Online Books Store. Arts & Photography

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Mastering the Nikon D300

Author: Darrell Young
ASIN : 1933952342
Sales Rank : 3395
Studio : Rocky Nook
Format : Illustrated
Binding : Paperback
EAN : 9781933952345
ISBN : 1933952342
Number Of Pages : 256
Publication Date : December 31, 2008
Publisher : Rocky Nook
Manufacturer : Rocky Nook
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Label : Rocky Nook

Product Description

Mastering the Nikon D300 by Nikonian Darrell Young provides a wealth of information and professional insights for owners of this powerful new camera. Each chapter explores the features and capabilities of the D300 in detail, surpassing basic user manuals by providing step-by-step menu setting adjustments coupled with illustrations and logical explanations for each option. Darrell Young's writing style allows the reader to follow directions in a friendly and informative manner, as if a friend dropped in to share his experienced knowledge without "talking down" to you, explaining the how and the why. The learning experience for D300 beginners (and refresher information for professionals) goes beyond the camera itself. When camera features and options expand to additional Nikon equipment (such as with the use of optional Speedlights) Darrell adds the necessary information. Young's frequent references to user manuals provided by Nikon (complete with specific page references) allow the reader to easily navigate past the "confusion factor" that often comes with new equipment.

Mastering the Nikon D300 is the inaugural title kicking off the Nikonians Press imprint "the exciting, new joint venture between Nikonians and Rocky Nook.

Wicked: The Grimmerie, a Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Hit Broadway Musical

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Wicked: The Grimmerie, a Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Hit Broadway Musical

Author: David Cote
ASIN : 1401308201
Sales Rank : 6839
Studio : Hyperion
Binding : Hardcover
EAN : 9781401308209
ISBN : 1401308201
Number Of Pages : 192
Publication Date : December 26, 2005
Release Date : December 26, 2005
Publisher : Hyperion
Manufacturer : Hyperion
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Label : Hyperion

Product Description

Wicked is not just a musical, it is a phenomenon. Every week 15,000 people pack New York+s Gershwin Theatre to see the show. The most successful musical on Broadway in 2004, Wicked is based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Gregory Maguire. It tells the story of Elphaba, the headstrong Wicked Witch of the West, and Glinda, the good witch, growing up in the Land of Oz. The show has cast a spell on fans, many of whom return for second and third viewings. In 2005, the show begins an extensive tour across the United States and Canada, hitting major cities such as Toronto, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and many more.This beautifully packaged, whimsical keepsake is designed to resemble the Grimmerie, an ancient book of spells that Elphaba uses in the show. Wicked: The Grimmerie offers fans a behind-the-curtains peek at the musical, profiles of the cast and creative team, and inside stories, with full-color photographs throughout. Some of the irresistible special features include an -Ozian+ glossary, spells, an illustrated family tree, and a step-by-step look at how Elphaba gets green before each show-everything fans need to relive the Broadway experience day after day.

American Farmer: The Heart of Our Country

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American Farmer: The Heart of Our Country

Author: Katrina Fried
ASIN : 1599620472
Sales Rank : 14797
Studio : Welcome Books
Binding : Hardcover
EAN : 9781599620473
ISBN : 1599620472
Number Of Pages : 276
Publication Date : December 14, 2008
Release Date : December 14, 2008
Publisher : Welcome Books
Manufacturer : Welcome Books
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Label : Welcome Books

Product Description

When photographer Paul Mobley set out to capture the soul of America's farming communities, he discovered a culture defined by tradition, integrity, and hard work, and comprised of the most authentic and generous individuals he's ever encountered. Traveling across the country from Tennessee to Montana, Mobley and his camera were welcomed into the homes of over one hundred farming families, who graciously shared their personal histories along with the fruits of their labor. To spend time with them was to turn back the clock--to an era when there were no locks on doors, no urban sprawl, and no virtue more prized than common decency. Children still move across the street and not across the state when they grow up, and parents move back in with their children whern they grow old. Story after story, visit after visit, Mobley slowly came to know the independent farmer's spirit both from behind the lens and over the dinner table.

