Visual Communication: Images with Messages

Came across a reference to the book, Visual Communication: Images with Messages by Paul Martin Lester. Looks pretty good, but at over $100 for a new edition, I won't be ordering that very soon. However, I also came across Lester's course notes. He's a professor in the Department of Communication at Cal State Fullerton. He's got 18 separate sections of topics you can click on, each with dozens of slides, some with well over a hundred. Topics range from how we sense and see, light, the eye, visual theories, visual persuasion, typography, graphic design, information graphics and many more. I haven't had a chance to get through them all yet and most of them obviously need additional explanation as they are essential PowerPoint presentations, but there's still some good information in there and sources for further surfing, particularly for a noob like myself. I particularly liked seeing references to the history of graphic design and information graphics in each of those sections.