Wednesday, 16 February 2011

Improve Your Photography: 50 Essential Digital Photography Tips & Techniques



Improve Your Photography: 50 Essential Digital Photography Tips & Techniques
Kevin Moss | 2010-01-01 00:00:00 | CreateSpace | 132 | Photography
Improve Your Photography is a collection of 50 digital photography tips & techniques from digital photography author and instructor, Kevin L. Moss. Known for his easy to understand style, Kevin proceeds to describe individual techniques that will help you become a better photographer. Some tips are obvious, while other techniques are in the category of "why didn't I think of that?".You'll start out reading about the virtues of using a 50mm f/1.8 lens on your digital SLR or learning the importance of knowing how to use everything on your digital camera, then Kevin will throw you for a loop. He'll move on explaining how to create cool abstracts in Photoshop, and then on to explaining the details of a color managed workflow. There is something for everyone here.There is a wide variety of topics that are covered, including some important descriptions of technical concepts, such as image ratios and color modes in Photoshop. Kevin also gives ten tips on improving photographic composition, and even a section on HDR (High Dynamic Range) photography.The book is enjoyable and beneficial for both amateur and advanced photographers alike. Topics in the book also includes how to manage your image library, extreme cropping, explaining 8 and 16 bit modes, using the gradient tool, understanding layers, Photoshop and Elements toolbox tools, file formats and sizing, proper ISO settings, infrared photography and simple lighting setups for the home studio. There are 50 digital photography techniques accompanied by beautiful color images and illustrations. Its easy reading, and its here for the photographer, no matter what level, to enjoy.
Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

Can Threatened Languages Be Saved? (Multilingual Matters)



Can Threatened Languages Be Saved? (Multilingual Matters)
Joshua A. Fishman | 2001-02-16 00:00:00 | Multilingual Matters | 520 | Social Sciences
Defenders of threatened languages all over the world, from advocates of biodiversity to dedicated defenders of their own cultural authenticity, are often humbled by the dimensity of the task that they are faced with when the weak and the few seek to find a safe-harbour against the ravages of the strong and the many. This book provides both practical case studies and theoretical directions from all five continents and advances thereby the collective pursuit of "reversing language shift" for the greater benefit of cultural democracy everywhere.

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

A Concise History of Greece (Cambridge Concise Histories)



A Concise History of Greece (Cambridge Concise Histories)
Richard Clogg | 1992-08-28 00:00:00 | Cambridge University Press | 271 | Greece
This book provides a concise, illustrated introduction to the history of modern Greece, from the first stirrings of the national movement in the late eighteenth century to the present day. It is designed to provide a basic introduction for general and academic readers with little or no prior knowledge of the subject, and supersedes Professor Clogg's Short History of Modern Greece which has become a classic since its initial publication in 1979. This latest account is a wholly new book, conceived afresh for a broad readership, in which the many illustrations with their extensive captions form an important part of the text.
Reviews
If you're looking for a blood and guts tale of the rich history of Greece, this isn't it. However it does seem authoritative and worth keeping on your shelf as a reference text. It reads more like a doctoral thesis, than a lively page-turner, but the main characters in modern Greek history were not bloodless, bland creatures, like Wooldrow Wilson, but tough politicoes, and you get no sense of personality in this book.If the author, Richard Clogg, had gone to Podunk State College instead of Cambridge, he might have been able to breath more life into his writing instead of sounding like the "Enclopedia Brittanica".
Reviews
Richard Clogg provides a rich history in a concise fashion. Highly recommended to students of Greek history for its well documented and supported writing. Factual evidence and sources add to the history, even though concise. I can think of no better short history of Greece. It is a must read for anyone wishing to understand the trends that have molded the modern Greek state and the historical infuences on Greek national identity. Many have written histories of Greece, but few have delved into an anaylsis of the historical trends that have helped to create the Greek world view and national identity.
Reviews
It is well structured, brief and not boring. How could it be? It's about my country's history! It concludes all the history of Greece so anyone could be informed about the facts from 1770-2000.I like the way it presents the destruction of Smyrna and the exchange of populations.

There are enough pictures and drawings as well. There are not enough about the recent history, but I was totally impressed when I saw at least few pages about the students occupation in Athens Polytechnic in 1973. I enjoyed it very much considering that in greek schools there is not even a little paragraph about this occupation.

Finally, I think the tables at the last pages of the book are quite useful for anyone who wants to search more or compare to.
Reviews
A very interesting and concise history of Greece from the 18th century to the present. It includes detailed examinations of all the major turning points in Greek history in the last three hundred years; the Greek war of independence, Greece under the Nazis, the Greek Civil War and the dictatorship. All of the important passions that have overcome the Greeks are woven into the story as is the story of the destruction of the Greek peoples of Anatolia (The Pontic Greeks and Smyrna Greeks and others) as well as the ethnic-cleansing of Greeks by the Turks from places such as Adrianople, Constantinople and Rumania and Bulgaria. The conflict over Macedonia is highlighted as is the tragic story of the 100,000 strong Greek community of Egypt that was also cleansed by the Nasser regime.



