It's book-ordering time, boys and girls, and so I'm wondering if any of you have pre-purchase reviews/comments about any of the following titles:

Film Lighting by Kris Malkiewicz
Lighting for Film and Electronic Cinematography by John David Viera, Dave Viera
Placing Shadows by Chuck B. Gloman, Tom Letourneau
Motion Picture and Video Lighting by Blain Brown
Setting Up Your Shots by Jeremy Vineyard, Jose Cruz
Cinematography: Image Making for Cinematographers, Directors, and Videographers by Blain Brown
Painting With Light by John Alton

"Placing Shadows" - Not bad, but a better title would be "Hardware to Place Shadows". Heavy on stuff, light on technique.

My current favorite book is "Reflections: Twenty-One Cinematographers at Work" by Benjamin Bergery (ASC Press). It's a bit pricey but it's rich in color stills, lighting diagrams and expert commentary. Take a look:

At the ASC site (http://www.theasc.com/cgibin/store/acsstore.cgi?user_action=detail&catalogno=10701) (the publisher), sample chapters, good description.

At amazon (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0935578161/qid=1066265657) (better price).

I must agree with Ken. I have the book as well and it is exactly
as he describes it.

Not familiair with the other books...

The other book you mention sure is expensive. You almost think
they wouldn't want you to buy it. Perhaps santa has a deep
enough pocket this year.

I have Cinematography and Film Lighting. Cinematography is somewhat of an all around book, covers screen direction, angles, things like that, as well as how light can be used in storytelling, color theory, set protocol, lots of mathematical formulas for depth of field and other fun stuff. . .goes on and on.

Film Lighting is all interviews with cinematographers, interspersed with a diagram here and there and stills from actual movies to illustrate the diagrams. Different cinematographers describe their tips, tricks, techniques, and such.

I have "Setting up your shots".
It has a strange format: the back is 19cm and it is 28 cm "long" (imitating widescreen).
It's full of illustrations and it describes cinematic techniques with examples (drawings) from movies and it gives references to more films where the techniques can be found.
It's especially great if you have the videos of the films available to have a look at them.

<<<-- Setting Up Your Shots by Jeremy Vineyard, Jose Cruz -->>>

This is a great book, very simple, straightforward, and easily accessible for an amateur like myself. You could read it in 30-60 minutes. If you work in the industry though, this book might be considered movie making 101. It might even be the first pop-quiz in your cinematography class!

I absorbed most of this book one weekend by actually planning and shooting each type of shot with some friends. We improvised a silly story based on whatever shot came next in the book. Instead of "what shot fits the next scene?", we played "what scene fits the next shot?". Great fun and a good workout for your creativity.

ditto on "setting up your shots"

it is sort of a coffee table book to flip through for ideas on shots and in the beginning it sure helps to recognize the stuff on tv/movies so that you start noticing the crane shots etc.

i'm still trying to find a decent reference on storyboarding...

without meaning to, setting up your shots makes a pretty good introduction to storyboarding.

matthew

It has been a while since I read, "Painting with Light," but I remember it was pretty good. I think it is one of the classics for DPs.

Me, I'm just happy to have light!