Last update: 2/1/2026
Do you even have the Nikon-supplied manual? And if you do, have you tried figuring out how to use your camera from it? While Nikon lists most features and gives basic information about them, what’s missing is the why, how, when, and a host of other important bits you probablly want to know. For example, advice on how you might want to configure your camera and why is missing from Nikon’s documentation. Each Complete Guide covers all this. More importantly, the byThom Press books are written by professional photographer Thom Hogan, who actually tests and uses these cameras extensively in his client work before creating each book. Even Nikon has learned a thing or two from his books along the way.
You can use the book file you receive on pretty much any device, though the Complete Guides are highly formatted technical books in PDF format, not novels, so they are best read on tablets and computers, not on the small screens of smartphones. We have customers using the books on iPhones, Android phones, iPads, Android tablets, Microsoft Surface, Kindle, Kobo, Remarkable, Boox, plus both Macintosh and Windows computers. The two types of devices that are least useful for the Complete Guide books are phones, which generally don’t have much screen real estate and tend to make it so you can’t see complete instructions all at once, and Kindle tablets, whose PDF support is weaker than that of the other devices (tip: read the ebook in horizontal mode, where Kindle’s PDF support doesn’t waste margin space). That said, you can read our PDF books on virtually any device you might want to read a book on.
The Concise Instruction book comes in both ePub format as well as PDF, and the ePub file is much easier to read on small screens, such as those on smartphones and tablets.
For the Complete Guides you need a PDF reader app (most devices have one built in). For the Concise Instructions Guide you should also have an ePub reader app (again, many devices have one built in). Free versions exist of both PDF and ePub readers on almost every platform. For Apple products we recommend that you simply and immediately save your purchased book into Apple Books, which will handle either type of file we provide and give you additional tools (you can also use Preview on a Mac). I you downloaded directly into your Apple device, you need to use Share and select Books to do this. On Windows, we suggest Aquile for ePub files and Adobe Acrobat Reader for PDF files (both are free). But, again, most platforms have many free app choices that will work.
The Complete Guides come as PDF files formatted as a standard paperback size. This works perfectly on iPads and other tablets, though Kindle’s PDF support is not as good as iPadOS or Android. It also works well on laptops and desktop computers. This size also prints well on most standard printers. The Concise Instruciton Guide also comes as an ePUB file that works well on smartphones, as well as iPads, Kindles, other tablets, and desktop computers. ePUB doesn’t have a specific size formatting, and adjusts to the device you’re using it on (but it also doesn’t have complex layout and structuring, which is why we don’t use it for Complete Guides). However, we also provide you a PDF version of all our ePub books should you want to print it.
The number of pages runs from 200 to over 500, depending upon the camera. The higher end and more complex the camera, the larger the book tends to run. However, in order to keep download size and speed to mobile-friendly levels, we currently put a total file size cap of about 50MBs on the PDF and ePUB files by using compression on the photo illustrations. That way the files don’t take forever to download or take up too much room on your device, particularly memory-constrained tablets and ereaders. The downside to doing that is that graphics and photos get compressed.
Our simple License Agreement says that you can place copies of the book file you get from us on any of your personal devices. What you can’t do is put your purchased book on someone else’s device or share copies with others. We want you to be able to read your book wherever you need to, whether it be while traveling with your iPad, or at home on your computer while fiddling with your camera.
Basically the same answer: our simple License Agreement says that you may print a copy of the book for your personal use.
That depends on the software you’re using to read the book. But generally with the PDF files, yes. With the free Preview app that comes with a Mac, for instance, you can keep a live Table of Contents open at the side as you read, use highlighters, put boxes or borders around things, draw on the document, and yes, take notes. Unfortunately, if we update the book, your notes won’t follow to the updated file you get; annotations you make are specific to the document you make them in.
This is a tricky question. With older, discontinued cameras such as the Nikon film SLRs we no longer tend to update those books (though many have been updated multiple times already). We’ve also not priced these books for free updates (update downloads cost us money for additional bandwidth). Should we update a book, we’ll offer a lower cost update option for owners of the previous version.
Nikon has this habit of making similarly-named models with a striking number of small, and often important differences. Rather than create (even bigger) books with lots of footnotes, caveats, and tables calling out all these differences, Thom believes it's better to be clear and precise and not include extra things that might confuse you.
In the 25+ years we’ve been doing this, only twice has someone asked us to do that after reading a portion of the book (in both cases because the book “was way more information than they wanted” ;~). Our official policy is that with downloadable electronic goods such as these books we do not offer refunds. But if you have a gripe, let us know and we’ll see if we can deal with that in a fashion that will make you happy.
No. We do not have the resources to create, manage, and maintain versions in multiple languages.
No, you cannot. Because these are downloads, they are not subject to the legal premise called First Sale. In order to protect our Copyright when using electronic transfer, the person who obtains our work must first agree to our License Agreement. Pass-along sales or gifts of the work to others would violate the License Agreement. Indeed, the person who obtained the book from you via pass-along wouldn’t have agreed to the License Agreement. Please respect our rights. We’re not trying to pull a fast one here, but we are trying to protect ourselves (and you, too) from legal hassles down the road should someone obtain the book electronically and try sharing it in any way.