July 5th, 2010 
highdefinition 
- ISBN13: 9781598635102
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
As the new owner of Canon’s most advanced intermediate digital SLR, you want to get started taking professional-looking photographs using all of the exciting features at your fingertips. “Canon EOS 40D Guide to Digital SLR Photography” is a concise introduction and guide to your camera’s essential controls and functions, such as Live View, built-in dust reduction, and the blistering 6.5-frames-per-second continuous shooting mode that is an action photographer?s drea… More >>
Canon EOS 40D Guide to Digital Photography
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I now can appreciate the earlier review by Susan (many reviews ago – page back to see it) in pointing out a serious error in the Busch book “Canon EOS 40D”. I agree with her completely, in spite of the flack that she has received from other reviewers subsequently. Her’s is the only review that I have been able to find on the entire web that has pointed out this serious error – she should be congratulated, not criticized!
I only wish I had seen her review before I purchased the book months ago and relied on it as an authoritative source all this time. This error was not a simple typo! The author goes on for a paragraph pointing out the wrong “default behavior” of the shutter release and AF-ON buttons and how to set the camera up “like many” would expect it to function using Custom Function IV-01. This, as she correctly points out, is completely wrong and highly misleading.
BTW, I am not a beginner in photography/digital photography – I have over 40 years experience, ranging from use of the earliest completely manual 35mm SLR’s through the modern Canon 20D, 30D, and now the 40D.,
I thought I was loosing my mind over this topic – I even sent my camera and lens back to Canon for recalibration! Background: I have just returned from my trip of a lifetime to Alaska using my Canon 40D (which I love). Unfortunately, many of my most important photos were wrongly exposed due to my habit of focus/exposure lock and then recomposing. Guess what? I had set up Custom Function IV-1 according to the glaring error in Busch’s book that she points out just before the trip.
I found her review only after searching the web afterward for an errata listing on the book, or any other explanation if this was in error. After seeing the conflict with other books and the Canon manual, I was totally confused as to which was correct, if any. Her review reinforced my belief that Busch just had to be wrong and pointed me in the right direction. Thanks again Susan.
As to Busch’s book itself, I can understand errors creeping into an early manuscript, maybe due to pre-release information on the camera from Canon – this was one of the first books on the 40D. However, it is unforgivable that at this late date there is still no errata sheet on the book, either on the author’s web site nor the publisher’s, nor any way (that I have been able to find) of contacting the author directly about this and several other errors it contains (not just minor typos).
This casts serious doubt as to what to trust in this book or any other book by this author. This major error cost me lots of money in having my camera recalibrated unnecessarily. More importantly, I lost never to return again opportunities in the form of wrongly exposed, otherwise wonderful, photos of Alaska.
Except for the misinformation and outright errors it contains and the confusion they create, it is an otherwise well-written book with excellent illustrations. Unfortunately, these positive aspects obscure the more serious flaws with what could have been an excellent book.
Most of the other reviewers give this book the highest rating — I suspect that they simply haven’t understood what they were reading in many instances. I feel that I’m being very generous in giving it 3 stars and not 1, as Susan more rightly did!
Rating: 3 / 5
I upgraded to the 40D from the 30D, and decided to get this book hoping to add to what I had learned from reading the Canon manual. While this book is well laid out and well written, it does not contain any new knowledge. In addition, a good part of it is devoted to basic photography, not the 40D itself.
If you are new to the XXD series cameras, you can add a star to my review and I would recommend this book. But coming from the 30D, I should have saved my money and put it towards my next lens.
Rating: 3 / 5
Not a particularly outstanding book. It’s a glorified version of the camera manual without too many new pointers. This has not been a good investment.
Rating: 3 / 5
I’ve read a lot of photography books and manuals in 55 years and this one was a complete waste of money for me. Too much irrelevant material.
Rating: 1 / 5
… you don’t need this book. The canon controls are intuitive enough, doesnt need to be explained to you as if youre so dumb.
What should have been the focus is to teach the factors that came in to taking pictures, point to where the dial is (unique to the 40D), show the result (the picture), illustrate why that happened. We can always refer to the manual included in the camera if we get confused in the menu and lost where that input should be set.
I bought this book thinking that somehow it will fuse operation to result. For example, explaining saturation, perhaps Busch will show the differences it will make to a picture. And how exactly to make livelier pictures… starting from the dials to the result. What I got instead is a book with a rather biggish font (so publisher can increase number of pages?) and very minimal picture examples. Pictures that occupied bigger spaces are those of the camera dials!
Busch also wasted some ink and paper on something like “this is not a manual, manual shows you this, but I will make it like this, etc.” almost on every chapter, instead of throwing away one sentence on this indulgence on the intro, then get on to the business.
A photog book should contain tons of photos, and explain it. Busch doesnt even illustrate f/stops, shutter spped, and ISO combination anywhere. I dont know if he held back so we should buy another book of his.
I think the audience for this one are those that truly cant read manuals. I think Busch wrote this one in two weeks. Didnt even bother to take pictures much with the 40D.
Not recommended. I think I should have bought the one by Lowrie. The “digital field guide” concept seems to be what Im looking for. Seems to recommend settings for each occassion/theme. And there are tons pictures actually taken by a 40D to illustrate the point (This is judging at least from the table of contents captured).
Also, I hate to be arrogant, but judging from the quality of the photos in this book, or comparing them to the photos of other guidebooks, David Busch might not be a very good photographer at all.
Rating: 2 / 5