5 comments about The Wedding Video Handbook: How to Succeed in the Wedding Video Business (DV Expert Series) (DV Expert Series).

1. Amazing examples, teaching, practicals on more than just filming! This book gives information on how to treat customers, how to market your video business, correct ways to write your disclaimers for jobs, and so much more. I bought the book and have already used several principles taught in the book with an upcoming wedding I have.
   
   Your confidence and your professionalism will increase the minute you start reading. If you are a novice or a professional there is always something new to learn and this book will get you to the next level. With a DVD included in the book you can't go wrong. Also the book is full of recommendations for other websites and materials that will give you even more guidance in this field of videography.
   
   100% amazing book that will really help - don't wait any longer, BUY IT today and see results!!



2. I was rather disappointed in this book. Much of the material was so "generalized" that it was not at all helpful, most was just plain common sense, and some was completely outdated. (Hey Kirk.....High Def IS here!) I would say that maybe 25% of the information was useful. Unfortunately, books covering this category seem to be rather scarce, so there are not too many other options.



3. The advice on structuring contracts alone was worth the cost of the book, which also included practical advice on every aspect I was interested in. Highly recommended. The only downside overall was with UPS (yet again).



4. This is a very informative book. Well written by a professional of the industry. Has all the information you need from start to finish.



5. Great book covering a lot of ground and details. I can recommend this book for anyone wanting to get started in
   wedding videos to make money. Good business ideas.

3 comments about Private Newport: At Home and In the Garden.

1. Private Newport features page after page of gorgeous homes--those that only we mere mortals can only dream about! The photography is spectacular and I love the way the exterior of the homes and their grounds are included, as well as the amazing interiors. This is a great gift for anyone who has visited Newport or who desires to. You won't see these homes on the mansion tour as they are privately owned and not open to the public.



2. I used to live in Newport and I recognize many of the houses in this book. You will not see these private interiors and gardens any other way. The photography and writing are excellent.



3. .
   This is an exquisite look at Newport Rhode Island by Betty Barden Pardee, a contributing editor to Bon Appetit, who, with her husband is a year-around resident of Newport. Ms. Pardee takes the reader inside the mansions for a private look at the interiors and gardens of this community from a bygone era.
   
   Photographer Mick Hales, whose work has appeared in House and Garden, Vanity Fair, Architectural Digest, and Town and Country does an extraordinary job capturing the light, mood and character of Newport.
   
   Designers, decorative artists, and landscape designers will especially enjoy these pages.

5 comments about i am 8-bit: Art Inspired by Classic Videogames of the '80s.

1. Where do I start? I found this gem listed under books from Chuck Klosterman, who I think speaks for an entire generation of 30-somethings raised on bad rock bands and crappy John Hughes movies. I gave it a shot, and wasn't disappointed!
   
   In typical Chuck fashion, he analyzes video games and why they had an indelible affect on the childhoods of guys like me who spent about $3 million in quarters on Yie Ar Kung Fu (and why, 20 years later, guys i tell this to completely understand). For Klosterman fans, this is worth half the price right here.
   
   But that's just 2% of the book! The rest is filled with totally awesome art that's hard to describe because I've never really seen anything like it--it's not advertising art, or game screenshots, or concept art from games. I guess it's just like the sub-title says, artwork inspired by what the artists played as kids in the 80's, but it's still hard to understand until you actually see it.
   
   And what's really cool are the pieces that have quotes from the artists explaining their inspirations, why they used a particular game, or just random game memories--really funny stuff!
   
   My favorites are:
   
   1) Excitebike: Cool blocky render of a classic. Made me remember how I'd build my own track and line up all those turbo things.
   
   2) Mega Man: I recognize this artist, Tim Biskup, from Juxtapoz and Super 7 magazines. Cool!
   
   3) Don't Be a 2nd Player Hater (Luigi for Sheezy): Luigi pimped out like Snoop. Hilarious, yo!
   
   4) Pac-Man in Hospice: This gives me nightmares. Especially the Frogger frog.
   
