General Books

Blu-ray Disc Demystified

Jim Taylor, Michael Zink, Charles Crawford, Christen Armbrust

Amazon Price: $37.77 List Price: $59.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: McGraw-Hill Professional Amazon Marketplace: 15 new & used starting at $35.88

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Subjects -> Computers & Internet -> Digital Music -> General
Subjects -> Computers & Internet -> Digital Music -> General AAS
Subjects -> Entertainment -> Movies -> Video -> Reference

Editorial Review:

The Latest Tips and Techniques for Getting the Maximum from Blu-ray Technology

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Blu-ray Disc Demystified provides the most current information and applications available for this popular high-definition optical disc format. Written by a team of experts with a wide range of experience in DVD and high-definition production, this thorough, skill-building guide details Blu-ray's many features, formats, and applications.

. .

Blu-ray Disc Demystified provides exhaustive coverage of the multitude of production and authoring processes, while explaining how the standard and high-definition DVD specifications dovetail and/or clash with related digital media standards. The authors also provide detailed descriptions of Blu-ray's strengths, as well as frank assessments of its weaknesses and common traps that often ensnare new users. Blu-ray Disc Demystified is the most comprehensive and practical guide available for navigating the numerous challenges, changes, and opportunities associated with Blu-ray technology.

. . .

Blu-ray Disc Demystified provides:

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• Detailed overview of Blu-ray technology .
• In-depth coverage of formats, features, and applications.
• The latest news on content protection .
• Tips on using Blu-ray in the home, office, and school.
• The facts behind the myths surrounding Blu-ray.
• Essential information regarding production.
• Interaction paradigms.
• Honest assessments of Blu-ray's pitfalls

. . .

Digital Image Processing (3rd Edition)

Rafael C. Gonzalez, Richard E. Woods

Amazon Price: $120.00 List Price: $150.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Prentice Hall Amazon Marketplace: 50 new & used starting at $88.00

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Subjects -> Computers & Internet -> Programming -> Algorithms -> Digital Image Processing

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 23 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Simply Excellent! Fully Justifies Its Price! 5 out of 5 stars.
8 of 8 people found this review helpful.

The preface of this book starts with a quote:
"When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing".
And once you start reading the book, you realize how much the book lives upto this. Everything is written clearly and importany points are stressed again and again in each topic until you become fully familiar with them. Topics are written with implementation in mind, as you can get started with writing your own code instantly.
The book makes the subject as interseting as it gets, and although some existing basic concepts of mathematics and statistics are quite helpful while reading, but you dont even have to be familiar with Digital Signal Processing to fully understand the contents.
Finally, I'd like to say that out of the few poeple that fully understand a concept, fewer have the gift to deliver their knowledge to others, and the authors of this book have that gift.

Editorial Review:

THE leader in the field for more than twenty years, this introduction to basic concepts and methodologies for digital image processing continues its cutting-edge focus on contemporary developments in all mainstream areas of image processing. Completely self-contained, heavily illustrated, and mathematically accessible, it has a scope of application that is not limited to the solution of specialized problems. Digital Image Fundamentals. Image Enhancement in the Spatial Domain. Image Enhancement in the Frequency Domain. Image Restoration. Color Image Processing. Wavelets and Multiresolution Processing. Image Compression. Morphological Image Processing. Image Segmentation. Representation and Description. Object Recognition. For technicians interested in the fundamentals and contemporary applications of digital imaging processing

The Artist's Guide to GIMP Effects: Creative Techniques for Photographers, Artists, and Designers

Michael J. Hammel

Amazon Price: $29.67 List Price: $44.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: No Starch Press Amazon Marketplace: 43 new & used starting at $25.84

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

The GIMP, an image editor whose power and ease-of-use rivals that of Adobe Photoshop, is one of the world's most popular free software projects. Artists and designers have relied on the GIMP since 1995 to retouch photographs, composite multiple images, and create new artwork from scratch.