The result is a stunning series of portraits and direct quotes that collectively chronicle the life of the American farmer. Each image offers an unvarnished and intimate look inside the hardships and joys of a quickly disappearing lifestyle--one that once defined our national identity and now struggles just to keep a foothold. And even as encroaching cities threaten their livelihoods, these men and women continue to find sustenance in the same basic human values they were raised with. American Farmer is an inspirational reminder of what it means to live with simplicity and contentment, in a world that is driven by excess. This vivid portfolio is accompanied by anecdotes and memories in the farmer's own words that are both a testament to their enduring hospitatlity and a moving glimpse into their daily routines and family histories. But what you will read first, and foremost, are their faces. From Bruce Crump, a citrus farmer in Florida; to Patsy Fribley, a stockyard dealer from Montana; to Thurston Wilber, a Maine lobsterman, Mobley's intense and beautiful portraits capture the furrows of fields lining their brows, the crevices of drought creasing the corners of their mouths, and the grains of truth in their squinted eyes.

35 states included: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming

List Price: $45.00
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Scrapbooks: An American History

Author: Jessica Helfand
ASIN : 0300126352
Sales Rank : 17537
Studio : Yale University Press
Binding : Hardcover
EAN : 9780300126358
ISBN : 0300126352
Number Of Pages : 224
Publication Date : December 03, 2008
Publisher : Yale University Press
Manufacturer : Yale University Press
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Label : Yale University Press

Product Description

Combining pictures, words, and a wealth of personal ephemera, scrapbook makers preserve on the pages of their books a moment, a day, or a lifetime. Highly subjective and rich in emotional content, the scrapbook is a unique and often quirky form of expression in which a person gathers and arranges meaningful materials to create a personal narrative. This lavishly illustrated book is the first to focus attention on the history of American scrapbooks—their origins, their makers, their diverse forms, the reasons for their popularity, and their place in American culture.

Jessica Helfand, a graphic designer and scrapbook collector, examines the evolution of scrapbooks from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the present, concentrating on the first half of the twentieth century. She includes color photographs from more than two hundred scrapbooks, some made by private individuals and others by the famous, including Zelda Fitzgerald, Lillian Hellman, Anne Sexton, Hilda Doolittle, and Carl Van Vechten. Scrapbooks, while generally made by amateurs, represent a striking and authoritative form of visual autobiography, Helfand finds, and when viewed collectively they offer a unique perspective on the changing pulses of American cultural life.

Published with assistance from Furthermore: a program of the J. M. Kaplan Fund

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Best of the Month, November 2008: The scrapbook has long been a popular and vital form of self-expression embraced by a cross-section of American society. "To read another person's scrapbook" observes Jessica Helfand in Scrapbooks: An American History, "is to acquire a body of knowledge about an entirely different time and place." Helfand--a prominent graphic designer, art critic, and author--has combined her considerable talents to create one of the most interesting and category-defying books on American culture this year. Through some 200 albums dating from the Victorian era through the present day--albums that Helfand personally curated and researched--Scrapbooks tells the story of ordinary and extraordinary lives, innovative visual ideas, and social change within the larger context of American history. The perfectly presented color photographs of album pages and schematic renderings draw readers right in. And, Helfand's detailed, yet evocative interpretations will keep them glued to the page. Scrapbooks is a special book that engages readers with a palpable sense of the material qualities of historic scrapbooks, and provides a stimulating presentation of the complex social and cultural worlds out of which they emerged. Like any first-rate scrapbook, Scrapbooks is a treasure-trove worth poring over for hours and hours. --Lauren Nemroff

The first book on the history of the American scrapbook. Discover untold stories in America's cultural history through nearly 200 fascinating scrapbooks.

Author Jessica Helfand Describes the Scrapbooks Project

Rich or poor, celebrity or civilian, men, women, and children of all ages kept scrapbooks. Some were ornate, with gilded covers and carefully composed pages of decoupage. Others were retrofitted from secondhand books, with chromolithographs glued sloppily on top of existing texts. Many consisted entirely of clippings, rigorously aligned and chronologically arranged, often around a central theme—pigeons, for instance, or movie stars or, not infrequently, obituaries. There were scrapbooks filled with babies, birds, and baseball statistics; scrapbooks about ice skating, dog breeding, and the intricacies of boy watching. Fragments of cloth from wedding gowns were included in bridal books, while new mothers included gentle locks from their baby’s first haircut. Debutantes saved news clippings, farmers saved weather reports, high school girls saved gum wrappers, and everyone, it seemed, saved greeting cards. Even soldiers kept scrapbooks, pasting in furlough requests, ration cards, and the tattered, beloved photos of their faraway sweethearts. Clumsily folded, haphazardly pasted, randomly annotated with fascinating afterthoughts, the material presence of these personal repositories offers a long-overlooked glimpse into the American spirit. Why did people feel compelled to save the things they did? What did they value, and question, and believe about themselves and the world around them? And how did the things they saved express what they themselves, for whatever reason, could not say in words?