   5) Record Dug Digger: Cross between skateboard art (in a good way) and NY graffiti. Trust me, it's awesome!
   
   Other games I recognized include more mainstream stuff like Joust and Space Invaders to games that are a little more esoteric, like Contra, 720, Kid Icarus, and that weird robot thing that came with the NES. If you're a fan of the classics, I highly recommend it!



2. First and foremost, this book makes a wonderful inexpensive gift for anyone who grew up in the '80s playing the 'ole 8-bit video systems and still has a bit of nostalgia for those simpler times. It's also pretty neat as a bound exhibit of how pop culture can be transformed into art that's actually quite captivating. About 70 artists contributed works, and the medium of choice is definitely oil and acrylic paint, with a fair number of mixed media pieces thrown in. The styles vary wildly, with influences ranging from surrealism to manga to skateboard art to graffiti to crafting to abstract to pixelation and on and on. It's actually a pretty decent overview of modern pop art sensibilities.
   
   In terms of subject matter, far and away the most prevalent "inspirations" are from the Donkey Kong/Mario Bros. franchise, with Pac Man coming in next, and Frogger, Zelda, and Dig Dug also getting much play. However, some of the best pieces are from less popular games, like Tim Tomkinson's "Duck Hunter S. Thompson" mashup of a portrait of the gonzo journalist with the Sega "Duck Hunter" graphics, Jim Rugg's faux poster for a pro wrestling event featuring characters from the Nintendo wrestling game, or Jason Sho Green's pen and ink "Tantric Tetris". On the whole it's a very fun, well-designed book, nicely produced, and sure to bring a smile to many 30somethings. It's worth noting that I like Chuck Klosterman too, but his foreword is pretty slim, maybe 500 words, so don't buy it for that!



3. this book is a great collection of established and up and coming artists interpreting classic video games. what more could you want?



4. "I AM 8-BIT" is a must have for those old school fanatics who long for another golden era... one of the best books ever made. Buy it now!!!



5. Coffee table or bookcase, this book is for the most artistic of videogame fans, as well as those that appreciate mixed media with their pop culture. Joust, Mario Bros, Donkey Kong, Pac Man, Q-Bert and more are all displayed like you've never seen them by talented artists. The nostalgia is thick and sweet smelling; a feeling that few will appreciate to it's fullest. Highly recommended for artists and nerds alike. Also check out Arcade Fever and Supercade for the history behind our favorite up up down down history.

5 comments about Snowflakes in Photographs.

1. I read Snowflake Bently to a group of four year old children. They loved the idea that it was a true story. The next day I presented this book and the kids couldn't get enough.



2. This book about lived up to my expectations -- which wouldn't make it worth it for everybody. In our case, we were doing a unit study on snowflakes and we covered Bentley's biography (from children's picture books for the young ones to more complete adult biographies for the older) and the point of this book for us was simply to see what it was that he did. I explained to my first grader that the large camera he had was also very young in terms of the history of photography and that what he accomplished was marvelous for his time. I also explained that today's equipment is able to do so much more. We turned to Libbrecht'sThe Snowflake-- being from Caltech he's probably a good one to take up the cause and the photos are incredible. My first grader loved them so much that we ended up getting the calendar, Snowflakes 2008 Calendar: Featuring the amazing micro-photography of Kenneth Libbrecht (Calendar). The high school student was more interested in the text, and I loved both.
   
   Since I was familiar with Bentley's photos I knew I was buying this one for historical interest to go along with the biographies and not for anything more -- therefore, I didn't experience any disappointment for it perhaps not being as good as other books mentioned.



3. Snowflakes in Photographs
   
   You can't imagine the variety of design in each individual snowflake until you these photographs. From simple to complex, these photos show how absolutely symmetrical and stunning these fragile crystals are.



