The Field Guide to Photographing Birds (Center for Nature Photography Series)

Highly recommended!


Incompetent both as a photographer and birder.   July 20, 1998
 14 out of 16 found this review helpful

When a book is published with the title "The Field Guide to Photographing Birds," the buyer should reasonably expect the authors to have some degree of competence in both the areas of photography and bird identification. Allen Rokach and Anne Millman, the authors of the Amphoto publication of this title, appear to have little competence in either area, judging from the photos and the captions in the copy of this book that I unfortunately purchased. This is a shame, and is hard to understand given the usual quality of other nature photography books published by Amphoto such as the series of books by John Shaw, Joe McDonald, and the new book by Art Morris (incidentally, also addressing bird photography). There are an overwhelming number of poor photos and mis-identifiactions in this book, making it of little value to anyone wishing to learn more about bird photography. Compared to the excellent "The Art of Bird Photography" by Art Morris, also from Amp! hoto, it has no justification for even being offered for sale. There is no reasonable excuse for anyone to provide incorrect identifications of so many common and easy birds - all correct identification takes in these cases is one of the many good field guides available such as the "Field Guide to the Birds of North America," from the National Geographic Society, or an hour's review of the photos by almost any member of a local Audubon Society chapter. An author of a book addressing bird photography who can't tell a Red-bellied Woodpecker from a Flicker, a Burrowing Owl from a Saw-whet Owl, a Red-shouldered Hawk from a Cooper's Hawk, a duck from a coot, a Snowy Egret from a Great Egret, a yellowlegs from a dowitcher, a Gila Woodpecker from a Flicker, or a Carolina Wren from a chickadee has no business instructing others in a book. The authors are equally ignorant of bird distribution, claiming to have photographed a Great Crested Grebe in Florida, Great Blue Herons i! n the Netherlands, California Quail in Ohio, and Pyrrhuloxi! a in Michigan.