5 comments about Fucked Up & Photocopied: Instant Art of the Punk Rock Movement.

1. I'm not quite sure how the publisher afforded to print massive hardcover editions of what is essentially a collection of flyers, but i am thankful he did. I love flyers-- they are little pieces of history and art. The layout was unnecessarily jumbled and weird for no reasons many times. Plus the quotes from some punk/hardcore luminaries was uninspiring a best. But who cares ... the book is cool.



2. Essential for the lovers of the 80's punk & hardcore movement...a must have also for art designers to understand their roots of gig art



3. I'm pleased that Bryan Ray Turcotte and his cohorts managed to preserve and resurrect the sometimes annoying, sometimes stunning epehemal art of the 70s-80s punk scene. This is a nicely-packaged collection of the era's most exciting do-it-youself graphics.



4. An absolutely gorgeous book. Even if you don't [care] about punk rock, it would still be fascinating.

   This is also an exceptional historical document. The history of the margins is lost so easily -- a book like this does a tremendous service to posterity.

   As to the guy from SF who says that this book distorts history and gives "unnatural significance to marginal bands..." Well, it probably does, and so what??!! [....]




5. This book shows that punk rock lived (lives?) more on a local level than history would show. It's about being in bands, going to local shows at clubs that might last 6 months, making your own fliers - essentially the DIY concept.

   My only gripe with the book is that it gives an unnatural significance to *very* marginal bands, whom I'm won't name. Let's just say that some folks wanted to rewrite history and overstate their significance in the local scene.

   Overall, though, this is the kind of book I never thought would see print. Old PR fliers; who would want to see those? At least a few people, I guess...

4 comments about The Graphic Design Business Book.

1. I am quite surprised just how useful this book is. Everything is here from a single freelancer working out of his bedroom (and basic rules about taxing the bedroom) to a full corporation with partners who rent commercial space.
   
   Specific topics covered here are simply not found in general business books. "How does one put a price on creative effort?" This books describes the methods! My favorite part is the negotiation chapter, which empowers artists with techniques to stand firm (yet polite) against those unscrupulous businessmen seeking to exploit the artist. The chapter finishes with sample contracts--an unexpected bonus.
   
   This book does not get 5 stars because it is a business supplement, not an exhaustive resource.



2. Design pros face many special obstacles in setting up a business, from locating and managing the right studio to developing an effective, specialized portfolio, using a web site's special marketing powers, and bringing in clients. Learn how to set up and run a successful design business using leading experts in the field with The Graphic Design Business Book, which teaches graphic artists all the basics for promoting their talents. Chapters are business-oriented in general scope but also provide many specifics unique to the graphic design venture.



3. Very Rich information , contains all needed information to begin a graphic design firm .... Recommended for everyone :)



4. I expected this to be much more informative and specific. I did not read through much of the book, as it all applies to design firms. I am a freelancer who's never been good at the business aspect; plus I was out of the game for a few years and wanted to catch up pricing wise and via other aspects. This provided no information relevant to me, and more frustrating, it referred to the Guild Handbook several times for specifics. Well, the Guild book is totally out of date -- that's why I was looking for something more current. The fact that it is 'copublished with the Graphic Artists Guild' made me hopeful that it was the finally a current variation to the Guild book.
   What I read otherwise seemed like information that was very very basic, what most designers who have some experience are already aware of.

3 comments about Rolling Stone: The Illustrated Portraits.

1. I don't know if Rolling Stone didn't use any art in their early days, or if the editors of this book just figured that they had to concentrate on appealing to their contemporary audience. Anyway, these very entertaining caricatures are mostly from the late Eighties through the Nineties. Risko and Burke account for a large percentage of the total. Risko especially is good, practically the second coming of Miguel Covarrubias. There's too much Madonna and not enough Sixties, but overall this is a fine compilation.



2. this is a great collection of pictures.before Rolling Stone sold out this was a very important magazine.many great Artists are featured here.i like to remember what made the Magazine great in the first place&this is one of them.



