Although a large number of books are categorized as surgical atlases, which are essentially the surgeon’s lifeline, there are surprisingly few atlases avail- able that truly meet the needs of the clinical surgeon. If surgical illustrations are simplified too much, they can become less realistic and not relatable to actual surgery; if the illustrations are too realistic, they can become more like plain intraoperative photographs that don’t clearly show what is important and what is not. In the past, illustrations were often considered supplemen- tary to the explanatory text, but today where images are often more popular than text, it is expected that almost everything will be explained using illus- trations. Achieving the right balance to do this is not as simple as it may first appear though.