4. Bentley photographed the ephemeral and hidden: snowflakes. He did this on his own with limited education and equipment. His glass plates remind us of the awe, beauty and wonder of frozen water. The book reveals Bentley's efforts on his Vermont farm over his lifetime. His dedication and creativity help us grasp the complexity, simplicity and three-dimensional images of snow. Snow is the most unstable substance on earth - always changing, even while it is forming in the atmosphere, falling through the atmosphere, depositing on a ground surface (water, soil, fence, glass, trees), sublimating (going directly from a solid to a vapor), hoar frost depositing out of a saturated clear atmosphere at night to produce a fairly land in at sunrise, going through continuous metamorphism (melt-freeze, temperature gradient, equitemperature gradient) and finally melting to return to the liquid form of the hydrologic cycle.
   
   Bentley's photographs enable us all to grasp snow from nursery to graduate school - the images all make sense - physically and mentally. Many images have been transformed into ornaments, framed photographs and other high end works of art.



5. I bought this book hoping the kids (8&5) would be intrigued by all the patterns of the snowflakes. They weren't, but the adults loved it!
   
   The photography and the story of the how these snowflakes were captured on film is very interesting.

5 comments about Robert Polidori: Zones of Exclusion: Pripyat and Chernobyl.

1. I won't endeavor to describe this book any more than Amazon's editors. But, I will say that I've collected photography books for close to twenty years and this is one of the most beautiful I've seen. The work is extraordinary, both disquieting and alluring at the same time. Polidori's composition, use of color and eye for detail is indicative of not only classic artistic stylisation, but a sensitive soul as well. This is truly brilliant work!



2. There is only one page of text in this book. Page 7, written by Elizabeth Culbert in New York City in April 2003, explains how Pripyat, a community of homes for workers from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, was evacuated 36 hours after tons of radioactive material had been released, hauling 50,000 people away in a fleet of buses. "Mandatory evacuation continued over the next 10 days, forcing 116,000 people to depart from towns and villages within 30 kilometers of the plant--this area would be named the exclusion zone. . . . Today the elderly are allowed to stay; children are not. No one is permitted to live within a 10-kilometer radius of Chernobyl. Pripyat remains abandoned."

   "Nearly 350,000 people were moved from contaminated regions of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia, though hundreds of thousands still live in areas unsuitable for habitation--unsuitable not only because of radioactivity, but also because of severe socio-economic and psychological pressures. . . . With limited local capacity to deal with health, economic and environmental challenges, living conditions spiral downward." Thousands of Ukrainians would like the Chernobyl plant to reopen to provide jobs and power to the region. But the danger of the collapse of the existing structure over the "200 tons of uranium and a ton of radioactive plutonium" at Chernobyl make it a bad place to risk having more explosions so close.

   The pictures are monumental, as only pictures of a catastrophe can come close to capturing the essence of the slow deterioration of nuclear decay. The picture on the cover, repeated on page 41, shows a farewell written on a red rectangle mounted on a light green wall. Very institutional colors and furnishings, but the paint on the walls is peeling, and plaster around the window fell over everything in the picture. The title of the book is written at the far edge of the ceiling:

   Zones of Exclusion PRIPYAT AND CHERNOBYL.

   The book is printed in Germany, and the photographer, Robert Polidori, was given the necessary visas and authorizations to enter the area around Chernobyl in Ukraine to take these pictures on June 6-9, 2001. Nearly at the end of the book, there is a picture, "Robert Polidori in the Unit 4 control room. Photograph by Konstantin Leifer, June 6, 2001." The page before that has captions for the other pictures in the book, starting with:

   3-4 Sarcophagus over the Unit 4 reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

   Pages 1 and 2 are blank, and the picture of the sarcophagus on page 3 only has text on a sign just below the barbed wire at the top of a gray block wall, but the text is too small and faint to read. There is a crane between the camera and the sarcophagus which looks like a combination of toothpicks. I assume the cranes in these pictures are now too contaminated to be used elsewhere, though this book does not have any pictures of them glowing in the dark. Page 4 shows the crane from another angle, closer to the side of a structure that is almost as large as the sarcophagus.

