Quick Take
- Narration: John-Roger Parkes brings professional delivery to the material, though a 2.6-star rating from actual users suggests the content does not live up to its advanced positioning.
- Themes: Advanced DSLR technique, flash photography mastery, travel and documentary shooting
- Mood: Instructional with a gap between the confident framing and the content depth
- Verdict: The low rating tells a more honest story than the synopsis; intermediate photographers seeking genuine advancement should look to more specialized resources.
I have some sympathy for what DSLR Photography Advanced is trying to do. The intermediate photographer is genuinely underserved by photography books, which tend to cluster at the beginner end, where the exposure triangle can be explained again for the thousandth time, and the specialist end, where you are reading lighting theory written by people who have spent thirty years doing nothing else. The gap in between is real, and Leonard Piquar is reaching for it.
The problem, which the book’s 2.6-star rating from ten reviewers makes fairly direct, is that the content does not fully earn its advanced positioning. Intermediate and professional photographers who come to this expecting genuine advancement of their craft, the kind of material that requires you to already know the basics in order to understand it, may find the book operating at a level below that promise.
What Advanced Looks Like on Paper
The table of contents covers camera history and evolution, maintenance and safety, flash photography, travel and documentary work, and DSLR setup guidance. Some of those topics, flash photography and documentary shooting in particular, have genuine claim to intermediate-level territory. Flash photography is technically complex and psychologically intimidating for photographers who have relied on natural light, and the strategies for reading and adapting to variable conditions in documentary work are legitimately advanced concerns.
But the inclusion of ten maintenance tips and five safety tips in a book billing itself as advanced is a symptom of the gap between the marketing framing and the actual content level. Maintenance and safety are beginner concerns. Their presence here suggests the book may be packaging intermediate-adjacent content in advanced packaging rather than genuinely advancing a practitioner who has already internalized the basics.
John-Roger Parkes and What a Good Narrator Can and Cannot Do
John-Roger Parkes is a professional audiobook narrator, which gives this title an advantage over the Virtual Voice productions that populate much of the photography how-to category. Parkes reads with appropriate authority and clear enunciation, and his pacing for technical content is measured in ways that make the material easier to absorb on a first listen. For the sections where the content holds up, flash photography being the most likely candidate based on the synopsis, his narration adds real value to the learning experience.
What a narrator cannot do is fix underlying content issues. If the advanced technique guidance does not go deep enough for the audience it claims to address, professional delivery will make that clearer rather than obscure it, because the listener will hear the gap between the authoritative performance and the relatively basic information being delivered. The rating suggests that is what is happening here.
Camera History as Contextual Detour
The inclusion of camera history and evolution in an advanced technique guide is an interesting choice. History of photography content, covering how the digital camera developed from its film predecessors and how sensor technology has evolved, is genuinely interesting and relevant to understanding why certain technical characteristics of DSLR cameras behave as they do. But it is contextual knowledge rather than advanced technique, and its placement in a book positioned for intermediate-to-professional photographers suggests a content strategy that is uncertain about its own audience.
The step-by-step instructions to help you set up your DSLR camera described in the table of contents raises similar questions. Camera setup guidance for intermediate photographers should be about configuring custom functions, setting up back-button focusing, and establishing a consistent raw workflow. If the setup guidance in the book is more basic than that, the intermediate audience will feel short-changed.
Who Should Listen and Who Should Not
Upper-beginner photographers who have moved past Auto mode and want structured guidance on flash photography and travel shooting may find more value here than the rating suggests, particularly with Parkes’s clear narration. Intermediate photographers with a solid technical foundation who are looking for genuine advancement of their craft should seek out more specialized resources, such as dedicated work on off-camera flash or documentary photography. Professional photographers will find nothing here. The 2.6-star rating from ten reviewers is a small sample but a clear signal: the book has not found a satisfied audience among those who came to it with advanced expectations.
Frequently Asked Questions
What specifically do reviewers find lacking about this book given its low rating?
The available data shows a 2.6-star average from ten reviewers but does not include the text of negative reviews. The most likely explanation is that intermediate and advanced photographers found the content too basic for the advanced billing, while beginners found it insufficiently structured compared to dedicated beginner resources.
Does John-Roger Parkes’s narration redeem the book for listeners who are primarily interested in audio quality?
Parkes is a competent professional narrator, and his delivery is cleaner than the Virtual Voice alternatives in the same photography category. For listeners who can get value from the content at a conceptual level, the narration adds to the experience. The narration alone cannot compensate for content that does not match listener expectations.
Is the travel and documentary photography section likely to be the most useful for intermediate photographers?
Based on the synopsis, travel and documentary shooting is one of the topics with the most legitimate claim to intermediate-level territory, since adapting technique to variable conditions in the field is a genuine skill gap beyond basic studio or controlled-environment shooting. Whether the book’s treatment goes deep enough is uncertain given the overall rating.
How does this book compare to Dwayne Brown’s DSLR Photography Made Easy for someone who has completed that beginner guide?
Brown’s beginner guide has a strong rating and clearly serves its intended audience well. Whether Piquar’s book is the right next step is debatable given the rating gap. An intermediate photographer who has outgrown Brown’s content might be better served by genre-specific or technique-specific resources rather than a generalist intermediate guide.