Over time, the scrapbook came to mirror the changing pulse of American cultural life—a life of episodic moments, randomly reflected in a news clipping or a silhouetted photograph, a lock of baby hair or a Western Union telegram. As a genre unto themselves, scrapbooks represent a fascinating, yet virtually unexplored visual vernacular, a world of makeshift means and primitive methods, of gestural madness and unruly visions, of piety and poetry and a million private plagiarisms. As author, editor, photographer, curator, and inevitable protagonist, the scrapbook maker engaged in what seems today, in retrospect, a comparatively crude exercise in graphic design. Combining pictures, words, and a wealth of personal ephemera, the resulting works represent amateur yet stunningly authoritative examples of a particular strain of visual autobiography, a genre rich in emotional, pictorial, and sensory detail. --Jessica Helfand

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House Beautiful Colors for Your Home: 300 Designer Favorites (House Beautiful Series)

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House Beautiful Colors for Your Home: 300 Designer Favorites (House Beautiful Series)

Author: Jessica Helfand
ASIN : 1588167399
Sales Rank : 3610
Studio : Hearst
Binding : Paperback
EAN : 9781588167392
ISBN : 1588167399
Number Of Pages : 288
Publication Date : December 02, 2008
Publisher : Hearst
Manufacturer : Hearst
Availability : In stock soon. Order now to get in line. First come, first served.
Label : Hearst

Product Description

What transforms a room from monotone to magical? Color! So, if you’re nervous about splashing that white with bright, this conveniently portable primer based on House Beautiful’s most popular column will help. With special insider advice from top designers, plus a directory of actual paint swatches, this book is the most comprehensive and appealing color resource available today. All the colors are searchable by shade and by room, and every paint is accompanied by its manufacturer, name, and number, so you can match what you want right from the book. The guide’s unique format makes everything easy.
Noted designers with long and distinguished careers offer suggestions for every room and mood. They provide advice on which shades to start with and which to experiment with, the classic palettes they keep coming back to, and how the right colors can simply make us feel good. Gorgeous room shots—such as Paula Perlini’s delphinium blue bedroom and Amanda Keyser’s merlot red walls—are accompanied by the exact brands of paint and their swatches, so you can examine the colors closely.An invaluable guide to color, this book will help you pick the right paints that will add beauty and style to your home.

List Price: $60.00
Price: $37.80
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A Passion for Blue and White

Author: Carolyne Roehm
ASIN : 0767921135
Sales Rank : 5953
Studio : Broadway
Binding : Hardcover
EAN : 9780767921138
ISBN : 0767921135
Number Of Pages : 288
Publication Date : December 28, 2008
Release Date : December 28, 2008
Publisher : Broadway
Manufacturer : Broadway
Availability : Usually ships in 24 hours
Label : Broadway

Amazon.com Review

Product Description

“Nature’s quintessential color combination of blue and white never ceases to amaze me. The look of pristine snow against deep blue Aspen skies; spires of blue and white delphinium in a garden; Connecticut’s spring mornings where the apple blossoms and nodding heads of white narcissus are in contrast to soft blue skies and vibrant green grass—these and many more images found in nature have informed my work for the last thirty-five years. From fashion to interiors, and tabletop to gardens, the presence of blue and white is a constant in my past collections as well as throughout my previous eight books. It seems natural that I would eventually do a book on living and designing with this seminal color combination.” —from the Introduction

This private tour of the dazzling homes of legendary style-setter Carolyne Roehm showcases her favorite color combination in more than three hundred glorious photographs.

From the time designer Carolyne Roehm rented her first small apartment in New York in her twenties, she has loved blue and white. In that one-bedroom flat, she draped the walls, chairs, sofa, and a canopy bed in an inexpensive blue and white sheeting fabric designed by her boss, Oscar de la Renta, and began collecting blue-and-white porcelain from around the world—initially bargain reproductions and eventually museum-quality pieces—from China, Japan, Portugal, the Netherlands, and elsewhere.