3. This book has everyone from Elvis to Marilyn Manson included. The illustrations in this book are phenomenal. It is a pretty large book, all pictures for all ages. It is the perfect gift book to anyone who has lived in the 70's, 80's or 90's. I have a copy sitting on my coffee table and everyone who comes over picks it up and cannot put it down until they have seen every picture. :-)

1 comments about Producing Successful Magazines, Newsletters and E-Zines.

1. Producing Successful Magazines, Newsletters and E-Zines by Carol Harris is a practical and accessible "how to" guide that is ideal for the non-specialist general reader wanting to venture into a commercial publishing activity. Currently the publisher and editor of "Effective Consulting" magazine, Harris teaches the reader how approach printed and electronic publications, helping the reader decide just what kind of publication is right for them, how to set up and run a magazine or newsletter, how to attract articles and paying advertisers, as well as how to interview and write articles. Of special note are the provision of additional contacts and resources for aspiring publishers. If you are contemplating publishing a magazine or newsletter, then begin by giving a careful reading to the informative advice to be found in Carol Harris' Producing Successful Magazines, Newsletters and E-Zines!

No comments about Briggs' Floral Embroidery Designs CD-ROM and Book (Dover Electronic Clip Art).

No comments about Package Annual Worldwide: noAH: noAH VIII.

No comments about Swinging Sixties.

5 comments about Flash 8 Cookbook (Cookbooks (O'Reilly)).

1. 
   I am not keen on any book that has Cookbook in the title. This book however is more of a Hanes manual for your old Volvo 240. You will have lots of shop spills (coffee not oil) and dog eared pages on this when you finally move on to a future version of flash. Even then this will become a great tool.
   
   The book has four main solution sections: creating content, building interactive interafaces, using projects (I never get around to actually doing that!) and adding multimedia and data.
   
   O'Reilly put a lot into this book, with a load of solutions, with the if, how, why and here you go.
   
   Best if your up to speed and know your way around Flash well. For me, its a matter of understanding and implementing solutions as I encounter them. "Damn, how do I best deal with that problem? - Dunno? Read the book".
   
   Short and too the point, you will need this if your a professional - either from the design side or the programming side of Flash. Not much use to students, though educators should read it through and get up to speed to increase the amount of knowledgeable students coming out of courses (enough of the bouncing balls already).



2. Flash 8 Cookbook
   Joey Lott ISBN: 0-596102402
   
   Cooking with Flash 8??
   
   Reading the Flash 8 Cookbook is a painful experience considering you pay $44.95 for it. If you need answers to real-world problems don't look here. This book is a semi-helpful reference guide for those designers who are just beginning to branch out into Action Script. They try to make everything in the book very easy for you to the point that some of the chapters talk down to the reader.
   
   The meatiest information is concentrated from page 200-340 of an almost 500 page book. Some of the information in this section is about fading movie clips in and out, the key word "this", working with Java Script in Flash, and adding event listeners.
   
   This book features one of the best explanations I have seen on how to create a listener object and add an event listener on page 346. They break all the code down there with samples.
   
   A bonus to reading this book is that you can download a number of great low file size components written by Joey Lott . Some of the unique components are the form controller, slide show, and window controller.
   
   This book even introduces you to 3d Max and how to use it in conjunction with Flash. There is info on video and mobile but, surprisingly no chapter on Office Yoga for the Flash Action Scripter. They lumped together a number of topics that could have individually comprised a number of 500 -1000 page books.
   
   I think too many cooks spoiled the Action Script in this case. I consider this to be an easy fast read. Great to take to the gym or the beach. If you had to buy just one book on Flash 8, this wouldn't be the one you would choose.



3. This is a book for beginners, not even intemmediate level readers. If you are familiar with any other design software like Illustrator, Photoshop, CorelDraw, etc. you will find that much of this book is useless since you already know it! This is a perfect exapmple, quoting the book:
   
   "1.1 Drawing Straight lines
   
   Problem: you want to create a straight line segment or a shape made out of multiple straight line segments.
   
