Customer Reviews

Introduction to Design (2nd Edition)

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This book was required for one of my courses. What a waste of money. The instructor gave every lecture straight from the book, she even used the same images from the book. So, my question is: Why did I have to buy the book?

This book talks a lot about things that will be WAY over many students heads (i.e. Russian Constructionists?), especially given that this is a beginners book. This is an Introduction book, that means it should be intended for students that haven't had experience with the subject matter, yet the author writes as if the reader is already well versed in the subject. The book is not very informative on most of the subject matter and really just brings up MANY more questions in the students mind. It mentions the basics of design then it skips all over the place and goes into great length on some matters and almost none in many other areas.

All in all, if it's not REQUIRED, don't waste your time or money. There are other books out there that will do a MUCH better job of explaining the basics and will not clutter it up with useless information that you will most likely never use and this author does a very poor job of explaining.

I'm just getting into this book this semester and will most likely add to this review as the semester rolls along.

A few impressions: Way too pedantic!

The author fails to define many of the artistic movements of the time and expects the reader to know them. This is for an introductory course! Italian Futurists? Russian Constructionists? Why is that important?

Despite the above useless information for pedantics and those fond of trivia and gatherers of useless facts, there are a few redeeming factors:

The use and application of the line, it's shape and contours, and how the manipulation of lines and contours helps create an effect that the artist would want to evoke on the viewer. This concept of pattern and line is very germane to the photographer or other artist.

So all in all, not a bad textbook but you could probably do better.

If you must study it for your class, ensure that you're able to take the wheat from the crap and study just what you need -- why clutter your mind?