A fascinating history,



Seth J. Frantzman
Reviews
Now in an expanded second edition, A Concise History Of Greece by Richard Clogg (Fellow of St. Anthony's College, Oxford University, England) is a straightforward, scholarly chronicle of the modern history of Greece, ranging from the Ottoman rule of the late 1700's, to the pressures of Balkan strife and political modernization of the present day. Deftly written and carefully researched, supplemented with tables, short biographies, as well as a listing of the royal houses of Greece, A Concise History Of Greece is an excellent and scholarly survey of the modern growth of the nation which is a strongly recommended addition to academic World History collections in general, and Hellenic History supplemental reading lists in particular.

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

The Alkaloids: Chemistry and Pharmacology, Vol. 33



The Alkaloids: Chemistry and Pharmacology, Vol. 33
Author Unknown | 1988-08-11 00:00:00 | Academic Press | 360 | Organic

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

Archaeology in the Lowland American Tropics: Current Analytical Methods and Applications



Archaeology in the Lowland American Tropics: Current Analytical Methods and Applications
Peter W. Stahl | 2006-11-02 00:00:00 | Cambridge University Press | 332 | Native American
The lowland American tropics have posed great challenges for archaeologists. Working in awkward terrain, in humid conditions where preservation is difficult, modern scholars pioneered new methods that increasingly influence archaeological practice internationally. The contributors to this volume all have substantial experience in the region. Their essays explore problems including site discovery, excavation, the preservation of artifacts, and methods of analysis. This book will be welcomed by all archaeologists, ecologists and paleontologists working in the tropics.
Reviews
The collapse of the Clovis paradigm has meant, among a great deal of other things,a re-evaluation of lowland tropical American archaeology. This is an invaluable and comprehensive guide to the field, which provides judicious analysis of recent research as well as very useful intellectual histories of debates. The very extensive bibliography is especially useful. My own interests are in the environmental history of the Amazon, and I found the chapters by Erickson, Bray, Pearsall and Piperno especially helpful. My only criticism is one of omission: I think a contextualising chapter putting the developments in lowland South American archaeology in a wider continental and hemispheric context would have been useful, especially since one of the most interesting implications of recent developments elsewhere is not the uniqueness of the lowlands, but the parallels between the South American lowlands and similar environments elsewhere in the Americas, such as the mound complexes and drained fields of the Mississippi valley. Nevertheless, a fitting and appropriate memorial to Donald Lathrap. David Cleary Harvard University

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

The Nurse's Guide To Teaching Diabetes Self-Management



The Nurse's Guide To Teaching Diabetes Self-Management
Rita Girouard Mertig MS RNC CNS | 2006-09-18 00:00:00 | Springer Publishing Company | 184 | Diabetes
As the population of diabetes patients continues to grow, nurses and care-givers must keep up with the daunting task of teaching patients to care for themselves. In this groundbreaking new guide, Rita Girouard Mertig provides the clinical guidance and expertise nurses need to successfully teach diabetes self-management and compliance to adults, children, and parents. Starting with the basics of diabetes to providing the most up-to-date information on drug therapies, everything you need to effectively instruct patients and help them gain control of their diabetes therapy is here. Topics covered include: Nutrition Management; Exercise; Medications; Glycemic Control; Continuous Glucose Monitor; Children with Diabetes and Their Parents; Adolescents with Diabetes; Diabetes in Adults with Special Needs; Diabetes and Mental Illness; Client Noncompliance. Addressing the most important and current topics necessary for successful self-regulation and maintenance of diabetes, this new innovative desk reference provides a quick guide and instructional tool for nurses and caregivers everywhere.

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download

Home Possessions



Home Possessions
Daniel Miller | 1900-01-01 00:00:00 | Berg Publishers | 256 | Decorating
Although so much of the life we care about takes place at home, this private space often remains behind closed doors and is notoriously difficult for researchers to infiltrate. We may think it is just up to us to decorate, transform and construct out homes, but in this book we discover a new form of "estate agency," the active participation of the home and its material culture in the construction of our lives. What do the possessions people choose to take with them when moving say about who they are, and should we emphasize the mobility of a move or the stability of what movers take with them? How is the home an active partner in developing relationships? Why are our homes sometimes haunted by ghosts?

This intriguing book is a rare behind-the-scenes exposé of the domestic sphere across a range of cultures. Examples come from working class housewives in Norway, a tribal society in Taiwan, a museum in London, tenants in Canada and students from Greece, to produce a genuinely comparative perspective based in every case on sustained fieldwork. Japan, long thought to be a nation that idealizes uncluttered simplicity, is shown behind closed doors to harbor illicit pockets of disorganization, while the warmth inside Romanian apartments is used to expel the presence of the state.

Representing a vital development in the study of material culture, this book clearly shows that we may think we possess our homes, but our homes more likely possess us.

Download this book!

Free Ebooks Download