Can any of you suggest a textbook? I need a basic primer on the use of a film camera and basic darkroom skills. I could write something myself, but a printed book might be nice as well.
Thanks,
Tommy.
You don't have time for complexity. A lot of great books will hurt more than help. Langford, Adams, etc. may work against you, great though they are.
Choice of textbook isn't just whether the book is "good". You might think of using one that offers students an alternative viewpoint to what YOU can give them. We all have limitations, and students don't all learn the same way.
I used Barbara London (used to be Barbara Upton) and Jim Stone's
A Short Course in Photography in my beginning classes not because it was the "best book" but because it was well organized and presented material in a clear and simplified way where students could easily find what they needed. My lectures and instruction in general tended to give the reasons for everything, and often students had trouble holding it all in their minds. Lots of information. Having a very accessible and relatively easy reference was a great help for them. Without it, some of the students (community college) would have been unable to deal with the brain pain and I would have lost them.
In other words, I used a book that was quite different from myself. Worked great.
The later editions, though, have been getting more and more into digital and some of the clarity I liked is lost. They are attempting to do more than I needed, and I would have preferred to stick with the third edition. I can see (and agree with) their rationale for contexts other than my own, because I think that a lot is lost, especially on the digital side, when both analog and digital aren't presented together. Digital photography, presented alone, produces a lot of really dumb photographers (in my experience).
However, had I had more than the ten week quarter, I would definitely have used Horenstein, and, in fact, recommended his books for more advanced students. His books are really excellent. If you don't use them in the class (and may well not use them for reasons presented above) you might benefit greatly by studying them yourself, to get a handle on his way of presenting and understanding the material. He's wonderful.
I don't want to bore you, but here's something else I think is really important to think about. You've been doing photography, as we all have, and when we enter a teaching context, the hardest thing (besides dealing with a bunch of very different individuals all at once) is to put yourself in their shoes. You and I know a lot and we come from a platform of assumptions that includes our own understanding. The students don't have that platform. Likewise, from my perspective, I don't have their lack of it, so it is difficult for me to understand what they need. Worse, they can't always tell me what they need, because they are likely to think that they don't understand for the wrong reasons. At worst, they can think it is their inadequacy ("I'm just not smart enough for this") rather than mine that produces the confusion, and they won't readily reveal their needs for fear of looking stupid. That's why reading books written for students by very experienced teachers like HH can help greatly.
If my confusion of present / past tense in the above is troubling, understand that I just retired this year, so I'm in a sort of transition.
Larry