The Artist's Guide to GIMP Effects shows you how to harness the GIMP's powerful features to produce professional-looking advertisements, impressive photographic effects, as well as logos and text effects. And author Michael J. Hammel, who has used the GIMP since its first public release, won't mince words or waste your time. His extensively illustrated, step-by-step tutorials are perfect for hands-on learning and experimentation. After a crash course in using the GIMP's interface and core tools (such as brushes, patterns, selections, layers, modes, and masks), you'll learn:

Photographic techniques to simulate ripped edges, create sepia-toned antique images, swap colors, produce motion blurs, alter depth of field, and even fix rips in an old photo

Web design techniques to create tiled patterns, navigation tabs, rollovers, and fancy buttons and borders

Type effects to create depth, perspective shadows, metallic and distressed text, and neon and graffiti lettering

Advertising effects to produce movie posters and package designs; simulate clouds, cracks, cloth, and underwater effects; and create specialized lighting

Interface design tips for creating textures, navigation bars, and buttons

Whether you're new to the GIMP or you've been playing with this powerful software for years, The Artist's Guide to GIMP Effects is sure to teach you some new tricks.

Visit the book's companion site for additional tutorials and resources. http://www.graphics-muse.org/artistsguide/

Fundamentals of Photonics (Wiley Series in Pure and Applied Optics)

Bahaa E. A. Saleh, Malvin Carl Teich

Amazon Price: $118.80 List Price: $148.50 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Wiley-Interscience Amazon Marketplace: 44 new & used starting at $79.00

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Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Engineering -> Electrical & Electronics -> Optics -> General
Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Engineering -> Electrical & Electronics -> Optics -> Lasers

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 23 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

Now in a new full-color edition, Fundamentals of Photonics, Second Edition is a self-contained and up-to-date introductory-level textbook that thoroughly surveys this rapidly expanding area of engineering and applied physics. Featuring a logical blend of theory and applications, coverage includes detailed accounts of the primary theories of light, including ray optics, wave optics, electromagnetic optics, and photon optics, as well as the interaction of photons and atoms, and semiconductor optics. Presented at increasing levels of complexity, preliminary sections build toward more advanced topics,
such as Fourier optics and holography, guided-wave and fiber optics, semiconductor sources and detectors, electro-optic and acousto-optic devices, nonlinear optical devices, optical interconnects and switches, and optical fiber communications.

Each of the twenty-two chapters of the first edition has been thoroughly updated. The Second Edition also features entirely new chapters on photonic-crystal optics (including multilayer and periodic media, waveguides, holey fibers, and resonators) and ultrafast optics (including femtosecond optical pulses, ultrafast nonlinear optics, and optical solitons). The chapters on optical interconnects and switches and optical fiber communications have been completely rewritten to accommodate current technology.

Each chapter contains summaries, highlighted equations, exercises, problems, and selected reading lists. Examples of real systems are included to emphasize the concepts governing applications of current interest.

Lighting Design Basics

Mark Karlen, James Benya

Amazon Price: $47.84 List Price: $55.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Wiley Amazon Marketplace: 50 new & used starting at $31.99

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Subjects -> Home & Garden -> Interior Design -> Decoration & Ornament
Subjects -> Home & Garden -> Interior Design -> Lighting
Subjects -> Home & Garden -> Interior Design -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Lighting is a basic, yet difficult-to-master, element of interior design, and Lighting Design Basics provides the information you need in a concise, highly visual format. Two leading designers, both with decades of experience, offer straightforward coverage of concepts and techniques, and present realistic goals you can use as guides to creating simple, typical lighting designs and when collaborating with professional designers on more complex projects.

Design scenarios for more than twenty different spaces illustrate real-world case studies for illuminating residential and commercial spaces, from kitchens to doctors' offices. Each scenario includes an in-depth rationale for the proposed solution, insightful lighting distribution diagrams, floor plans, and details for lighting installation and construction. In addition, exercises allow you to develop lighting design skills in preparation for working on actual projects, as well as the NCIDQ and NCARB exams.

