THE FIRST BOOK WITH ONE FOOT ON THE COFFEE TABLE, AND ONE FOOT IN THE CLASSROOM Joe McNally, one of the world’s top pro digital photographers, whose celebrated work has graced the pages of Sports Illustrated, Time, and National Geographic (to name a few), breaks new ground by doing something no photography book has ever done—blending the rich, stunning images and elegant layout of a coffee-table book with the invaluable training, no-nonsense insights, and photography secrets usually found only in those rare, best-of-breed educational books. When Joe’s not on assignment for the biggest-name magazines and Fortune 500 clients, he’s in the classroom teaching location lighting, environmental portraiture, and how to “get the shot” at workshops around the world. These on-location workshops are usually reserved for a handful of photographers each year, but now you can learn the same techniques that Joe shares in his seminars and lectures in a book that brings Joe’s sessions to life. What makes the book so unique is the “triangle of learning” where (1) Joe distills the concept down to one brief sentence. It usually starts with something like, “An editor at National Geographic once told me...” and then he shares one of those hard-earned tricks of the trade that you only get from spending a lifetime behind the lens. Then, (2) on the facing page is one of Joe’s brilliant images that perfectly illustrates the technique (you’ll recognize many of his photos from magazine covers). And (3) you get the inside story of how that shot was taken, including which equipment he used (lens, f/stop, lighting, accessories, etc.), along with the challenges that type of project brings, and how to set up a shot like that of your own. This book also gives you something more. It inspires. It challenges. It informs. But perhaps most importantly, it will help you understand photography and the art of making great photos at a level you never thought possible. This book is packed with those “Ah ha!” moments—those clever insights that make it all come together for you. It brings you that wonderful moment when it suddenly all makes sense—that “moment it clicks.”

When it comes to photography, it’s all about the light. After spending more than thirty years behind the lens—working for National Geographic, Time, Life, and Sports Illustrated—Joe McNally knows about light. He knows how to talk about it, shape it, color it, control it, and direct it. Most importantly, he knows how to create it...using small hot shoe flashes. In The Hot Shoe Diaries, Joe brings you behind the scenes to candidly share his lighting solutions for a ton of great images. Using Nikon Speedlights, Joe lets you in on his uncensored thought process—often funny, sometimes serious, always fascinating—to demonstrate how he makes his pictures with these small flashes. Whether he’s photographing a gymnast on the Great Wall, an alligator in a swamp, or a fire truck careening through Times Square, Joe uses these flashes to create great light that makes his pictures sing.

In the story of every great company and career, there is one defining moment when luck and skill collide. This book is about making that moment happen. According to Frans Johansson’s research, successful people and organizations show a common theme. A lucky moment occurs and they take advantage of it to change their fate. Consider how Diane von Furstenberg saw Julie Nixon Eisenhower on TV wearing a matching skirt and top, and created the timeless, elegant wrap-dress. That was a “click moment” of unexpected opportunity. Johansson uses stories from throughout history to illustrate the specific actions we can take to create more click moments, place lots of high-potential bets, open ourselves up to chance encounters, and harness the complex forces of success that follow.

Following up on the great success of The Moment It Clicks and The Hot Shoe Diaries: Big Light from Small Flashes, legendary magazine photographer Joe McNally takes us on another memorable ride with Sketching Light, another trip into the land of light--but this time running the gamut from small flash to big flash, and everywhere in between. Of course, Joe includes coverage of Nikon Speedlights, but he also covers big flash, as well as "in-between" lights as the Elinchrom Quadra. The exploration of new technology, as well as the explanation of older technology. No matter what equipment Joe uses and discusses, the most important element of Joe's instruction is that it is straightforward, complete, and honest. No secrets are held back, and the principles he talks about apply generally to the shaping and quality of light, not just to an individual model or brand of flash. He tells readers what works and what doesn't via his let's-see-what-happens approach, he shows how he sets up his shots with plentiful sketches and behind-the-scenes production shots, and he does it all with the intelligence, clarity, and wisdom that can only come from shooting in the field for 30 years for the likes of National Geographic, Time, Life, and Sports Illustrated--not to mention the wit and humor of a clearly warped (if gifted) mind.

Photography has been the business and the passion of LIFE since the original weekly magazine's inception in 1936, and it continues to be the business and passion of LIFE Books and LIFE.com in the new millennium. But photography has surely changed during these many decades. The rigs and gear of old have given way-first slowly, then all at once-to sleek miracle machines that process pixels and have made the darkroom obsolete. The casual photog puts eye to lens, sets everything on auto and captures a photograph that is . . . perfectly fine. One of LIFE's master shooters-in fact, the final in the long line of distinguished LIFE staff photographers-was Joe McNally, and he has always believed that with a little preparation and care, with a dash of enthusiasm and daring added to the equation, anyone can make a better photo-anyone can turn a "keeper" into a treasure. This was true in days of yore, and it's true in the digital age. Your marvelous new camera, fresh from its box, can indeed perform splendid feats. Joe explains in this book how to take best advantage of what it was designed to do, and also when it is wise to outthink your camera or push your camera-to go for the gold, to create that indelible family memory that you will have blown up as large as the technology will allow, and that will hang on the wall forevermore. As the storied LIFE photographer and photo editor John Loengard points out in his eloquent foreword to this volume, there are cameras and there are cameras, and they've always been able to do tricks. And then there is photography. Other guides may give you the one, two, three of producing a reasonably well exposed shot, but Joe McNally and the editors of LIFE can give you that, and then can show you how to make a picture. In a detailed, friendly, conversational, anecdotal, sometimes rollicking way, that's what they do in these pages. Prepare to click.