   Solution
   Use the line tool[...], the pen tool[...] or the pencil tool."
   
   This is by no means a "cookbook" and I'm very disappointed with O'Reilly being the publisher, since most of the time their books are great.
   
   The book probably focuses on REAL ACTIONSCRIPTING up to 15% its entire content!
   
   Only consider it if you never worked with a design application in your whole life and don't have the time or patience to read more than 2-page long chapters.



4. As an intermediate Actionscripter, I find this book incredibly useful on a daily basis. It's well-organized and well-written, with several juicy tips and tricks.



5. Hardly any information that would constitute as worthwhile if you have a decent grasp of Flash. There is entirely too much elementary information here. One recipe is a small excerpt on how to create an invisible button by only putting content in the hit state of the button. Also, although the cover reads "Using the Flash IDE to build Flash animations and applications", it includes entirely too much information on Swift3D in a Chapter discussing 3D in Flash. The chapter should probably have been renamed "Creating 3D in For Flash using Swift 3D" instead of the misleading name "Simulating 3D in Flash".

5 comments about Barlowe's Inferno.

1. When I saw this book and seen the reviews, I figured that it was just going to be "cool". Then when I finally got this in the mail I was completely overwhelmed by the imaginative visions that Barlowe puts into each of the paintings. Each picture is filled with detail and rich color. The captions get really in depth with what the picture stands for and which Demon is shown and when you think about it, it can be fairly creepy if this is what Hell was really like. Barlowe talks about making his way into the lowest reaches of Hell and bringing back the images to share with the world. The artwork in this book will completely blow you away.



2. This collection is basically Barlowe's visual interpretation of Dante's Inferno from The Divine Comedy. Each painting has a page of description pointing out the purpose and reason for every detail in the image. From a tortorous picture of Lillith, to the haunting painting of a minor demon riding on the backs of several tortoured souls held together with muck, they are each fascinating to examine. Like Dali and other fantastical artists, one can look at these paintings and see something new every time. The color work is fantastic, and in some paintings actually appears to be digital photography until one looks closer. A ver well-thought-out project, it is pleasing to see another side of Barlowe's intelligent work.



3. The book was not as good as I thought it was going to be. When I read certain passages of it at the bookstore I thought it was going to be a fictional narrative of a doomed person's experience in Hell. Instead it was more of an artists explanation about his paintings. The book still drew me in and made me think and feel about what Hell might be like. For this reason, the books ability to make me seriously think about Hell in a literal sense, I will give it four stars.



4. Wayne Barlowe has long been one of my favorite artists, up there with Bekinski and Giger. He has a real talent for pulling the viewer into his world, so that we can almost smell the sulfur. This and its companion piece Brushfire are my (current) favorite art volumes, as I seem to be in a very hellish phase right now. But even when I'm not feeling hellish, I'm in awe of Mr. Barlowe's talent. I love the texture of the worlds and characters, the deep, roaring, ash-filled atmosphere of the environs of hell he portrays. I am always inspired by his work.



5. Normally I am reserved in my reviews but this one stands out as an entity that deserves high praise. I had been researching visions of Hell for some years when this book came out. It was an exquisite find as the author's vision was finely detailed and provided a wealth of information. His Hell is different yet similar to Dore's vision which appealed to me. It is as if he took Dore's vision and placed his own ideas and concepts on top of Gustave's.

   This is highly recommended. The pictures are stunning and the text adds some nice thought as well. One reviewer wrote that he thought the souls looked to much like statuary and while I do agree with that criticism it is a minor quibble and is not always the case.

5 comments about Portfolios That Sell: Professional Techniques for Presenting and Marketing Your Photographs.

1. Every serious photographer spends time trying to figure out how to make better photographs. But professional photographers also have to spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to market photos, because without sales there is no profession. One of the tools professional photographers use is a "book". A book is a portfolio of the photographer's pictures used to get clients to hire him or her.
   
