Book Review - Still Life and Special Effects Photography: A Guide to Professional Lighting Techniques by Roger Hicks, Frances Schultz

Useful, Educational, Long-term Resource
I found this book to be a great resource for inspirational ideas. It's a beautiful, hard-copy volume with excellent color reproductions. Each image is accompanied by a 2-D plan view of the lighting and studio setup, a 3-D illustration of the studio setup, exposure information, and two or three short paragraphs describing the set and shooting process. This books is USEFUL, even for advanced photographers, and that alone makes it a rare find.

All of the photography represented is done in-camera without digital manipulation. It's unfortunate that this method is almost destined to become a lost artform; however, at the same time my largest disappointment with the book is that it's void of digital capture examples. Some of Jody Dole's digital work would have been an excellent addition. Many of the book's images are obviously dated and produced in the early 80s. Even still, they serve as excellent learning examples.

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