Jump to content

​​​​​​​how reliable is osprey publishing in its books about singular AFVs? 


punkinguy

Recommended Posts

i found a bunch of PDFs of their works on tanks, particularly the New Vanguard series of books, when i shared some photos of the book and mentioned that it was from osprey some people told me that it was unreputable and has errors in its books, and when i asked for examples they told me to google it and all i found on google was mentions of historical inaccuracies in extremely particular battles in historical ww2-medival books. but i have not found any mention of inaccuracies such claims directed towards osprey's historical books, that i have claims found about its books which focus only on a particular tank or armored vehicle in, for example, New Vanguard series of books.
I'm pretty new to AFVs having only gotten into them a year ago and now i figured that reading books and whatnot would prove better than youtube marathons scrounging for anything new about certain tanks, and my autism still hasn't reached the level of reading extremely low information-density manuals of tanks.
 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Depends on the author. Some of them are bloody awful. If you find one  with an author whom has a decent reputation, such as Steve Zaloga or Simon Dunstan, you can be assured its pretty reliable. In Zaloga's case, some of his Osprey works, such as on the BMP, have been expanded and made it into longer works.

Doesnt mean they arent opinionated of course, but if you have a dozen best selling books under your belt, maybe they have a right to be. :D

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

14 hours ago, punkinguy said:

i found a bunch of PDFs of their works on tanks, particularly the New Vanguard series of books, when i shared some photos of the book and mentioned that it was from osprey some people told me that it was unreputable and has errors in its books, 

Show me a book that hasn't any errors in it.

As a primer into the field of AFVs you could do much worse. Clearly they are limited in their depth but they are a better start than, say, opinionated Youtube rants (that's not to say that all Youtube videos are worthless).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Every book will have errors. Only question is "is it something really fundamental?"

They are OK "picture book" level entry into the field for a lot of topics, but nothing more. They still can have some valuable pictures here and there, even if incorrectly labeled. Most of the fun of the hobby, at least for me is actually finding better sources, including archival ones.

 

Edited by bojan
Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

Depends on the author. Some of them are bloody awful. If you find one  with an author whom has a decent reputation, such as Steve Zaloga or Simon Dunstan, you can be assured its pretty reliable. In Zaloga's case, some of his Osprey works, such as on the BMP, have been expanded and made it into longer works.

Doesnt mean they arent opinionated of course, but if you have a dozen best selling books under your belt, maybe they have a right to be. :D

 

Or a certain Kenneth Estes that drops by this grate sight. They also cover some niche vehicles that wouldn't make the big book leagues, like the Ontos.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is some value in learning the current and history of the living understanding of a particular tank as well. Learning it comes by only going through various sources and kinds of medium. Errors are seemingly a naturally occuring phenomenon and so knowing the erros in typical areas adds to one's understanding as well. And the inverse, certain expressed facts not changing regardless of source or medium lends itself to reinforcing confidence in those facts as really being correct.

Just get used to bringing the pinch of salt with you and get used to trigger hot heads that jump down people's throat on every imperfection you may risk illuminating by engaging on an interactive medium.

Edited by futon
Link to comment
Share on other sites

22 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

Or a certain Kenneth Estes that drops by this grate sight. They also cover some niche vehicles that wouldn't make the big book leagues, like the Ontos.

Yep, I wouldnt knock anything he wrote, whatever the format.

On 1/10/2022 at 12:02 PM, bojan said:

Every book will have errors. Only question is "is it something really fundamental?"

They are OK "picture book" level entry into the field for a lot of topics, but nothing more. They still can have some valuable pictures here and there, even if incorrectly labeled. Most of the fun of the hobby, at least for me is actually finding better sources, including archival ones.

 

Im not so sure. There are some books, such as Dunstans book on Challenger 2, with information in it that has never been in print anywhere else.Its been ridiculed simply because of the format, overlooking that the Author wrote well accepted, longer works elsewhere. Which is unfair in that context, simply because nobody has written a Jentz equivalent on Challenger 2. His books on Centurion were exchanging for silly money on Amazon, for exactly the same reason.

Some of the 'vs' series are really quite good. I think there is informaton in the Flak Vs Heavy Bomber books you simply wont find elsewhere in a single tome. Ive bought damn near every book written on flak, and its the only one ive found thus far that shows how they laid flak units out on the ground. OTOH, I can point to the 'ME110 vs Lancaster' book to show quite how biased some of them are.

I guess the point im trying to make it, it really depends on the book and the author. Some are an excellent addition to the shelf, some I felt I wasted money on.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

I find the Osprey book useful, but as said previously, it really depends on the author.  The nice thing about the New Vanguard series is that it's been going on so long, they have done most of the obvious topics and have gotten further into more obscure vehicles and topics over time.  For me, I find the Duel series books useful, but quality varies.  THe ones by Zaloga are usually good.  In particular, the ones on 1940 French tanks vs Panzers are interesting, since that topic gets little attention in English language stuff.  

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The ones   done on Air Defence have been particularly interesting, not least this one.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/German-Defences-Allied-Heavy-Bombers/dp/1472836715/ref=sr_1_5?crid=8F63YUHWED5K&keywords=german+air+defence&qid=1648818076&sprefix=german+air+defence%2Caps%2C117&sr=8-5

Ive bought books twice as expensive as that, with nothing like the detail on how the defences were set up tactically.

I guess thats the value of the better parts of the Osprey series, the relatively small size allows them to touch on subjects nobody else will touch with a bargepole.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/10/2022 at 3:47 AM, Stuart Galbraith said:

Depends on the author. Some of them are bloody awful. If you find one  with an author whom has a decent reputation, such as Steve Zaloga or Simon Dunstan, you can be assured its pretty reliable. In Zaloga's case, some of his Osprey works, such as on the BMP, have been expanded and made it into longer works.

Doesnt mean they arent opinionated of course, but if you have a dozen best selling books under your belt, maybe they have a right to be. :D

 

There’s an expanded book on the BMP by Zaloga? Where at?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...