Packed with informative illustrations, Lighting Design Basics is an invaluable resource for students, as well as interior designers and architects studying for professional licensing exams.

Introduction to Fourier Optics

Joseph W. Goodman

Amazon Price: $81.86 List Price: $98.50 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Roberts & Company Publishers Amazon Marketplace: 29 new & used starting at $58.18

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 8 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Goodman's Fourier Optics 3rd Edition: An Improved Classic. 5 out of 5 stars.
22 of 22 people found this review helpful.

For the last month, I have been using this book for self study to aid me in my work with lasers. Originally, I was working from the 1st edition (borrowed from a co-worker), but decided to buy my own copy. I wound up buying the 3rd edition, a significantly expanded version of the original.

Goodman's writing style is conversational and his treatment of the subject is thorough. I appreciate his inclusion of enough optics/E&M background within the text that I am not constantly having to go to my bookshelf to consult other references. Note, the 3rd edition has several helpful appendices not found in the 1st edition.

There are also many instructive problems given throughout the text to help students solidify their understanding of the material.

This is an excellent book for self study, and would certainly make a fine text for a senior undergrad course on the subject. I recommend it highly.

Charlie.

Editorial Review:

Fourier analysis is a ubiquitous tool that has found application in diverse areas of physics and engineering. This book deals with its applications in optics, and in particular with applications to diffraction, imaging, optical data processing, and holography. This new third edition of the book comprises a general update of the material and a new chapter 10 which considers optical communications.

Schaum's Outline of Optics

Eugene Hecht

Amazon Price: $17.05 List Price: $18.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: McGraw-Hill Amazon Marketplace: 41 new & used starting at $3.74

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 6 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Clear concise outline of optics 5 out of 5 stars.
7 of 7 people found this review helpful.

This Schaum's outline is better than the expensive textbook by the same author on the same subject in many ways, and in my opinion stands alone as a guide on optics. It gets to the meat of optics via solving problems that range from simple to difficult, which is particularly attractive to engineers learning or reviewing this subject. To me, the only chapters that seemed a bit confusing were the first two on wave motion and on electromagnetic waves and photons. For that material you may need to consult another source. From that point onward, however, the outline couldn't be any better. The outline even has a chapter that introduces Fourier optics. This outline would make an excellent review or supplement for someone taking a course in Photonics that uses Saleh's "Fundamentals of Photonics". That textbook has virtually no solved problems in it whatsoever, and the first third of the book follows the material covered in this outline nicely.

Editorial Review:

Confusing Textbooks? Missed Lectures? Not Enough Time?

Fortunately for you, there's Schaum's Outlines. More than 40 million students have trusted Schaum's to help them succeed in the classroom and on exams. Schaum's is the key to faster learning and higher grades in every subject. Each Outline presents all the essential course information in an easy-to-follow, topic-by-topic format. You also get hundreds of examples, solved problems, and practice exercises to test your skills.

This Schaum's Outline gives you

• Practice problems with full explanations that reinforce knowledge
• Coverage of the most up-to-date developments in your course field
• In-depth review of practices and applications

Fully compatible with your classroom text, Schaum's highlights all the important facts you need to know. Use Schaum's to shorten your study time-and get your best test scores!

Schaum's Outlines-Problem Solved.

The Landscape Lighting Book

Janet Lennox Moyer

Amazon Price: $88.00 List Price: $110.00 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Wiley Amazon Marketplace: 25 new & used starting at $78.64

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Subjects -> Home & Garden -> Gardening & Horticulture -> Landscape
Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Architecture -> Landscape
Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Architecture -> Reference

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 3 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

A richly illustrated and up-to-date source of practical guidance and hard-to-find technical data on all aspects of landscape lighting

