In a continuous quest to imrpove my photography I often pick up new books, both traditional like Understanding Exposure by Bryan Peterson and more recently ebooks.

You can certainly find all the information that is available in these books on the internet for free, however it is rarely gathered into one place with a consistent writing style and consistent photography style that helps rather than hinders the message.

Recently in my G+ stream I came across a post by +David duChemin spruking  his two ebooks Ten Plus. Ten More. The link lead me off to his blog Pixelated Image. The books looked interesting and of course there were positive comments on the blog and on the sale site Craft & Vision. I always take these comments with a pinch of salt - you wouldn't publish bad comments would you?

I searched and couldn't find much of interest in the way of reviews but since the investment was so small I went ahead and bought them anyway. I was able to immediately download my PDF copies. The first thing I noticed is that they're not protected so the author and seller are relying on good faith and cheap prices to keep them in business.

Each of the books is filled with great colour and monochrome images that well illustrate each of the points David is trying to get across to the reader. As you would expect from the name each of the books has ten fundamental points to get you thinking. There is one point to a page and each has a lightly worded explanation, an accompanying image and en exercise giving you ideas to test out the point to find how its meaning applies to you personaly.

Having been creating images for about 30 years with more recent emphasis on seriousness many of the points were not new to me. However, the style of writing and the exercise helped me to rethink my own approach to some of these basic ideas. Will this improve my photography? Probably it will, as long as I actually do the exercises!

The language used is light and approachable - it feels like a friend is pointing out some ideas rather than an experienced photo-snob talking down to the unenlightened. This is always tough to pull off and I imagine the writing style in the ebook has evolved from that which David has found works well on his blog.

David encourages us to forget the rules, forget the how to guides, forget the detailed instructions and get our their with a small amount of gear and actually learn. One example in Ten Plus tells us to take the lens we use the least and go out only with that one and play to learn. Good advice.

I won't go into what the ten and ten more points are because I don't want to rob David of his income but be assured they are useful from beginner up through seasoned practicioner. You will get most if you have a camera which allows a good degree of control over speed, arpeture and shutter speeds. You will still get something out of it on composition even with a fully automatic point and shoot.

My youngest son also enjoys photography and I'm always seeking ways to share my passion with him. The exercises help with that because we can do them together. Each taking our own approach and then comparing our results afterwards.

In conclusion, the purchase of the two ebooks for only US$7 is well worth it. The lack of protection allowing me to print the books which lets me read them in bed or when occupied doing other human things (use your imagination - would you take a computer in there to read an ebook?) made the purchase valuable to me.