   Page 5 has the title. Page 6 shows an entryway with a sign "Contamination Control Post" in English. Page 9 shows a mall with buildings that used letters of the Russian alphabet for their signs. Trees are growing, even in the cracks in the pavement. The pictures on pages 10-11 show buildings with the nuclear power plant in the background. A lightpost on page 11 has trees close enough to hide some of the power lines in the bottom corner of the picture, but there would not be power in the line, so the trees don't need to be trimmed. Pages 12-15 show electrical transfer stations with high-voltage wires, with the nuclear power plant in the background. There are still a few guards and a STOP sign at the nuclear power plant on page 17. Page 26 is blank except for the page number because the picture on page 27 is huge, showing the Unit 4 control room in the damaged condition that fate left it in. Page 28 is blank because it marks a transition to pictures of a kindergarten classroom that has been neglected for years. There were a lot of beds in the nursery on page 33, but the mattresses are falling apart. I think the doll on page 36 might have been posed, like the chair sitting on the top of a desk near a picture of Lenin and some kids on page 37. The dangling light fixture on page 39 looks as likely to crash down as the other metal channels lying about, and they don't look they were part of the ceiling. The library on page 49 is really messed up. A lot of people left their gas masks in the cafeteria on page 53.

   Then there are pictures of an abandoned hospital, vacant residential buildings, vehicles that ought to be buried, old boats in the harbor, and small pictures of little places. Trees that used to grow around the nuclear power plant are now lying in rows of piles in fields of radioactive logs. This book makes the catastrophe seem pretty recent, compared to how long people ought to wait before these areas are populated again.




3. Robert Polidori has captured in large format, cities which have now become ghost towns, due to the most devastating of nuclear accidents. The colors are muted in the photographs as they are in real life, with everything that's left covered in dirt, debris, and rubble. There may never be a full clean-up because of the radiation still present, which would put people at risk, and the fact that it will never be rebuilt anyway. It appears most of the shots were taken during cloudy days, and I am wondering if the mood would have been emphasized a tad further had some warmer light shined into the interiors.
   
   The story of what happened is barely touched upon, but this book is a photo representation of what is left behind, and not a story about what happened. I have no problem looking elsewhere to find the history of the accident, and think the book stands alone as a stunning pictorial depiction of what can go wrong in the nuclear age. One of my favorite photo books in any genre.



4. The photos are poetic, well composed and beautifully printed. Those interested in images of Chernobyl, or in architectural photography, will find this worthwhile.
   
   However, the book contains almost no text, and this weakens it. There is no discussion of the places shown in the photographs, or what happened in each setting. There is no pairing of before and after photographs. There is no discussion of how, technically, Polidori took the photographs. I would have preferred to see all three of these things.
   
   There are other sources, of course. A recent issue of National Geographic used the 20th anniversary of the disaster as its cue to cover this ground (and with some very similar photos too). However, this was a missed chance by Polidori.
   
   Also, I found the array of photographs of little houses being reclaimed by the forest to be less interesting than Polidori probably expected. The urban photos were much more compelling.



5. Found this book on a movie set and was amazed at the images. Photographed in 2001, this book brings the horrors of Chernobyl to life. Another event in our life that should not be forgotton. An amazing pictorial.

5 comments about 50 Fast Photoshop 7 Techniques.

1. Intended user: Beginning to Advanced

   I knew just by thumbing through this book that I was going to enjoy the time I spent reviewing it. And then when I read these words on page two of the introduction - "If I had to make a single recommendation about how to quickly learn to successfully use Photoshop, it would be to learn all about those few features that you need to use to get your work done - and ignore the rest." - I said where was this book 5+ years ago? Oh sure there has always been instructional books similiar to this, but most are bible length epics and just as cryptic as the bible itself.

   The book comes with a CD-ROM that not only includes:

   * 50 sets of "before" and "after" images
   * A Photoshop tryout version: 6.0, but hey - beats having to download.
   * An ebook.pdf of the book that you can keep on your computer.
   * A slide show of all 50 techniques
   * A companion webpage: called www.reallyusefulpage.com, and
   * You can even email the author himself - right from the CD.

