A New History of Photography, with chapters by a variety of scholars, and Rosenblum's A World History of Photography are generously illustrated as well as full of scholarly text.

The aesthetic, technological and social dimensions of 160 years of photography are traced and analyzed in 41 essays by 29 experts, along with a thousand (yes, a thousand) reproduced photographs, in this attractive volume. This New History is the English translation of the French Nouvelle Histoire de la Photographie (1994): it is at once an expansive (and well-indexed) encyclopedia, an anthology of essays, an archive of photographs and an all-round gorgeous production.

The writings are certainly useful and interesting, but the real impact of the book is the sheer abundance and diversity of its over 1000 black-and-white and full-color photographs. An extensive bibliography, notes, and index make this a useful tool for students of history as well as those studying art and photography, but the marvelous reproductions make it a browser's dream.