Web Site Design for Professional Photographers by Paul Brooks Rose & Jean Holland-Rose
I have been designing, building, and developing Web sites since the early 1990's. I've even written a couple of books about creating your own Web site. So you ask why did I purchase this book? The answer lies in my returning interest in photography over the past year. I wanted to know how best to display my photographic works via a Web site.
The cover should have told me that this book wasn't worth the thirty dollar asking price. Right there on the cover it stated "Step-by-step techniques for designing and maintaining a successful Web site." I think some idiot intern wrote something similar to that for the cover of one of my books back in the '90's. That book was a best seller too. (I wonder if that intern has now gotten a promotion and works for Amherst Media?)
Anyway, back to the book. The book is only 126 pages long. That's just under 24 cents a page. What a deal!
The book is relatively recent being published in 2003 so the material should be more up-to-date than any of my books from the mid-90's even if it's not cutting edge. So although Dreamweaver is mentioned, the tool of choice for these two authors is FrontPage. Hey, that's cool. I wrote one of the first books about FrontPage. Started writing the book before Microsoft even bought the product. Problem is they don't make it any more. Yes, I know in 2003 FrontPage was still being made. And some people were using it. But why do you think Microsoft quit making it? Because few professional Web developers would touch it by then. The people that were still using FrontPage were pointed at another even simpler product. The professionals were given new products to compete with Dreamweaver. And this book is supposed to be for professionals, isn't it.
But back to the book itself. The authors apparently make a living creating sites for photographers. That's what their bio states. The first chapter, however, talks about doing your own site to save money. Do you see the problem with the logic here?
But wait. I'm doing what I say shouldn't be done. I critiquing the book for what it's not. The authors and publishers say the book is aimed at professional photographers but I can't accept even that. The authors act like the reader has never been around Photoshop. I think this book is at best something maybe a beginner might want to look at and even there I'm not so sure. Even the downloadable site templates are amateurish.
I didn't like this book at all. It was hard to find anything positive about the book. The publisher should be ashamed of themselves.
Housekeeping
Today I am beginning the process of moving all of my reviews from the Summitt New Media site to my personal site. This message is being posted to both. The Summitt New Media site is the home of Summitt New Media, LLC and should reflect the operations of that business, the design, development, and maintenance of Web, desktop, and database applications for business. As a result, all references having to do with my writing are being moved to paulsummitt.com where my academic, fiction, and music writing have been for quite some time. I moved all references to my genealogy studies to The Summitt Family Quarterly some time ago. I'll also be moving the Summitt New Media Bookstore to another location soon also. I will make every effort to link to the new sites from the current locations so that anyone looking for this material will still be able to find it. I hope you understand my reasoning for these moves and will continue to visit my sites to find out what I'm doing and what I think.
thanks
paul
Game Design: Secrets of the Sages 2nd Edition edited by Marc Saltzman
Sorry to say but I was very disappointed with this book. I was expecting more explanation of game design with perhaps some structure and examples. What I got was short slices of interviews with people in the game design business. I knew several of these people and their work, some of which I was not impressed by at all. I'm a gamer from the old board and pieces style and many of the computer games by these people that I have purchased were based on board games I have played. I must say that in my opinion the computer game versions were butchered.
This type of thing might just be your cup of tea but it is not mine. Not only does it not go in my keep on my desk book group, it doesn't even make the not great but keep in my collection group. If you are looking for an inexpensive, well-read copy of this book, check out our bookstore. I'm going to put it up for sale real reasonable shortly after I finish this review.
The Matrix and Philosophy (Edited by William Irwin)
"Welcome to the Desert of the Real!"
At times while reading this book I thought to myself that these people have way too much time on their hands. Several times the various authors refer to
The Matrix as being "the most philisophical film ever made." I bet these people believed Paul was dead while they sat around playing the Beatles record backwards in their college days. And if they didn't because they were too young, they would have if they had known who the Beatles were. I really had to reminding myself that these were "professional philosophers."
Several of them seemed astounded by the similarities between the plot of the Matrix and the story of the cave in Plato's
Republic. They would probably be stunned to learn of the similarities between Shakespeare's
Romeo and Juliet and
West Side Story. These people really need to read more rather than sitting on their duffs in academia while pontificating to each other on the number of angels that can sit on the head of a needle.
Probably the worst chapter was that written by feminist Cynthia Freeland. It seems she really dislikes Keanu Reeves. She constantly compares the blockbuster
The Matrix to a little known basicly cult film titled
eXistenZ. Yes, there is a stronger female character in
eXistenZ. I won't argue that at all. We're both in agreement. I've seen both films and found both interesting, but one made a lot more money than the other and I'll give you three guesses which one and the first two guesses don'tr count.
I'm pretty sure that it is not so much her comments and comparisons but rather the manner in which she presents it. Her constant feminist harping frankly just irked me and damaged that part of her message that was important. There's really no question about why one film outperformed the other. The film was written by young white males for young white males and their dates. Like it or not, these people have the money to go to the movie theater several times a month and sustain Hollywood. Most of them barely read. You want people to like films like
eXistenZ more than
The Matrix? Get more readers into the film industry, doesn't matter if they're male or female as long as they read.
My favorite chapters are probably the last two on postmodernism and marxism. Being somewhat of a postmodernist myself, I found the viewpoints in that chapter considerably in agreement with my own views on the film. Of course, as such, I had never thought about
The Matrix from a Marxist perspective before and it was extremely enjoyable to read and enlightening.
Overall, I would recommend this book to anyone who would like to look at something such as this film from a varity of other viewpoints. Whether you agree with those viewpoints or not, being exposed to those viewpoints will make you a better person. Then again, most of you are just going to go to a movie.
Sunset Limited by James Lee Burke
I think I've said it before but I do like Burke's style in these Dave Robicheaux novels. The funny thing is that I'm not overly impressed with his other works. If you don't know anything about Dave Robicheaux, he's a middle aged detective for the sheriff's department in New Iberia, Louisiana. He's a Vietnam veteran and suffers from nightmares. He's been married twice. His first wife died and in a later book after this one. I sometimes wish I had had the opportunity to read them all in order.
But let's get back to this book. I don't think I've read this one before but thoughout the book I had a strong deja vu feeling. Either I had read it and just didn't remember what happened, which is possible, or the plot was extremely similar to another Robicheaux novel. Burke's descriptions and dialogue made me feel as if I was there. I could almost see and hear the various characters.
As with any of Burke's Robicheaux novels, Sunset Limited is worth your time reading. I highly recommend it.
Lasher by Anne Rice
Believe it or not, I've never read a book by Anne Rice until now. I must tell you that this book did not live up to the hype I have heard about her. While the book wasn't boring, it was extremely slow and much of her dialog and description was simply too long. I guess the horror genre is not what it once was. I found myself not feeling any empathy for either Lasher or any member of the Mayfair family. Of the two characters I did become interested in due to their having some type of personality, Dr. Larkin disappears mysteriously with no clear explanation. Larkin was one of the most developed characters in the book His disappearance and assumed death is sudden and without cause. Rice never explains what may have happened to him. Yuri was the other character that I became interested in during the early chapters but toward the end it's as if Rice didn't know what to do with him and simply had him wandering around with little if any purpose.
Overall, I was very disappointed in this work by someone some say is a very good author. I don't recommend the book at all.
Busy Busy Busy
Sorry for the long time between posts lately. It has been extremely busy around here lately. We took on three new clients a couple of months ago and they have kept me working quite a bit (which is GOOD!).
The site is going to undergo a major overhaul here shortly so be watching for the changes. I'll try to do a better job of adding to this blog also. Thanks for hanging in there.
paul
