Teaching an abstraction is a truly challenging task; it is all too easy to miss the forest for the trees. To avoid this, and, furthermore, teach others to appreciate the forest when perceiving the trees, is certainly all the more challenging.

Written to achieve just such a goal, this book attempts to teach the serious reader the ins and outs of artistic creation using tools offered by contemporary technology. The author, rightly, observes that a great many resources that exist to teach the use of artistic software and other tools give a mechanistic, uninspiring description of the functionality at the user’s command, while saying little of note about how to use it to good effect. Therefore, in this instance, the reader is given a book that does not belabor the nuts-and-bolts issues of software. Instead, it offers a broad description of the types of tools and their functionalities from a historical and contemporary perspective, while maintaining a focus on the intuitive and abstract aspects of the theory and appreciation of art.

The first chapter addresses the history of art and digital media, starting from the abacus and cave paintings, and continuing on to the present day. The second chapter presents a basic outline of contemporary computer technology as it is applicable to art, while the third chapter attempts to teach creativity, or, at least, the methods and practices most likely to foster it. Later chapters address the specifics of certain types of digital art and media, including Web design, audio and video, photography, and animation. The twelfth and final chapter gives the budding artist some advice about advancement in the profession, including how to create a resume and portfolio, how to exhibit creative work, tips on employment and maintaining good health, and the like.

Though the book is, for the most part, built on Wands’ own career experience and understanding of art and technology, a useful feature of the text is the addition of the edited transcripts of interviews with several artists working with various media, whose works the author recommends as case studies. This insight into the thinking of various successful professionals is likely to be of more use to a serious student of the arts than a lecturing on facts and theories.

Wands should be commended for his brevity; it is not hard to conceive that a work of similar range would be twice its length. Though something could be said for a more in-depth and detailed approach that would be offered in such a case, not overloading a reader, especially a beginner to the arts, and giving a broad outline and tips for further learning, is not without merit.