   The first six chapters are set up as a Photoshop bootcamp, to help you become successful with the last 44 techniques. Even if you are an experienced user o f Photoshop, I recommend - as does the author - that you complete all six techniques in Chapter 1 before trying any of the other techniques. Then you will have the required knowledge to try any of the other techniques in any order that you want .

   Take a Peek at All the Information Packed In This Book:
   

   Chapter 1 - Photoshop 7 Fundamentals - Techniques 1-6:

   Configuring Photoshop, Controlling Image Window, Automamating Tasks, Creative Experimentation, Calibrating Your Monitor, and Configuring Basic Color Management.

   Chapter 2 - Correcting, Enhancing, and Restoring Digital Photos -Techniques 7-13:

   Quick Image Correction, Advanced Image Correction, Increasing Color Saturation, Restoring an Old Image-(my personal favorite), Removing Noise or Grain, Sharpening Digital Photos, and Adding Information to a Digital Photo.

   Chapter 3 - Working In Black and White -Techniques 14-19:

   (2)Converting a Photo to B&W, Burning and Dodging with Masks, Using Scaling Masks to Speed Edits, Isolating and Extracting Detail using Values, and Selective Focusing.

   Chapter 4 - Creative Experimentation - Techniques 20-25:

   Hand-Painting a Black and White Image, Creating a Pseudolsolarization, Adding a Traditional Darkroom Texture Screen Effect, Fixing Images with a Digital Graduated Neutral Density Filter, Simulating an Infrared Film Effect, and Creating a Toned Image.

   Chapter 5 - Combining Photos in Montages, Collages, and Composites -Techniques 26-29:

   Creating Photo Objects, Making a PhotoMontage, Combining Bracketed Photos, and Using a Mask to Create a Collage

   Chapter 6 - Fine Art Techniques - Techniques 30-35:

   Total Color Transformation, Using Filters to Create Fine Art Prints, Coloring a Digital Sketch, Creating a Pen Ink Sketch Using a Watercolor Wash, Creating a Digital Painting, Creative Use of Filters and Commands.

   Chapter 7 - Using Plug-Ins to Add Impact to Your Photos - Techniques 36-41:

   Using Image Correction Plug-Ins, Using Grain Surgery to Remove Digital Noise, Convering Color to B&W Using Convert to B&W Pro, Creating Artwork with Buzz.Pro 2.0, Using a Pen Tablet and Pen Palette 1.0, and Using Special Effects Plug-Ins.

   Chapter 8 - Making Photographic Prints - Techniques 42-47:

   Using Print Preview (Picture Package and Contact), Increasing Image Size to Make Large Prints, Using an ICC Profile When Printing with an Epson 880/1280 Printer, Getting Fuji Frontier Prints Made, Using Shutterfly's Online Printing Service, Getting Lightjet 5000 Prints from Calypso Inc.

   Chapter 9 - Creating An Online Gallery - Techniques 48-50:

   Creating an Online Gallery, Creating Animations Using Digital Photos, and Creating an Image Map.

   I would highly recommend this book to anyone from beginners to professionals who work with Photoshop everyday. Not only is it loaded with detailed, reference information - (and CD) - it's also a [great price]BR>MacMice Rating: 5 out of 5

   ------------------------------------------------------------------------

   Trixie McGuire ...




2. While I like the book, the fact that it is ignorant of Mac (9 or OSX) commands is disappointing. Basically, Photoshop books today respectfully address and discuss both PC and Mac issues. This is standard. All the great Peachpit Press books, for example. If I had known that the author was a PC guy and not going to address any of this, I would not have purchased it. The cover makes no mention of this. Additionally, there are other errors in the book as well (as in directing you to a disk file which is misnumbered).

   Maybe this is my pet peeve, but I wasted time today figuring out how to do this stuff on a Mac when I wanted to be figuring out Photoshop techniques instead.

   There are other books which are just as good...if not better. Next time I'm sticking with Scott Kelby for this type of book.




3. I read almost everything published, books to magazines. As a book for entry level digital photographers wishing to progress, this is the best book. I learned a few things too. Well done.



