Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Primer for a Dedicated Beginner
Review: Starting from scratch, this book + CD had me using Photoshop CS quite effectively within several days.
Several days, mind you, of very hard, concentrated study. But that is required of you whatever path you follow into the useful but complex maze that is Adobe Photoshop.
There are no typos I found, the examples work perfectly and match the text exactly. The flow of chapters is logical and effectively teach you what's available and how to get at it.
If you're prepared to work hard, this book will be something you enjoy and appreciate.
Rating:
Summary: Photoshop CS is powerful
Review: This book is great if you want a no nonsense approach to Photoshop CS. If you are a beginner, then this book is for you. For those of you that have been with Photoshop since 5.0, you might be a little disappointed. Either way this is a great refresher and reference to any who wants to know how powerful Photoshop can be.
Carl
Software Trainer
www.johnsontraining.net
Rating:
Summary: Great Book - Even greater videos
Review: This is a very good book for the beginner. The videos are from the same company that produces the videos that comes with Photoshop CS except they are very in-depth. I do photography and web development and this book does a good job of covering the basics.
Rating:
Summary: An excellent guide for Photoshop CS
Review: This is the best book for learning Photoshop CS I have seen. The book and accompaning CD show you how to use the powerful tools in photoshop in a clear and easy to understand way. It doesn't matter if your just wanting to touch up a picture or layer several pictures together, the techniques given in the book are easy to understand and fun to do.
Rating:
Summary: Stunningly beautiful and useful book...
Review: To say I am "graphically challenged" would be an understatement. For whatever reason, I just have a hard time envisioning what I can do with images and colors. To help solve that issue, I got a copy of Adobe Photoshop CS one-on-one by Deke McClelland. In short, this book is packed.The book is organized into the following 12 lessons: Open and Organize; Highlights, Midtones, and Shadows; Correcting Color Balance; Making Selections; Crop, Straighten, and Size; Paint, Edit, and Heal; Creating and Applying Masks; Adjusting Focus; Building Layered Compositions; Text and Shapes; Layer Styles and Adjustments; and Printing and Output. Each lesson starts out with an "About This Lesson" page, which gives you an idea of what you're going to cover. It ends with a "What Did You Learn?" exercise where you match the concept with the description. And in between is the excellent material on how to do what it is that's being covered. Interspersed throughout the text are "Pearls Of Wisdom" which are short 5 to 10 line sidebars that explain a concept or a slant on the material that you may not have realized. And McClelland doesn't just explain how to do things, either. He goes into the concepts behind how graphics and color work, such as how to read a histogram or the difference between 8 vs. 16 bits per channel. So when you get done with the book, you should have a greater understanding and appreciation for the art of graphical manipulation. But you're not done yet. The book comes with a CD that includes video lessons that follow along with the book, as well as the files you'll need to do the exercises. Unlike most CDs that are included in a book, this is one that actually enhances the value of the material instead of just allowing the publisher or author to charge more for stuff you may never look at. On the aesthetic side of things, the book is really stunning. High-quality paper and beautiful colors on the examples. The only flaw I can mention is that my copy must have gotten a bad batch of paper at the printers. A small number of pages are flawed (ingrained folds) and a couple of the graphic screen shots are blurred to the point of not being able to read the text. Even with that, there is nothing that takes away from the usefulness and quality of this effort. If you use Photoshop and want to learn how to utilize it to the fullest, you owe it to yourself to check out this book.
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