Dan Margulis is #1

rutt

Look here: here.

Dan's new book on LAB is the Amazon #1 bestseller for the entire computers and internet field. I subscribe to his newsgroup, and he's pretty surprised as well as darned happy about this. Who would have guessed that a deeply technical book about LAB color correction would be outselling Kelby, Fraiser, and Adobe itself, not to mention "Windows for Dummies".

DavidTO

rutt wrote:

Look here: here.

Dan's new book on LAB is the Amazon #1 bestseller for the entire computers and internet field. I subscribe to his newsgroup, and he's pretty surprised as well as darned happy about this. Who would have guessed that a deeply technical book about LAB color correction would be outselling Kelby, Fraiser, and Adobe itself, not to mention "Windows for Dummies".

Looks like a great book. On my wishlist for another day...when I have the time...

Baldy

Good find. I bought one.

rutt

Where to buy this
It's backordered at Amazon, but available elsewhere. You can also buy directly from the publisher:

http://www.peachpit.com/title/0321356780

Their website says ships in 24 hours.

luke_church

rutt wrote:

Look here: here.

Dan's new book on LAB is the Amazon #1 bestseller for the entire computers and internet field. I subscribe to his newsgroup, and he's pretty surprised as well as darned happy about this. Who would have guessed that a deeply technical book about LAB color correction would be outselling Kelby, Fraiser, and Adobe itself, not to mention "Windows for Dummies".

Hi Rutt,

How much does this book discuss other colour spaces? Soon I'm going to need a somewhat deep understanding of the major colour spaces, Gamut issues etc.

I don't want a tutorial on Photoshop.

Would you recomend this one?


Cheers,

Luke

rutt

luke_church wrote:

Hi Rutt,

How much does this book discuss other colour spaces? Soon I'm going to need a somewhat deep understanding of the major colour spaces, Gamut issues etc.

I don't want a tutorial on Photoshop.

Would you recomend this one?


Cheers,

Luke

Sounds like you should start with Professional Photoshop and then start reading Dan's yahoo group "colortheory"

Sam

rutt wrote:

Look here: here.

Dan's new book on LAB is the Amazon #1 bestseller for the entire computers and internet field. I subscribe to his newsgroup, and he's pretty surprised as well as darned happy about this. Who would have guessed that a deeply technical book about LAB color correction would be outselling Kelby, Fraiser, and Adobe itself, not to mention "Windows for Dummies".

I bought this book based on your recomendation, (hence all responsibility is yours). Chapter one was easy and shows great promise. Chapter 2......I am on the second reading I don't get the numbers thing!!! If L is 86, and A is 8, and B is (8), then will A get to the station before B?

Since it's only the second chapter, and I think I read that the numbers thing is very important to understand, I am fighting to not default to my normal mode which would be to skip chapter 2, and move on. :cry

If this keeps up I'll have a 16 chapter book for sale with only the first chapter used. :

Sam

rutt

Sam wrote:

I bought this book based on your recomendation, (hence all responsibility is yours). Chapter one was easy and shows great promise. Chapter 2......I am on the second reading I don't get the numbers thing!!! If L is 86, and A is 8, and B is (8), then will A get to the station before B?

Since it's only the second chapter, and I think I read that the numbers thing is very important to understand, I am fighting to not default to my normal mode which would be to skip chapter 2, and move on. :cry

If this keeps up I'll have a 16 chapter book for sale with only the first chapter used. :

Sam

Don't panic! I just read Ch 2 and, yes it's more technical than most people are used to, but help is on the way. Either Pathfinder or I will write a summary and tutorial for this chapter over the next week. Pathfinder and I are both here to discuss things and soon others will have their books and will have read the first two chapters and be ready to discuss.

Also, I skipped ahead a little. You don't have to have internalized the numbers in order to learn lots of cool stuff. If you doubt this, skim the final chapter. Take a look at just how much Dan improves those portraits with canned recipe.

Dan teaches something MUCH better than canned photoshop recipes: deep understanding of color theor and it's application to photography. But nothing good comes for free. This deep understanding only comes with quite a bit of practice and over time.

