers extensive coverage of digital imaging and the latest technological developments, such as Web page design and formatting photos on CD-ROMs.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #159789 in Books
• Published on: 2004-04-19
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 432 pages

Amazon.com Review
A picture tells a thousand stories, but the one it doesn't tell is how the shot was made. Barbara London and John Upton's Photography is an all-inclusive look at the craft of photography. This book will help any amateur move up a few notches, and it serves as a refresher course for professionals as well. The sixth edition of this classic work (the first was published in 1976) includes a companion Web site with interactive activities, Web resources, and a learning archive. Amply illustrated with at least one photograph or diagram on almost every page, Photography is the one reference work every student of photography must have--even those who will never set foot in a classroom. --Brenda Pittsley

From the Back Cover

Why is this the #1 photography text year after year? Because no other source does so much so well.

The eighth edition of Photography teaches the skills you need to use the medium confidently and effectively, emphasizing both technique and visual awareness. It features: ,/P>

Complete coverage. What you need to know about black-and-white and color photography, plus special techniques such as lighting, close-up photography, and more. Digital imaging. Two updated chapters on digital imaging reflect cutting-edge technology. An emphasis on seeing photographically. Includes not only technical information, but also insight about flaw to make your pictures better. The text gives special attention to the visual choices photographers make about elements such as sharpness, tonality, and cropping. An easy-to-follow format. Each topic is discussed on a set of facing pages using photos, drawings, text, and captions.

New to this edition:

• Revised and updated digital-imaging chapters.
• Two new Photographer at Work profiles expand this popular coverage of contemporary photography.
• Updated coverage of color photography reflects changes in this dynamic field arid brings the text into the 21st century.
• Striking new fine-art images representing a range of photographic styles.

Unique FREE online study resoiurce...The Companion Website
www.prenhall.com/london For Students

• Interactive simulations and demonstrations that help you understand photo and lab processes.
• Chapter objectives that help you organize the key concepts for each chapter.
• Quizzes with multiple-choice, true/false, and fill-in questions that give you instant feedback and scores. A built-in e-mail routing option lets you forward quizzes to your instructor.
• Useful web links for each chapter as well as an online glossary.

For Instructors

• The Art Central section includes teaching resources from the Instructor's Manual with lecture hints, class activities, and mare, coordinated to each chapter. This module is accessible through a password provided by your local Prentice Hall representative.
• The Syllabus Manager is an easy way to create and post your syllabus online.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

More than a million copies of Photography are now in print. Many people who have used this book have become professional photographers or photography instructors, or are continuing to pursue their personal interest in photography. Whatever your interest in photography, this book is designed to teach the skills that you will need to use the medium confidently and effectively.

The emphasis of this edition continues to be in two major areas—technique and visual awareness.

The technical material helps you learn how to control the photographic process, or as Ansel Adams put it, to "understand the way that the lens 'sees' and the film 'sees.'" Equally important, this book can help you see by showing you the choices that other photographers have made and that you can make when you raise a camera to your eye.

Clarity and convenience have always been a focus of this book. In this edition even more effort has been made to organize and format information into an easy guide for beginning photographers and a quick reference for those with experience.

• The easy-to-use format has been maintained, with every two facing pages completing a single idea, skill, or technique.
• Boldfaced topic sentences outline the text on every page.
• "More About. . ." boxes on many pages cross-reference related topics in other parts of the book.

The general organization of technical information has been maintained, with updates for this new edition.

• General photographic techniques are covered completely in Chapters 1-8: camera, lens, film, exposure, developing and printing black-and-white film, and mounting.
• Chapters 10 and 11 expand and update information on digital imaging, focusing on the information that beginning students need to know.
• Chapters 9, 12, 13, 14, and 15 cover color photography, lighting, special techniques (such as making cyanotypes), view camera use, and a specialized method of exposure and development—the Zone System.
• Throughout the book, changes have been made to meet the needs of students using more digital imaging.
• A fully illustrated Troubleshooting Appendix, beginning on page 400, groups together technical problems, their causes, and ways to prevent them.

Improving visual awareness is a major emphasis of the book. Many demonstration photographs make topics easy to understand. Throughout the book you will find hundreds of illustrations by the best photographers showing how they have put to use various technical concepts. See for example:

• The photographs illustrating lens focal length on pages 45, 47, and 49, or how one photographer uses electronic flash plus available light on page 285.
• Photographer at Work pages throughout the book feature interviews with photographers who have developed successful careers in everything from sports photography (pages 90-91) to an integration of digital imaging with documentary photography (pages 252-253).
• Chapter 16, Seeing Photographs (pages 340-365), deals with composition, tonality, sharpness, and other visual elements that will help you make better pictures yourself, and see other people's photographs with a more sophisticated eye.
• Chapter 17 (pages 366-399) surveys the history of photography so that you can place today's photography—and your own—in a historical context.

New to the Eighth Edition

• Chapters 10 and 11 expand and update information on digital imaging.
• Two new Photographer at Work profiles continue the coverage of coverage of contemporary photography (158-159, 252-253).
• Many new fine art photographs illustrate technical concepts and help students develop visual awareness.

We are pleased to offer a Companion Website. Please visit the site at http://prenhall.com/london. This free online study resource contains many features, including:

• Simulations and demonstrations of various photographic processes
• A study guide
• Chat rooms
• Links to other photography e-sites
• An electronic instructor's manual. Please contact your Prentice Hall representative for a password. An integrated student lab manual/journal is also available.

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Customer Reviews

MUST be on your bookshelf.
For those impatient enough: if you are to buy one book that would teach you photography - this should be the one. This book has survived seven editions and it has enough information to make your head hurt. Needless to say, this book does not offer a silver bullet that would make you Ansel Adams, but it has enough information to build a solid technical foundation upon which you could leverage your creativity.

Make no mistake: this book is first and foremost about film photography. While there is a somewhat obligatory chapter on digital photography, it is hardly more than a very brief introduction. The rest of the book implies film photography (needless to say, that information on exposure and lens is generally applicable to both film and digital photography techniques).

Furthermore, the book is seriously geared toward black and white photography. There is plenty of information about the color process but it feels complementary to the narration.

On the negative side, there are only a couple things to note:
- Having so many precise instructions, this book ought to have an appendix containing all data in one place (from reciprocity failure correction numbers, to N+2 development time increase, to film processing checklists). It is a shame, the book doesn't have such a reference chapter.
- The price of the latest edition is way too steep. While I am far from suggesting sacrificing quality for lower price (as unfortunately so many other books do), I still think that the price has risen way too high compared to older editions.

All in all, it is an excellent basic reference. It is unlikely to be the only book on your shelf, but it will definitely be an extremely useful one while you are mastering advanced photography. Bottom line: buy this book now.

The best reference book ever found.
When in college, I took a photography course from a well known and respected photographer in the Bay Area. This was the textbook we were to purchase. I have since turned to photography full time. I look to this book for little things from time to time and I am glad it is there. It is like a little mentor. I recommend it to all people I speak with who say that they would like to know more about photography. It is a great book. One you will use over and over again. One that will not grow dust on its' cover.

Excellent textbook for those starting out
This is a great book for amateurs who want to understand how photography works. The textbook format is well laid out and organized. It has chapters that cover everything from how the camera works and different lens characteristics to developing and criticizing your own work. I don't think it will be much use for experienced and pro photographers but it might come in handy to freshen up on your photo knowledge.