4. Disjointed and seemingly written for the Windoze only crowd, give this book a pass and spend your money more wisely elsewhere.



5. I have yet to get through all the tips and excersizes, but I am getting there. So far the directions are SUPER easy to follow and a lot of fun. The author is quirky and blunt and I like that. Defintely worth the purchase!

5 comments about Lighting for Portrait Photography.

1. I am a portrait photographer and I pull this book out all the time to review lighting set ups and get inspiration. A definate must have for any photographer. I especially love that the book extensively covers one and two light set up and using foamcore bookends. You don't need a bazillion lights to create amazing images.



2. This book is great if you are just starting out in portrait photography. There are detailed light diagrams and a lot of awesome portraits to choose from.



3. 
   
   At the middle of last year I opened a photo studio. So, I can say, I'm still beginner int this topic. So, this book was very helpful for me to gt advance knowledge about art of making great photos.



4. This book leans towards the "artistic" elements to portrait photography (which I love). If honey dripping and being licked from fingers (non sexual way) or a portrait of a model with egg suspended over her face are not yours (these are the extremes of the book, most others are more realistic)and you are looking for improving your family photos or posing seniors, you may want to look elsewhere, although you will still likely benefit from this book. If you want to see how some very "non ordinary" ie exceptional photographers achieve their results, this is it. I enjoyed it very much and it is basically a diagram book. An image is shown, then little keys show where (and what type) lights, gobos, flags, etc were placed and the cameras settings for the shot are diagrammed -excellent. this makes the book a quick read and a great reference, I've read it once but as soon as I finish a few others I have left to read I've got this on the "return to read" stack.
   
   Also, worth noting for anyone who noticed and may be sensitive to nudity and get the wrong idea. If you click on Amazon's "look inside" feature, in the table of contents section it shows a topless photo (as of this writing).In the revision of the book I have, 2007, purchased from amazon, that photo has been replaced. There aren't any nudes in the book, that I remember. Just in case something like that is offputting to you I thought I'd mention it. In fact I think that photo has no place in the book, not because it's a nude, which is also why, but because it's not up to the caliber of the rest of the book either. There are some flat out great portraits in this one.



5. I loved this book it is great, I haven't tried every illustration but I love the layout, and the ones that I did try are excellent I own numerous amouts of portrait books but I find myself reaching for this one the most.

5 comments about Body Type: Intimate Messages Etched in Flesh.

1. This book is fabulous for all the reasons Ina outlines in her introduction. I was not prepared for it to be both philosophical and intimate. I love it. It is inspirational. And I abhor tattoos.



2. Although this charming little book is a quick read, it deserves to be returned to many times, to really admire and appreciate all of the unique, amazing, and well-done tattoos on display therein. In recent years, the old stereotypes of body modifications and the people who get them have been changing for the better. This book can only help in that endeavor. Far from displaying a bunch of bikers, criminals, delinquents, soldiers, and sailors, the type of people who are stereotypically associated with tattoos, these are people from a wide range of walks of life. Many of them are professionals and educated, and all put a lot of thought into these tattoos. And far from being the stereotypical fare of skulls, hearts, roses, and pin-ups girls, the tattoos themselves are also from a very diverse sampling.
   
   The book was inspired by a typographic tattoo which Ms. Saltz saw on the subway one day, and after that discovery (which her subject happily let her photograph), she began seeing more and more tattoos that contained words, letters, and typographical symbols instead of the more standard traditional pictorial images. These people used a wide variety of typefaces for these tattoos, and sometimes even designed their own typefaces. I loved the ambiagram tattoos, the ones designed in a typeface that lets the word be read the same upside-down as it is when viewed rightside-up. People have gotten tattoos containing loved ones' names (very unique was the woman who got her blind lover's name tattooed in Braille on the top of the back of her neck), quotations from Shakespeare, the Bible, movies, songs (the story behind the 33 people who had the first 33 words of Holland's national anthem tattooed on them was a very interesting one, reflecting not only the diversity of the nation but also how much the Dutch love their country), popular quotations, works of literature, and other things which inspire them. One of my favorite word tattoos was the one containing the opening line of 'The Divine Comedy,' in the original Middle Italian, since I also find the opening lines of that long epic poem to be very beautiful, moving, and inspiring. The tattoos are also categorised into such divisons as love, self-love, self-expression, politics, religion, and personal beliefs.
   