Today, Carolyne Roehm presides over a magnificent duplex in Manhattan, an antique-filled stone house in Connecticut, and a chic yet rustic home in Aspen, all of which contain rooms decorated in blue and white, featuring accents from her collections of china, ceramics, glassware, linens, furniture, and decorative pieces. These rooms employ the whole spectrum of blues, from delicate sky to the deepest, boldest navy, evoking moods ranging from tranquil to vibrant.

In A Passion for Blue and White, Carolyne Roehm takes us inside her homes (including her former pied-à-terre in Paris) in never-before-seen photographs of these stunning rooms. She also reveals how she has used blue and white to magnificent effect outdoors in Connecticut around her pool and in her gardens—and even how she used the combination in designing a wedding for a friend.

She provides inspiration for tabletop design, flower arranging, and gift-wrapping, suitable for all budgets. Her ceramic, textile, and glass collections (endless sources of her creativity) can be emulated by anyone with trips to flea markets, thrift shops, and inexpensive import stores as well as antique stores and galleries.

A swatch of French fabric began Carolyne Roehm’s lifetime love affair with blue and white. In this book, she demonstrates through her own decorating and designs, how this combination works its magic on everything from upholstery and drapes to napkins and tablecloths, wrapping paper and ribbons. For anyone with a passion for blue and white, here is the ultimate style guide and Carolyne Roehm’s most gorgeous book yet.

Amazon.com Exclusive: An Interview with Carolyne Roehm

Q: Reviewers are calling your new book “gorgeous” and your “most self-expressive book”. What inspired you to write A Passion for Blue and White?
CR: Blue and white has always been a big part of my world, and this passion is reflected in the books I’ve done, whether the subject matter was flowers, entertaining, or creating beautifully wrapped gifts. It seemed natural that I would eventually do a book on living and designing with this seminal color combination. Blue and White gives me a design focus – one that’s endlessly rewarding.

Q: What will the reader find in the book?
CR: Blue and white has been a constant in my interior design work. The book is filled with photos of interiors and outdoor spaces enhanced by collections of ceramics, textiles, porcelain, dishes and linens. I’ve always been inspired by nature and no other combination is as omnipresent as glorious blue and white so I’ve included an endless assortment of ideas for arranging flowers, gardens and bouquets for every season. This is really a book about creating a beautiful environment with style and ease. I’ve also included wonderful ideas for wrapping paper and ribbons, napkins, drapes and linens. Of course I didn’t feel this book would be complete without including a plethora of information on the meaning and history of blue and white, and its use in all of the decorative arts.

Q: Since the holidays are upon us, do you include suggestions that may be useful for the upcoming season?
CR: Yes. During the holiday season, I sometimes stray away from a red-and-green theme and use a blue and white color scheme that works surprisingly well with a green wreath or urns filled with narcissus.

At Christmas, blue and white pieces can show off the traditional deep red flowers of the season including amaryllis, berries and roses.

Q: Do you have other holiday ideas that don’t involve flowers?
CR: Yes, I’ve included photos of holiday cards, invitations, gift tags, menu cards and gift wrap that is beautiful when created in a blue & white color scheme. Elegant card stock is a luxury but it’s incredibly simple and satisfying to use the computer to make invitations, menu cards or holiday gift tags. Guests feel you’ve taken the time to create something special when it’s made by hand.

Q: Any suggestions for those on a budget?
CR: Absolutely. The best thing about blue & white is the ability to collect and display so inexpensively. Chinese porcelain is readily available and inexpensive fabrics can always be purchased at discount outlets. A few of my favorite table setting ideas include mixing white porcelain with a blue and white tablecloth and using white carnations in the centerpiece. It creates a dramatic table inexpensively.

The right flower arrangements can be made inexpensively any time of the year. One of my favorite combinations is mixing white cosmos from the cutting garden with frilly Queen Anne’s lace to create a fresh and simple bouquet. Simple daisies in a cobalt blue glass create a dramatic effect and nothing is more cheerful than bright yellow sunflowers in deep blue glass.

Q: Any final comments?
CR: This book is my personal story of designing and living with this magical color combination. I hope in some small way it will inspire others.

A Look Inside A Passion for Blue and White
(Click on Images to Enlarge)

For the Living Room For the Bedroom

In the Garden Interior Arrangements

Floral Arrangements Tablescapes

For the Holidays Decorative Arrangements

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