But AND THIS IS AN IMPORTANT BUT, you will learn a lot of useful techniques before you gain the deep quantitative understanding of what makes them work. Dan's other book Professional Photoshop has a similar scary section near the beginning which has scared off many people unnecessarily. I just read it the best I could the first time and went on. Soon I was learning things which really helped me and eventually gained some intuition of what the numbers mean.

One thing to do which may help you lot is to use the CDROM versions of the book's images and the color sampler tool to examine colors and see their LAB values.

Sam

rutt wrote:

Don't panic! I just read Ch 2 and, yes it's more technical than most people are used to, but help is on the way. Either Pathfinder or I will write a summary and tutorial for this chapter over the next week. Pathfinder and I are both here to discuss things and soon others will have their books and will have read the first two chapters and be ready to discuss.

Also, I skipped ahead a little. You don't have to have internalized the numbers in order to learn lots of cool stuff. If you doubt this, skim the final chapter. Take a look at just how much Dan improves those portraits with canned recipe.

Dan teaches something MUCH better than canned photoshop recipes: deep understanding of color theor and it's application to photography. But nothing good comes for free. This deep understanding only comes with quite a bit of practice and over time.

But AND THIS IS AN IMPORTANT BUT, you will learn a lot of useful techniques before you gain the deep quantitative understanding of what makes them work. Dan's other book Professional Photoshop has a similar scary section near the beginning which has scared off many people unnecessarily. I just read it the best I could the first time and went on. Soon I was learning things which really helped me and eventually gained some intuition of what the numbers mean.

One thing to do which may help you lot is to use the CDROM versions of the book's images and the color sampler tool to examine colors and see their LAB values.

Rut,

Thanks! I don't really have any intentions of quiting, just venting a little frustration.

My C drive is filled to the exstent that I can't defrag it, and I am having some problems. Off to Frys and I bought Partition Magic to resize (enlarge) the C drive.

When I got home I found the water heater had let go. When It rains it pours. I am now having my morning coffee (bottled water, since my house water is off), and procrastinating. I got it all hooked up yesterday, more work than one would think, with all the valves and inlet piping all rusted, only to have it leak.

There goes the LAB reading for today. :cry

Sam

rutt

Take a look at the thread about Ch 1 if you haven't already:

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=18308

I'm trying to recruit someone to kick off a similar thread about Ch 2. Your message made me think a little about how people who are unfamiliar with Dan and who don't glory in numbers will perceive Ch 2. I'll write something about that soon one way or another.

Sam

rutt wrote:

Take a look at the thread about Ch 1 if you haven't already:

http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=18308

I'm trying to recruit someone to kick off a similar thread about Ch 2. Your message made me think a little about how people who are unfamiliar with Dan and who don't glory in numbers will perceive Ch 2. I'll write something about that soon one way or another.

Chapter one I think I understand pretty well.

I have practiced with a number of different photos, and they all improved substantially in a blink of an eye with just the standard curves. Seems to really put some zip in the photos.

Don't tell any one, or they will all be using it.

Sam

rutt

Dan posted an interesting point about his LAB book. Both Dan and his publisher were taken aback by the sales of this book in the first month. The book was aimed at intermediate to advanced color retouchers. The topic is pretty specialized. Dan has a distinctive style, quite different from most technical writers. Why was it outselling Windows for Dummies?

Dan and his publisher now think they understand. The basic LAB recipe as presented in the first chapter is SO easy and works SO well on SO many images. People are buying the book for that first chapter. So far, Dan says he hasn't gotten that much feedback for the much later chapters.

Shows the power of a great hook. The next edition of Professional Photoshop (2006, Dan says) is bound to benefit from this experience.

rutt

Now we are #1 as well. Google for "margulis lab". You'd think you'd get Dan's book on Amazon or something. Think again.

Google for "Dan Margulis". We're not quite #1 there, but not too far down.

pathfinder

I just googled it and the Canyon COnundrunm thread on dgrin was #1 and #2