   Overall, this is a great small-sized coffeetable book full of great photography of a very unique subject. One doesn't need to have a tattoo or tattoos oneself to appreciate the photographs; I can't get a tattoo due to my religious beliefs, but I greatly admired all of the workpersonship and personal meaning that went into thinking up, designing, and executing these amazing tattoos, and even saw some I'd like to have myself if I were allowed to have a tattoo. I'd love for there to be a second volume, particularly because this one didn't include my own favoritest typefaces, Palatino and Bookman!



3. If you are into typography, the personal meanings of words, or tattoos, this is an excellent book. The photos focus on the words, not the people wearing them, but the descriptions of the tattoos from the owners bring it back to the people. There are also a few discussions about typeface choices that show that at least some of the owners really thought about it.



4. This book has thousands of clearly photographed tattoos for inspiration, they may also serve as a "What not to get" sample.



5. Ina Saltz, Body Type: Intimate Messages Etched in Flesh (Abrams Image, 2006)
   
   The idea of an all-text tattoo is brilliant. I can't believe I never thought of it. A lot of people, however, have, and Ina Saltz has made a project out of documenting these tattoos. The result (at least, up till now) is Body Type, a fine book of photography depicting these tattoos, with the expected short captions containing explanations by the owners of the tattoos about their reasons for getting them. (These are, at times, unintentionally hilarious.)
   
   As enamored as I am of the idea behind the book, I'm not as much so where some of the actual photographs are concerned. Many of them are nicely done, but there are a few that just don't work; too dark, too light, too washed out, too something, depending on the photograph. Not a good thing in a book of photography, one thinks. Still, there are enough good photographs here depicting such an excellent idea that it's still worth your time. *** ½

No comments about American Photography (Oxford History of Art).

2 comments about Masterclass: Anal Sex.

1. Wonderful pictures, short book, not very much information. Buy this book for the visual and "Anal Sex for Couples" for instruction.



2. This is a really informative read for anyone interested in adding any anal behaviour to their play.
   
   Anal sex must be one of the most discussed topics, highly erotic for some repulsive and vile for others etc. Even historically it was significant enough to rate a mention, written into Mythology where it was demonized as an extremity of sinfulness (Sodom). Curious that. After all, the same mythology includes enlightenment being evil (The tree of the knowledge of good and evil), female empowerment being improper (check out the Lilith myth) etc. So that in itself acts a pretty good recommendation, suggests there may be something worth exploring in anal sex. Anything that was so vigorously opposed by the institutions charged with the job of keeping the masses compliant and scared to reach their full potential for knowledge, power and pleasure must have some merit!! In the Southern parts of India anal sex was also included in the Kama Sutra as a sacred and significant act, yep, lots of good reasons not to dismiss anal sex as weird kinky stuff just for sick people.
   
   This is a great little read that doesn't bother with the historic aspects I've just mentioned. Instead it's straight forward, honest and a good manual, helping people understand what it's all about, to know their own bodies, to learn their own pleasures, understand safety and, for some no doubt, find some of the best fun times and most powerful orgasmic experiences they might ever have. For others they'll just have a better understanding on their bodies and possibly just find one more sexual option that just `isn't for them'. None of that matters though because there's probably very few people who could read this book without gaining a better understanding of their bodies and find some more options to explore in search of the pleasure that does `do it' for them.
   
   If my body is a temple, there is no part of it which isn't sacred and no part of my body which is dirty or in any way a shame or embarrassment. If anyone has a problem with my refusing to consider any part of me or any partner of mine dirty or a humility, you know where they can stick their thoughts,-in their dirty, humiliating places!!
   
   Cheers
   
   Lloyd