Nude Bible [Hardcover]

Philippe De Baeck (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 9076886504 | ISBN-13: 978-9076886503 | Publication Date: January 19, 2011

In this work nude photographers from all over the world pay tribute to the beauty of the human body. Not vulgar and coarse, but artistic and erotic, this large format photographic book will appeal to a broad public, both male and female. Over 400 pages filled with stunning photographs of the human body.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• Publisher: TECTUM PUBLISHERS (January 19, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9076886504
• ISBN-13: 978-9076886503
• Product Dimensions: 15.7 x 12.8 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,997,252 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Over-Sized, Over-Priced, Over-Produced, Mediocre Images, January 26, 2008

By 

The Range of Light (California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Nude Bible (Hardcover)

I guess I misunderstood what I should expect from a book entitled "Nude Bible." I loved the cover image and the promise implied by the title of a comprehensive book of nude photographs.

There is nothing comprehensive about this book. Although many contemporary photographers are represented here, the editors have chosen many photographers who are stylistically indistinguishable from one another. Several of the worst of the photographers are represented by the greatest number of images. There are no historically significant photographers represented. And, although I do not know this for a fact, this appears to be a "vanity publication," that is to say a book in which the photographers paid to be included.

Following a current trend in coffee-table book publishing, this is an over-size, overweight book. This trend has worked great for books filled with detailed images. This is not one of those books. The book is filled with low-resolution images that are printed 13 x 15 inches, but should never have been printed to more than 5 x 7 inches, and that might have been pushing it.

This book is much larger than the images deserve or require and is hugely over priced. About 80% of the images don't deserve to have had paper and ink wasted on them.

That being said, and in fairness, about 20% of the images are very good.

Even those that are very good do not, however, constitute a bible, a testament or even a gospel to the incredible richness of nude photography. They are a minor psalm at very best.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars some great, most been there, seen that, March 31, 2008

By 

Jackomo (CA, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Nude Bible (Hardcover)

This is a huge book, I can only store it standing on it's spine or flat - if I'd have the room. It will not fit into any regular book shelf.

It is also a strange book. There is no text what so ever, except the names of the photographers. No editorial, no intro, no info about the photogs, nothing. Very strange.

There are a lot of photos in this book, many printed very large. Most in b/w, a few in color. But most look like something from the 60es or 70es, not much new ground is broken here. Maybe some are form the 60es or 70es, but I'm not gonna spend time looking up the photographers myself if the editors don't find it necessary to supply that info.

Now, there are some really nice photos in this book, don't get me wrong. But too many IMO are just the same old same old seen a million times average nude.

Calling it the Nude Bible is more than pretentious, there would have to be a wider variety, some more edgy images, and info about the photographers to even remotely fall into the "Bible" category.

An ok addition to a collection, but I can't say I'd recommend buying it unless you already have a lot of the much better books out there.

Aside of that, printing and binding are very nice, good quality paper too. Just an odd book, probably mostly fault of the (lazy?) editor in this case.

I'd suggest to look at it in a store if possible, then order it if you really like it. I'm gonna give it an other look tomorrow, but I might just return it for credit, I somewhat doubt I'll pull it off the shelf very often.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Quite an ambitious title, but a decent survey of CONTEMPORARY nude photography., January 30, 2008

By 

C. Waeber "C. Waeber Photography" (Boston) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Nude Bible (Hardcover)

First a disclosure: I am one of the photographers featured in this book. But I had to purchase the book from Amazon, because the publisher was too cheap to give a free copy to the photographers (or to the editor, for that matter). This should take care of the comment by "The Range of Light" about the book being a "vanity publication". If he/she had been paying attention, he/she would have noticed that there is no detail or contact information on any of the photographers, a very unlikely omission if the photographers had paid to be included!

I received the book yesterday morning, and quickly flipped through the pages. It looked to me that the print quality was quite good, so I put the book back on the table for later browsing. During the day, I came upon the first, very negative review of the book, which made me think that maybe I had missed something. But after looking at it more carefully last night, I think that the negative review by The Range of Light deserves a rebuttal.

* First, it is indeed true that this book only covers contemporary nude photography. If you are looking for images by Weston, Brandt, Newton or Cunningham, this book is not for you. And a lot of my preferred contemporary nude photographers are missing. But the book does a decent job at showing a large variety of styles. While some of the photographs don't go much beyond standard "T and A" photography, the rest is surprisingly original. I was for instance quite pleased to see a fair amount of male nudes(too many books on figure photography only feature female nudes).

* Yes,this is an over-size, overweight book! The Product Detail make no mystery of it. Dimensions: 15.7 x 12.8 x 1.6 inches, Shipping Weight: 11 pounds (Good thing there's Free Shipping!). But NO, the book is NOT filled with low resolution images. Most images, black and white as well as color, have a gorgeous tonal range, with no sign of grain or pixelation. Yes, some images are grainy, but this seems to me more an artistic choice than poor printing. As for the "[the book] ... should never have been printed to more than 5 x 7 inches" comment ... are we reviewing the same book? Again, the print quality is excellent.

* The comment "About 80% of the images don't deserve to have had paper and ink wasted on them" is a bit harsh. But who can account for taste? As an editor, I would have included more of the well-known contemporary figure photographers, but I obviously cannot complain about lesser known artists being included! In addition, these well-known photographers have all been published in numerous books, so there is clearly some merit to the editor's selection.

* This leaves us with the "hugely over priced" comment. Well at $78, it's about half the price of the similarly sized hardcover "The Passionate Camera: Photography and Bodies of Desire", which does not contain nearly as many images... . Printing a full color book this size is not exactly cheap!

In conclusion, it is regrettable that the "Look Inside" feature is not implemented for this book, as a lot of it boils down to personal taste. For what it's worth, the www.tectum.be web site currently features 9 of the book's images.