   Now it might seem that a photographer's pictures could stand by themselves and not need any special method of presentation. The author, who is a consultant to photographers in the preparation of their books, disagrees. She believes that everything from the drafting of a positioning statement about the photographer's work (which will guide the selection and display of pictures in the book) to the texture of the slip case for a book is critical for the photographer to get the edge over competing photographers. After you finish this book you may agree with her.
   
   The author gives simple straightforward advice. Indeed it is so simple that most of the text in this volume could probably be contained in a short brochure. What fills most of the book is the pictures taken by the author's clients, which illustrate the points she makes along the way. If you pay attention to Oppenheim you probably do stand a better chance of catching an art buyer's or art director's eye. On the other hand, unless you already feel comfortable with the economics of marketing, you may gulp when she tells you to spend $125 for what is essentially a loose-leaf binder.
   
   Most of the message contained in this volume, and the photographs included, seem to be directed at assignment photographers, that is, those who must sell a buyer on purchasing his or her skills, rather than selling existing photographs. Yet other photographers from stock to fine arts also probably need a book. While those photographers seem largely ignored by the author, they can benefit from the advice contained here.
   
   I must confess that I'm a little resistant to an assumption underlying the approach of this book, i.e., that photography buyers and directors are willing to form an opinion, at least initially, from form rather than substance. But then again, photographers deal in form, not substance (I don't mean that negatively), so I suppose a nice looking book is important. I wish there was a little more meat in this book, but I suppose even a few words that can show the error of marketing common sense, and the importance of following a path that works, are worth the time and cost of this volume.



2. As a professional photographer in the throes of a major repositioning effort, Selina's book provides valuable insight into how to carve out a single vision in 15 to 18 images, wrapped, packaged or otherwise presented in a way that supports that vision. The book doesn't pull any punches. It isn't for the on-the-fence photographer. If you want to win, you have to play to win. There is an investment in time, in money and in patience...none of which are particularly pleasant when faced with the uncertainty of a complex and ever-competitive market. My only disagreement with her - and the reason I rated the book 4 out of 5 stars - is because I feel that the biggest obstacle to getting an assignment is not knowing the right people. Salina thinks it's all about the work. I have found that my biggest assignments came from contacts in the industry. All of us who work on a national level are technically proficient, and most of us are bright, talented and driven. Yes, our styles cover the broadest spectrum imaginable, but what really seperates us is our contacts. With the onset of digital, photography as we once knew it is history. And that's the dirty little secret of this business...If it isn't perfect, we'll fix it in photoshop. My suggestion to anyone entering this field is to network like your life depended on it. Believe me, it's where the line in the sand is drawn.



3. Regardless of whether you are a professional, student and/or considering a career in photography, this is one of the few books that you can learn from today and in the future. With more than 25 years as a consultant to professionals, Selina has the experience and vision to show photographers how a sellable portfolio can be created: from selecting a visual point of view image selection, editing images, sequencing & all the way to portfolio case selection. The marriage of: concepts, text and photos are presented logically and in a way that makes the information easy to understand and apply. If you really want to succede in today`s market, then this is the book you need to begin your journey.



4. Most commercial photographers know about Selina Oppenheim, but only a lucky few make the investment to hire her for her expertise in portfolio development and refining your vision as a photographer. Even though hiring Selina as a consultant was one of the best decisions I have made as a photographer, I still wanted to read her book to make sure I hadn't missed anything she has to say about marketing myself as a photographer. I can say from personal experience that this book distills the essence of her one-on-one consulting. This book is really, really worth learning from.



5. Selina Oppenheim is one of the premier creative consultants in the photography industry. Although no single book could possibly encompass her 25+ years of portfolio building and marketing experience, Portfolios That Sell gives you the opportunity to dive into her portfolio building process that she's used to develop so many exceptional photographers portfolios. It clearly and succinctly lays out the step-by-step process that you can follow to develop your own vision based portfolio. The photos that Selina chose to use as examples work well and will both guide you and encourage you to create new portfolio visuals.