Photographic Lenses

Rating:
Summary: Clarifies confusing terms, among other things.
Review: If you have ever owned a Hasselblad you most likely have a copy of Ernst Wildi's The Hasselblad Manual - virtual bible for Hasselbald owners. Once again Wildi exhibits his mastery of photographic equipment in this book, Photographic Lenses: A photographer's guide to characteristics, quality, use and design. Have you ever confused depth of field with depth of focus? Wildi will set you straight. Clear diagrams, succinct, precise and clear writing and wonderful images abound in this 125-page volume. There is nothing left out of this book. Wildi discusses lens characteristics, understanding advertising claims, lenses for film and digital photography, lens specifications, focal lengths and zoom lenses. And those are just the first few subjects talked about in chapter one. Don't let the number of topics lead you to think that the subjects aren't covered thoroughly, though. They are. The information is clear enough for beginners to understand, informational enough for pros to learn something new. You can't go wrong with this volume.

Rating:
Summary: A decent simple view of a technical subject.
Review: This book gives a reasonably complete explanation of photographic lenses for the casual to moderate user. It has some decent explanations of various lens characteristics. I drop it to a 4 rating because it could have been better had the author used pictures purposely aimed at showing lens differences. Unfortunately someone in the advertising department must have gotten a hold of the production decisions and filled the book with cutesy stock-photo advertising type shots that dumb the personality of the book down to a coffee table type book rather create the educational type experience it could have been. A shame such great information is presented like a PhotoShop retouched advertising brochure.