4.0 out of 5 based on 4 reviews. – Customer review on 28/04/2009

Joe McNally is a seriously good photographer. Along with people like his buddy David Hobby (of Strobist.com fame) he deals with real world photographic problems, and often in an innovative way that produces spectacular results using minimal equipment, and with not much set up time. This is a theme continued from ‘The Moment it Clicks’ but this time it is all about speedlites.

This is great in that gives the reader insight and shooting solutions they might otherwise have taken years to work out for themselves, but not so great – and this a biggie – he uses Nikon gear exclusively, and you would need a decent knowledge of the Canon e-TTL system to easily translate from Joe’s Nikon CLS jargon.

So is the book worth it? For a Nikon user a resounding yes, but from a Canon, (or I guess there are one or two other camera systems out there) probably yes, but it will take you longer to work out what is going on.

2.0 out of 5 based on 4 reviews. – Customer review on 29/01/2010

After reading the reviews of this book I had great expectations. I waited with high anticipation of what was to come, but to be honest, was rather let down upon receiving the book and reading through it. First off, Joe McNally is a talented photographer, no doubt about that. The book is quite thick, and I thought this would mean it would have a lot of insight into real world, everyday problems photographers run into dealing with light, both natural and artificial.

I was expecting more lighting diagrams in terms of setting up the shot, but only found a handful in what is a book that has close to 300 pages. Apart from these visually appealing diagrams that really help the reader get a sense of how McNally achieved certain shots, the rest of the book is rather 'blah, blah, blah'. McNally could (and should have) used an editor as the amount of useful information in the book could be cut down by half, easily.

His attempts at writing in a colloquial style epically fail after the first ten or so pages, and it becomes simply annoying after this point when all the reader really wants is concise, easy to follow lighting tutorials and set-ups accompanied by lighting diagrams. It's got some nice pictures here and there, nothing spectacular that will make the reader go 'wow, that's amazing'.

The other thing you will notice while reading is the blatant product placement of Nikon, or the must have lighting panels by LumiQuest. Now my background with information in terms of camera lighting started with David Hobby, aka Strobist and also Planet Neil (Neil Van Niekerk). These two photographers (in my own humble opinion) offer a lot more insight (for free) and also don't blatantly name drop products such as LumiQuest, Nikon, or any other major photography brand across their page. They simply focus on camera lighting both off-camera and on with the goal of 'minimal equipment', and that's where McNally fails.

The book has its moments, but the majority of it seems like it was written by a child. The book is good, but could have been a lot better if McNally hired a decent editor, and spent time focusing on camera lighting and a how to, rather than trying to make the reader laugh (I don't care about how you paid for your daughter's 16th birthday, btw). Previous to reading this book I had read Fil Hunter's Light: Science and Magic book and was thoroughly impressed with how insightful it was with camera lighting. It had diagrams on nearly every single page, with picture examples to boot. McNally doesn't offer this, only bits and pieces here and there, and it's hard to use his book as a reference where you can simply open it up and read on, as you will find yourself filtering through the poor editing, completely irrelevant information, or lack of lighting diagrams of set-up shots.

If you want a book that you can open up and read that will give you a really good insight in terms of getting creative with lights - get another book. I wish I had bought Fil Hunter's book instead (I hired it from the library). It was actually edited, and has lighting diagrams!

2/5 from me, as I was severly let down. PS. I shoot with Nikon too, in case you think that I'm writing this from a Canon view. I couldn't afford half the gear McNally mentions in the book anyway.

2.0 out of 5 based on 4 reviews. – Customer review on 29/01/2010

After reading the reviews of this book I had great expectations. I awaited with high anticipation of what was to come, but to be honest, was rather let down upon receiving the book and reading through it. First off, Joe McNally is a talented photographer, no doubt about that. The book is quite thick, and I thought this would mean it would have a lot of insight into real world, everyday problems photographers run into dealing with light, both natural and artificial.

I was expecting more lighting diagrams in terms of setting up the shot, but only found a handful in what is a book that has close to 300 pages. Apart from these visually appealing diagrams that really help the reader get a sense of how McNally achieved certain shots, the rest of the book is rather 'blah, blah, blah'. McNally could (and should have) used an editor as the amount of useful information in the book could be cut down by half, easily.

His attempts at writing in a colloquial style epically fail after the first ten or so pages, and it becomes simply annoying after this point when all the reader really wants is concise, easy to follow lighting tutorials and set-ups accompanied by lighting diagrams. It's got some nice pictures here and there, nothing spectacular that will make the reader go 'wow, that's amazing'.

The other thing you will notice while reading is the blatant product placement of Nikon, or the must have lighting panels by LumiQuest. Now my background with information in terms of camera lighting started with David Hobby, aka Strobist and also Planet Neil (Neil Van Niekerk). These two photographers (in my own humble opinion) offer a lot more insight (for free) and also don't blatantly name drop products such as LumiQuest, Nikon, or any other major photography brand across their page. They simply focus on camera lighting both off-camera and on with the goal of 'minimal equipment', and that's where McNally fails.

The book has its moments, but the majority of it seems like it was written by a child. The book is good, but could have been a lot better if McNally hired a decent editor, and spent time focusing on camera lighting and a how to, rather than trying to make the reader laugh (I don't care about how you paid for your daughter's 16th birthday, btw). Previous to reading this book I had read Fil Hunter's Light: Science and Magic book and was thoroughly impressed with how insightful it was with camera lighting. It had diagrams on nearly every single page, with picture examples to boot. McNally doesn't offer this, only bits and pieces here and there, and it's hard to use his book as a reference where you can simply open it up and read on, as you will find yourself filtering through the poor editing, completely irrelevant information, or lack of lighting diagrams of set-up shots.

If you want a book that you can open up and read that will give you a really good insight in terms of getting creative with lights - get another book. I wish I had bought Fil Hunter's book instead (I hired it from the library). It was actually edited, and has lighting diagrams!

2/5 from me, as I was severly let down. PS. I shoot with Nikon too, in case you think that I'm writing this from a Canon view. I couldn't afford half the gear McNally mentions in the book anyway.

5.0 out of 5 based on 4 reviews. – Customer review on 29/07/2009

Fantastic book!! if you want to learn about speedlights and what you can do with them, do yourself a favor and buy this book.