The art of photographing people is a difficult one. People Photography is about elements required for successfully making such pictures. It covers equipment, preparation, techniques and situations in four vibrant and inspiring parts. The uniqueness of this 160 page book lies in the details that complete each part such as pushing film, photo etiquette, rear-curtain sync and on-stage photography. Micheal Coyne shows his mastery of people photography with exceptionally beautiful and technically perfect photographs for each situation he describes.

People Photography, by Micheal Coyne, is published by Lonely Planet. Like most Lonely Planet books, it is full of pertinent information. However, this particular book is concise with little fluff and is cleanly organized in 4 stand-alone parts. The book is prefaced with an introduction of its author and his approach to people photography. Notably, Micheal Coyne's art has been published in National Geographic, Newsweek, Time, Life, Smithsonian and numerous other publications.  Once you explore the full-color photographs present on virtually every page, it is clear that he deserved to be published in such famous magazines! This is a pleasant contrast when numerous photography books are poorly illustrated or don't even contain color images.

Overall, the book is well written using simple language and plenty of examples. Being mostly pictures and only 160 pages long, the entire book can be read in just a few hours. This quick read will gratify readers with plenty of useful details. The text strongly draws from the author's personal experience and consistently explains the techniques used to realize each printed photograph. Each photograph is captioned with technical details such as shutter-speed, aperture and lens. Frequently, captions also include anecdotes proper to the creation of that photograph. Micheal Coyne does very well at explaining what he did to obtain each photograph. What are mostly missing are insights on his thought process that led to those decisions. Perhaps that information is missing because it is part of the creative process, but it is probably the most difficult aspect of photography to teach - that's why we would like to see it finally explained in a book, any book. People Photography also inspires, not only by the amount of splendid photographs, but also by the described effort required to take many of those pictures.

Part one of the book is dedicated to equipment and film. Obviously, the five pages dedicated to film don't apply to digital photography and neither does the half-page on auto-winders. The remainder of this part, however, does apply very well to DSLR cameras. Of particular importance are the pages on various lenses, which introduce pictures as a two-way communication medium. In one direction, a picture describes its subject to viewers. In the other direction, a picture shows what is important to the photographer who took it. Lenses influence both messages.

Part two is about being prepared before and after traveling. Topics covered here include researching a location, exploring surroundings and approaching people. These topics demonstrate the need for taking pictures of people we don't know, relating to them, making them cooperate and working swiftly. Part two's second chapter describes how to make dealing with unknown people in unfamiliar places less intimidating.

Part three, Technical Elements, describes exposure, composition and light. Note that these three concepts are put in the context of people photography and only explained briefly in themselves -- this book is not meant as a general introduction to photography. Justifiably, composition is described with the most depth since it forms the basis of the message each picture conveys.

Part four should be considered the book's core. It is titled, On The Road, and describes 18 contexts for people photography. These contexts such as environmental portraits, crowds, travel companions, on the street, festivals and silhouettes all have particularities which are explained in their dedicated sections. Overlap is kept to a minimum, with common themes explained in the book's previous parts. Here the author reinforces that photography must be treated as a communication medium to be successful.

In the end, People Photography achieves its goal of elaborating on, well, people photography. It does so without assuming too much nor spending too much time on general photography. Based on its text and photographs, it explains and shows what are beautiful picture of people. The range of topics covered is rather good and so is the description of how each picture what made. As we mentioned earlier, more information on the creative process is all that is lacking from this otherwise great book.