Customer Reviews

A Short Course in Nikon Coolpix 950 Photography

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

It's a mediocre, high school-level basic photography course peppered with a few 950 settings and tidbits you can just as easily find on the quick reference card that comes with the camera. All of the illustrations are in black and white, and, if the photos were actually shot on a 950, (which I doubt), they are so poorly reproduced here as to do the camera a disservice. The things you really want to know about a 950 are available for free on a variety of web sites. Are you a beginner? Buy a good photo basics book or two on lighting, the effect of shutter settings, etc. Buy one containing color illos and glossy paper while you are at it. Are you an experienced photographer needing to know about digital cameras, which resolution settings to use, how big a memory module to buy, which batteries to use, and minutiae about the 950 in particular? Search the web for some sites set up by 950 owners, and even Nikon's own. I almost never return books. This one went back.

Perhaps, this IS really a book for beginners. But, if this is the case, it misses some important stuffs. The most noticeable one is no discussion about playback. The second problem is that it looks like a generic book that fits every digicam. The author(s) could just replace a number of sidebars and instantly make the book for another camera, say Sony 505! So, that means you could read a good basic books on photography and then read the Nikon manual. Third, the discussion on flash is weak. The use of external flashes is not there, although the author(s) did mention slave flashes. However, they failed to point out the disadvantages of using slave flashes. Finally, there is no index, and, as a result, it is difficult for a reader to perform keyword searches.

Nikon did not do a good job in writing a good manual for E950. That manual looks like something written by computer programmers. (You know how bad that type of user manuals are.) The CD version does a better job in terms of providing technical information. Hence, this book still has its value. What I really don't know is how long you will need this book, ;o)). A week? or a month?

By the way, the copy I have was purchased last August. I am not sure if a new version is available.

The book is spiral bound which is about the only high point about it. It describes very basic techniques which are displayed by very poor photos. The worst thing is that there are descriptions of color techniques/problems that are shown in black and white. Don't even bother ordering this book, it is a total waste of time and money.

This book is self-published. In other words, Dennis prints the pages from a laser printer and then binds it. As such, the photos do not look that good. It looks to me like an HP PCL printer driver in the banding/speckling, so the photos look "digitized" and not smooth.

Dennis, switch to a Postscript driver and halftone those graphics and photos. That would make the photos and graphics much smoother in the final print.

Some decent info, but nothing earth-shattering here. I think the poor printing has turned off a number of readers, but the content is still OK, especially if you are a beginner. I have been shooting with SLRs for a while, so I was not that impressed, but it did have a couple of CP950 tips that were valuable.

Mr. Curtin's book looks like it was used at a community college photography class and then zeroxed poorly. The photos are pretty grainy for a book on digital photography. If you are using this book as a resource guide, subjects are hard to find. Granted, Nikon camera guides are often poorly translated and difficult to understand, but this book doesn't clarify a lot of things. For example, I use an off-camera Nikon Speedlight in a lot of my photos, and it took me 6 weeks to figure out how to turn off the built-in camera flash but still fire the external flash. I finally found the answer on the internet. If this book were selling for ..., it might be worth it.

I bought this book because Thom Hogan's on the same subject failed to come out when promised last Fall. Curtin's book is nothing more than an adaptation of his book for the 990 which, although shares a lot of features with the 995, it is not the same camera. Pictures on the book are bad. He uses gray scale pictures to demontstrate the camera's color features. It is clear that Curtin used a word processor's find/replace feature to "convert" his book to the 995. Even that was done poorly. You are better off trying and failing while learning to use your camera's features. Reading this book will not get you much closer to knowing much about the 995 than just playing with the camera yourself. After all, you need not pay anyone to develop your pictures!

A Short Course in Nikon Coolpix 950 Photography is a great book for anyone wishing to familiarize themselves with the miriad of settings on CP 950. I had no photographic experience, and Mr. Curtin's book definitely helped me put on film (or in this case pixals) the image I wanted to see. The photographs give examples of the different settings, and are very helpful, but would be better in color!

If you own a Nikon CP 950, Buy This Book!