Book Review - Mastering Digital Flash Photography

I just bought this book and have been anticipating sitting down for more than a few minutes with it, but it seems that everytime I go to sit down, something else comes up as soon as I open it up. Nonetheless, I have read enough now to be able to say I am happy I picked this book out.

I am an analytical person and thus am happy when I get a formula or chart with numbers. This book has some great charts. Very few photographers are going to carry around a book to reference charts, but reviewing the charts when looking at a picture that didn't turn out quite as expected can help. By understanding why it did not turn out the way you expected, you will be in a better position to take a similar picture the next time the opportunity presents itself.

An example of a good chart that will be handy to understand is the Max Flash range chart. It shows how to take the Guide Number of a flash, the aperture and ISO you are using, and figure out about how far away from your flash will still get light from the flash.

Another thing that I like about this book is advice that I put into a category called "rules of thumb". (I know I didn't coin that phrase, but I like it.) Advice like this on page 27 "it is almost always better to have clipped shadows than clipped highlights". In other words, it is easier to recover a picture that is too dark than one that is too bright. That is one I can file away in my mental checklist as I am reviewing shots on my LCD to know if I need to tweak settings and reshoot.

Pictures always tell a story and photography books are certainly no exception. That said, a picture with explanation is good, but several pictures with the explanation of why they are different and how they were taken differently really makes a lot of sense. One great example of that is on pg 55 where pictures show the difference between direct flash and indirect (bounced) flash.

Before I bore you all to tears, I will just mention one more thing that I really like about this book. Diagrams. Lots of them, showing where the camera, lighting, reflector and subject were in relation to each other for a photo.

An old boss used to say "Stephen, give me the short version"when I started to give him more details than he wanted. So for those of you out there that are still reading, here is the short version: "Mastering Digital Flash Photography is a great book with a lot of very helpful information on flash photography. I'm not sure how helpful it would be if you are already a master of the flash, but for anyone that is just getting started with flash photography or has a few problem areas with their flash, this book is worth the money."

Do you have any good books? Photography-related or not, I am always interested in a good book, so please leave me a comment here below this post or give me a shout over at Twitter.