In his book "101 Quick and easy secrets to create winning photographs" the Author Mathew Bamberg takes us around the world capturing day to day things using various techniques, taking the mundane shot and turning into a visual masterpiece. Bamberg does an outstanding job of describing the photo techniques that he employed as well as the technical aspects of the shot, the use of color, light and shadow, for ground object, background object etc.. Bamberg describes his thought process behind the decision he makes about the framing of the shot, whether to use aperture priority, shutter priority, type of lens etc.



The book is divided into 15 chapters:

Chapter 1 Making your photographs look 3D. This chapter describes how to use objects to give your photo some dimensionality using foreground and background objects.



Chapter 2:Painting with light. The chapter covers using available light vs. flash vs. reflected light



Chapter 3 Adding action to your frame. This chapter covers using long exposures. It also covers taking shots of people in motion and how to convey what they are doing through photography.



Chapter 4. Adding or subtracting shadow. This chapter covers how to use shadows to emphasize the subject as well as how to get rid of unwanted shadows.



Chapter 5. Making Art from architecture. This chap0ter is basically about photographing buildings in interesting ways.



Chapter 6. Creating mood shots using weather. This chapter is about using exposure compensation to bring out color. It's also about using black and white photography to set the mood.



Chapter 7 Beautifying with color. This is about finding color in the shot and then emphasizing it. Making the color jump off of the page.



Chapter 8. Breathing life into people. This chapter is about using the lens, colors they are wearing and the environments they are in to create a photograph.



Chapter 9. Making animal photos sharp and fun. In this chapter Bamberg shows us how to capture the essence of the animal. He really made these images stand out.



Chapter 10. Spicing up photos with lens flare, noise and other unusual effects. Here Bamberg talks about using the settings on your camera and lens to really bring out unusual effects whether is lens flare, distortion or long exposure.



Chapter 11. Composing with landscapes. Here Bamberg covers using focal lengths, aperture, shutter speeds and combining many different camera settings to achieve the perfect shot.



Chapter 12. Shaping up with symmetry. This chapter covers using lines to direct the viewers eye.



Chapter 13. Technical tango. Here Bamberg talks about what equipment and settings to use in different situations.



Chapter 14. Daytime, nighttime, anytime. Here Bamberg talks about using the settings on your camera to capture the brilliance of light and color. Any time.



Chapter 15. Back to the future. Simply said., how to photograph old things and bring visual life to them with color.





This book serves as a multipurpose book. It can be used in the classroom and it can be used as reference material and it is very well suited for both.



The book is filled with beautiful photography. It's an easy read. What I really liked about this book is that it will be very easy for the novice photographer to understand and there is something here for the experienced photographer as well. Bamberg really captures the essence of photography in this book. Bamberg really makes the photos in this book come to life and he walks the reader through how to do this. Bamberg did an excellent job writing and editing this book as well. The points he makes are detailed but concise. The book flows very well from beginning to end and yes there are 101 very useful secrets here. This is worth 10 stars in a 5 star limitation.