Petersen’s PHOTOgraphic Digital Photo Guide, available only on newsstands, is a beautifully designed quarterly with 48 pages of up-to-date tutorials, uninterrupted by advertising from cover to cover.

What makes this publication unique is that each issue is devoted to a single topic, enabling you to make the most of your digital camera and shoot like a pro.

You can’t fully understand the fundamentals of photography until you know what lenses enable you to do. All the cool bells and whistles that camera bodies offer are certainly important (such as a large LCD monitor, spot metering, ultra fast shutter speeds, and more), but the tools that allow you to capture the images that you see in your mind are the lenses.

The truth is, though, lenses don’t capture what you see. They come close, but it’s not the same as how our eye/brain combination perceives the world. For example, we have peripheral vision and lenses don’t. We look at an object or a scene over time—several seconds, for example—while a photograph is taken in a brief instant. The difference is that our eyes can focus on various elements in the scene over those few moments, from the foreground to the background, but when a picture is taken the lens has to be focused on one point and one point only. That means we always have complete depth of field when we look at a scene, but we photographers have to constantly manipulate the capability of a lens when taking pictures to get an entire composition as sharp as we see it.

Volume 5 - Choosing & Using Lenses
Choosing & Using Lenses Buying A Lens After you buy a good camera that allows you to change lenses, it will become obvious to you that it is not the camera that enables you to be creative in photography. It is the lenses. 1.12.10 | Jim Zuckerman
Choosing & Using Lenses Telephoto Lenses Photographers love telephoto lenses. We can't always get close to the subjects we want to shoot, and a telephoto lens allows us to fill a significant part of the frame with them. 1.12.10 | Jim Zuckerman
Volume 4 - People Photography
People Photography Photographing Children Photographing children is a joy because of their innocence, the honesty in their faces, and their beauty. 10.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
People Photography Photographing Families Taking pictures of a family and doing it well is challenging. There are many things you have to think about to please both you and the people you are shooting. 10.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
People Photography Window Light When I refer to window light, I am talking about the soft lighting that comes in through a window when it faces north or when the sky is overcast. 10.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Volume 3 - Landscape Photography
Landscape Photography Get Close Minute details in nature are captivating. Rock textures, flowers, lichen, seashells, fungi, and leaf patterns make incredible pictures that reveal a world seldom noticed by people. 7.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Landscape Photography Black And White While fine black and white landscape photography is quite possible with digital technology, just like with shooting film it takes significant manipulation of the original image to make a good black and white print or digital file. 7.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Landscape Photography Silhouettes One of the most effective ways of dramatizing a landscape or a wildlife subject is to capture its silhouette. The combination of a strong form with a beautiful background is unbeatable. 7.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Volume 2 - Mastering Composition
Mastering Composition Unique Perspectives Compelling compositions can come in many forms, and they can also come from unique points of view. 4.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Mastering Composition Leading Lines One of the things that makes a photograph successful is that attention is directed to the subject. This can be done with good lighting, muted backgrounds, or graphic design. 4.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Mastering Composition Moving Into The Frame One of the traditional compositional guidelines that many artists and photographers adhere to is that a subject's movement should go toward the center of the frame. 4.14.09 | Jim Zuckerman
Volume 1 - Exposure Techniques
Exposure Techniques Using Handheld Meters In The Digital Age A typical handheld exposure meter actually provides you with two ways to meter. 12.15.08 | Jack Neubart
Exposure Techniques Exposure Basics II Now we come to how exposure and creative photography go hand in hand. 12.15.08 | George Schaub
Exposure Techniques Exposure Diagnostics One way to help avoid overexposure is to use the Highlight Warning feature in the Playback menu of your camera. 12.15.08 | George Schaub