The Portrait Photographer's Guide to Posing by Bill Hurter
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Book Reviews of The Portrait Photographer's Guide to Posing
Book Review: Not very useful
Summary: 2 Stars
This book did not meet my expectations. The text and pictures seemed to belong to different books. Hurter writes how a person should not be posed, but most of the images in the book break those rules! I wanted to see pictures that illustrate the text. I would recommend Posing for Portrait Photography: A Head-to-Toe Guide by Jeff Smith instead. The pictures aren't quite as lovely and artistic as the ones in this book, but Smith shows you what he means.Book Review: Barely Discusses Posing!
Summary: 1 Stars
Comparing this book with Bill Hurter's The Best of Family Portrait Photography: Professional Techniques and Images, this book is a complete waste of money!
The majority of the book talks about portraits taken by other photographers and how good they are. The whole book leaves an aftertaste of being a published photographers plug! It's as if the author is writing the book to promote some photographers and their included works.
By the time I got to the chapter before last, the book finally begins to discuss how to pose subjects to conceal imperfections. However, I have noticed that the author does not address concealing imperfections through posing techniques, rather he explains how to hide imperfections through the manipulation of lighting and the use of shadows, there were extremely brief points on the subjects attire and color of attire to help disguise imperfections. The whole chapter was obviously written in an extreme rush, as if the author went on and on plugging his friends and then realized that he hasn't actually added any technical advice and decided to cram SOME QUICK tips in this chapter.
The final chapter obviously demonstrates that the author is just writing this book to market his friends and buddies, in addition to making a few bucks. The entire chapter is a gallery for other photographers and their works, NO TEXT AT ALL!!! COME ON!
I'm sorry but Mr. Hurter has disappointed me greatly with this book as it doesn't even come close to partially doing what the title claims! Give me your money instead and I'll give you a good punch to face and it will be the same thing!
If you are looking for a book to give you genuine advice on posing techniques I recommend Corrective Lighting, Posing and Retouching for Digital Portrait Photographers by Jeff Smith instead.
Book Review: A bunch of photos with a slap-dash attempt at essay
Summary: 1 Stars
I received this book today from Amazon and will be returning it tomorrow.
The author has assembled some stunning pertraits and surrounded them with a trite attempt at an essay explaining pow to pose people for portraits.
Mr. Hurter doesn't carry it off. The portraits are often beautiful, but there is no explanation of how they were acheived. The captions are often ridiculous and read like a museum curator's strained attempt at reading meaning into a canvas of paint drippings.
The narrative is ofen just plain silly as when Hurter speaks of image stablization lenses that have very limited application to portraiture. Statements such as "Most photographers agree that a pleasant, happy expression is considered more desirable than a big smile" aren't worth paying money for.
In sum, the serious student of photographic portraiture will find nothing of value in this book.
Jerry
Book Review: Quite disappointing
Summary: 1 Stars
This book may provide some info to the totally ignorant snapper, but any decent amateur already knows these things. Moreover many concepts are not even clearly explained, and all the photos are rarely linked to the text. The useful info could have been enclosed in 20 pages booklet!
As an outstanding example of superficiality, 90% of featured photos are digital, and no consideration is due to the choice of film (while portraiture often requires medium and large format films).