Book Review: The New Complete Guide to Night and Low-Light Photography (Lee Frost)

Book Review: The New Complete Guide to Night and Low-Light Photography (Lee Frost)

Book Introduction

I was fortunate enough to receive several photography books for Christmas, one of which being 

'The Complete Guide to Night and Low-Light Photography' by Lee Frost. A link to the book on Amazon is here.

I was already familiar with Lee Frost through Digital SLR Photography Magazine (an excellent read that I subscribe to), where he is a regular contributor. This book covers a wide range of low-light/night related topics, such as shooting at sunrise versus sunset, landscape photography, low light portraits, even capturing star trails. It also contains the obligatory chapters on recommended kit and the use of computers to enhance the final shot.

The Good

Having been a photographer for decades, Frost really knows his stuff. The photos within the book are all of an extremely high standard and range from old film photos through to DSLR efforts (and even a few compact and mobile phone efforts). I particularly liked the descriptions for each photo also, which detail the conditions under which it was taken and a little of Frost's thought process.

The range of topics is also excellent, covering pretty much any type of photo you could imagine taking under low-light. I had initially expected the book to focus on landscapes, which meant the chapter on portraits was a pleasant surprise. Frost gives one of the best explanations I've seen with regards to metering, which has proven very useful with my own recent efforts at night photography.

The Bad

I did have a few minor gripes with the book. First, Frost goes to great lengths initially when discussing suitable cameras to make it clear that you don't need to have a high end model, and that you are better off spending money on better lenses. He then proceeds to use a Canon 1D Mark III for the majority of his photos, hardly a budget model! Given that there are plenty of instances where the ISO needs to be high, it was slightly jarring at times as the low-light performance of the 1D would be expected to be higher than cheaper models (though newer DSLRs are likely to have caught up).

I would also have liked a little more explanation sometimes on how to achieve certain shots. It was nice to see the end result and a some of the thought behind it, but maybe a few setup shots or walkthroughs would have helped. In particular, due to the depth of subjects offered, sometimes some aspects simply got a paragraph or two that amounted to "put lens on F8, stick on tripod, use auto white balance".

Finally, there were quite frequent typos, and in one case a missing few lines to a paragraph. A minor point I know, but this isn't the first edition of this book!

Overall

This is definitely worth a read if you are interested in low-light photography. It certainly inspired me to get outside and start snapping, with the results achieved noticeably better than earlier efforts. Although there are explanatory chapters at the start around kit and settings, I'd suggest that this is aimed a little above the beginner and more at people who are confident with their DSLR. As mentioned above, the book won't hold your hand through taking a photo, but instead discusses the sort of things you need to consider.

On the whole though, any gripes were just minor, and I'd certainly recommend having a read!

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