The Landscape Lighting Book, Second Edition shows you how to achieve a wide range of beautiful and dramatic lighting effects. You'll get expert guidance and advice on the theory, design process, project needs, and techniques of landscape lighting. You'll find prizewinning projects designed by the author and other landscape lighting professionals throughout the United States. Plus, hundreds of diagrams, drawings, and black-and-white and full-color photographs illuminate topics and provide visually stunning insights into new and creative ways that lighting can transform landscapes. This fully updated edition covers the latest technologies and equipment and features new chapters on installation, documentation, and seasonal lighting. You'll also find:
* Guidelines for preparing lighting drawings, control and transformer charts, symbol lists, and other technical specifications
* Design strategies for avoiding potential conflicts between plantings and landscape lighting equipment
* Accurate performance characteristics of all lighting materials, finishes, and fixtures
* The best ways to locate fixtures, set appropriate light levels, and perform preventive system maintenance
* The special lighting needs of plants in indoor environments
* A complete listing of fixtures, controls, lamps, and accessories manufacturers and vendors


Whether you're seeking to sculpt a landscape with light or make an outdoor space useable at night, The Landscape Lighting Book, Second Edition shares all the technical and creative insights you'll need to beautify your landscaping projects and consistently win client approval.

Remote Sensing: The Image Chain Approach (Oxford Series in Optical and Imaging Sciences)

John R. Schott

List Price: $104.00 By: Oxford University Press, USA Amazon Marketplace: 22 new & used starting at $14.73

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Subjects -> Professional & Technical -> Engineering -> Electrical & Electronics -> General

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Remote Sensing is a unique advanced text which covers the fundamental science underlying the rapidly growing field of remote sensing. Unlike similar books, which focus on one aspect of remote sensing, it treats the subject as a continuous process, including energy-matter interaction, radiation propagation, and data dissemination, and emphasizes the tools and procedures required to extract information from remotely sensed data using the image chain approach. Using the image chain analogy, the component processes are linked together using a common quantitative terminology that can be used to study physical parameters (e.g., reflectance and temperature) that are related to the type and condition of land cover features. This approach has evolved from over a decade of the author's teaching experience with undergraduate and graduate students and two decades of research and consulting experience on remote sensing problems for government and industry.
Remote Sensing is ideal as a first text in remote sensing for graduate students and advanced undergraduates in the physical or engineering sciences, and will also serve as a valuable reference for the many practitioners of remote sensing throughout government and industry who were trained in the traditional technical disciplines and need to know how to better apply them to the remote sensing process.

The Automated Lighting Programmer's Handbook

Brad Schiller

Amazon Price: $40.13 List Price: $40.95 Usually ships in 24 hours By: Focal Press Amazon Marketplace: 15 new & used starting at $31.24

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Subjects -> Arts & Photography -> Performing Arts -> Theater -> General
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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 7 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Competent, but a bit thin... 4 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Buying this book to expand my knowledge into this area, I found it a bit thin. It feels stretched to me - like a padded long article. The info about cue types was good, but I'm sure it's covered in user manuals, and the insistence on avoiding mention of specific products diluted the rest of it too much for my liking. I think picking a console and fixtures, even if it's one per chapter, would allow a little more detail. As it is, readable, but unsatisfying.

Certainly room for another edition, hopefully with more detail. I should note that I'm not a beginner, I've been programming other aspects of shows for decades. Possibly a beginner would get more out of it. I gave it more stars because it covers the exact topic I was looking for.

Editorial Review:

From basic principles of automated lighting, to pre-production preparations, the text details concepts, procedures, and guidelines to ensure a successful production. Then the author continues with in-depth explanations for beginning, intermediate, and advanced programmers. Additional sections explore troubleshooting principles, working relationships, and future technologies. For the final chapter of the book, the author interviewed many respected lighting industry veterans including John Broderick, Christian Choi, Laura Frank, Jim Lenahan, and Arnold Serame.

* Linear aspect of building a show from beginning to end
* Includes author's Sydney 2000 Olympic Journal
* Advice from respected industry pros including Christian Choi, Laura Frank, and John Broderick