Photographer and best-selling author Joe McNally shares stories and lessons from a life in photography.

When Joe McNally moved to New York City in 1976, his first job was at the Daily News as a copyboy, “the wretched dog of the newsroom.” He was earning the lowest pay grade possible and living in a cheap hotel in Manhattan. Life was not glamorous. But with a fierce drive, an eye for a picture, and a willingness to take (almost) any assignment that came his way, Joe stepped out onto the always precarious tightrope of the freelance photographer—and never looked back. Fast forward 40 years, and his work has included assignments and stories for National Geographic, Time, LIFE, Sports Illustrated, and more. He has traveled for assignments to nearly 70 countries and received dozens of awards for his photography.

In The Real Deal, Joe tells us how it all started, and candidly shares stories, lessons, and insights he has collected along the way. This is not a dedicated how-to book about “where to put the light,” though there is certainly instructional information to be gleaned here. This is also not a navel-gazing look back at “the good old days,” because those never really existed anyway. Instead, The Real Deal is simply a collection of candid “field notes”—some short, some quite long—gathered over time that, together, become an intimate look behind the scenes at a photographer who has pretty much seen and done it all.

Though the photography industry bears little resemblance to the industry just 10 years ago (much less 40 years ago), what it really takes to become a successful photographer—the character traits, the fundamental lessons, the ability to adapt, and then adapt again—remains the same. Joe writes about everything from the crucial ability to know how to use (and make!) window light to the importance of creating long-term relationships built on trust; from lessons learned after a day in the field to the need to follow your imagination wherever it takes you; from the “random” and “lucky” moments that propel one’s career to the wonders and pitfalls of today’s camera technology. For every mention of f-stops and shutter speeds, there is equal discussion about the importance of access, the occasional moment of hubris, and the idea of becoming iconic.

Before Joe was a celebrated and award-winning photographer, before he was a well-respected educator and author of multiple bestselling books, he was just…Joe, hustling every day, from one assignment to the next, piecing together a portfolio, a skill set, a reputation, a career. He imagined a life—and then took pictures of it. Here are a few frames.

Winner of the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism A New York Times Book Review Top Ten Book of the Year Time magazine Top Ten Nonfiction Book of 2007 Newsweek Favorite Books of 2007 A Washington Post Book World Best Book of 2007 In this sweeping and dramatic narrative, Alex Ross, music critic for The New Yorker, weaves together the histories of the twentieth century and its music, from Vienna before the First World War to Paris in the twenties; from Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia to downtown New York in the sixties and seventies up to the present. Taking readers into the labyrinth of modern style, Ross draws revelatory connections between the century's most influential composers and the wider culture. The Rest Is Noise is an astonishing history of the twentieth century as told through its music.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: VOGUE • FORBES • BOOKPAGE • NEW YORK POST • WIRED “I have not been as profoundly moved by a book in years.” —Jodi Picoult Even after she left home for Hollywood, Emmy-nominated TV writer Bess Kalb saved every voicemail her grandmother Bobby Bell ever left her. Bobby was a force—irrepressible, glamorous, unapologetically opinionated. Bobby doted on Bess; Bess adored Bobby. Then, at ninety, Bobby died. But in this debut memoir, Bobby is speaking to Bess once more, in a voice as passionate as it ever was in life. Recounting both family lore and family secrets, Bobby brings us four generations of indomitable women and the men who loved them. There’s Bobby’s mother, who traveled solo from Belarus to America in the 1880s to escape the pogroms, and Bess’s mother, a 1970s rebel who always fought against convention. But it was Bobby and Bess who always had the most powerful bond: Bobby her granddaughter’s fiercest supporter, giving Bess unequivocal love, even if sometimes of the toughest kind. Nobody Will Tell You This But Me marks the creation of a totally new, virtuosic form of memoir: a reconstruction of a beloved grandmother’s words and wisdom to tell her family’s story with equal parts poignancy and hilarity.

When did you know you were a feminist? Whether it was a scene in a television show, an experience in school, or a specific day at work, many women can point to a particular moment in which they knew-or realized-they were feminists. Accomplished young authors Courtney E. Martin and J. Courtney Sullivan offer a look at feminism in the lives of young women-and tackle the questions of what made them feminists, how they came to define themselves as feminists, and how that identity has shifted and grown over time. Click features a range of women, including Amy Richards, Shelby Knox, Winter Miller, Allisa Quart, Rebecca Traister, Jennifer Baumgardner, and Debbie Siegel, each sharing their self-defining and personal stories. Sometimes emotional, sometimes humorous, each of these stories offers something to which other women can relate. In a time of feminist reflection, Martin and Sullivan offer a look at feminism for the under-forty set.