Rating: 
Summary: The Painter 6 WOW! Book (with CD-ROM)
Review: Disclosure: At the author's request, I submitted for the book, gratis, several illustrations I had done for clients, and as part of those contributions, I described how I created them with Painter 6. I have no financial association with the book. I am unquestionably a Painter advocate; it is the workhorse of my medical illustration business. In my estimation, this application is peerless in the area of computer 2D graphics applications that simulate natural artistic media -- whether used for commercial art or for fine art. REVIEW: The Painter 6 WOW! Book has taught me how to make use of many of Painter's features that I hadn't yet explored -- and I've been using it since 1994! As was once aptly stated in a MacWorld review, Painter doesn't have a steep learning curve; it has a steep experiential curve. It has SO MANY artistic effects waiting to be experienced by the user who takes the time to delve its depths. There are certain of its features and capabilities that I've made use of, but was unaware of how to use those features even more fully. Cher Threinen-Pendarvis' inspiring, informative and well designed book has helped me to maximize my use of Painter, and has greatly helped to extend my knowledge of what it is capable of doing. It is a digital artist's dream come true. My opinion.
Rating: 
Summary: Frustrated to insanity
Review: I am a traditional artist, accomplished in the fields of acrylics, crayons and pencil work in particular. I have long been drooling over what can be accomplished with Photoshop and Painter and their likes, in terms of building artwork and illustrations from scratch. However making the jump to computer graphics has proved to be quite difficult or complex at best. I have purchased nummerous books on those programs but they have all been 99% about image editing and touching up or making graphics for the web. Not exactly what I needed.Till now! This volume has with one fell swoop fulfilled all of my above wishes. In here I have found detailed explanations of every technique imaginable from gouache to coloured pencils. It is wonderful! The explanations and learning aside, the book is also chokefull of inspirational work from master painters and illustrators. And this is not all. All the primary focus of the book is on illustration and painting, the book also covers the programs abilities in touching up photos and creating web graphics. I am very impressed, and consoled that I will soon enough be able to master computer graphics as yet another artistic outlet thanks to this volume. I believe it offers just as much for both beginners, intermediaries and advanced artist. If you have any of the same aspirations as I did, don't hesitate to buy this book. Not only is it one of the few books that can teach you what you need to know, but it is also excellent value for money, as the pages are jammed full of tips, instructions and vivid colour images. Wow! indeed.
Rating: 
Summary: Nice book, to many repeats
Review: I have all but one of this series. This book is very well designed and filled to the brim with inspiration. The illustrations and samples of work are unsurpased in regards to what the Painter program can do. The author has accomplished a thorough and complete coverage within the wide range of practical and abstracted work that can be accomplished with Painter. The book is filled with tutorials, all the way through. This is no other book available anywhere that offers what this book gives to the reader. It is excellent in scope and detail. You will learn a lot from this book and it will always be a resource tool, that you will want to keep close at hand. I do have some gripes, and here they are. I was 'very' disappointed to see that a large majority of the "articles" and "images" are reproduced from previous versions. Not that this in and of itself is a bad thing. It's just that there is so much material "repeated" from the other versions, I couldn't help but feel a little "cheated"! There are twenty seven (27) repeated articles from the other versions, repeated exactly!!. Many of these repeats are two or three page articles. There are also many repeated images throughout the book. There are forty (40) repeated images just from the Painter 4 version. The one book I do not have in the series is version five. I did not buy it because of the repeating of so much material from earlier versions. The level of quality in all of these books is excellent. I am just disappointed with so much repeated material. With that said and done, I still contend that for the first time buyer or repeat buyer there is no better book for Painter than this one, in regards to inspiration and tutorial techniques.
Rating:
Summary: Brush up on your Painter skills
Review: I've had every version of Painter software since it began as a grey-scale sketcher program. Since then, I've learned basic skills in Painter, but even with long experience, I found I needed a text for learning how to get the most out of this powerful but sometimes difficult software. The book is complete in that it contains Basic instruction, tricks, and techniques --for example, how to paint in watercolors and oils. If you've used the software at all, you probably know how to do this. But looking at the fine examples of artwork in the book can help to suggest how to get more from the basics. Where The Painter 6 Wow book really shines is in learning the more difficult techniques such as working with layers and shapes (drop shadows, dynamic text, melting text into water, photo enhancement and especially now to do montage/collage and terrain maps.) There are some nice examples of art work using these techniques. Painter 6 software added some features for working on web images and animations--these are also covered and for me, were the reason I really wanted this book. It's nice to have the CD-ROM with extra textures, and other goodies. There are some trial software programs like Photoshop demo, a collection of stock photos, some "fabulous fonts", some backgrounds and video clips. WELL WORTH THE PRICE.
Rating:
Summary: Brush up on your Painter skills
Review: I've had every version of Painter software since it began as a grey-scale sketcher program. Since then, I've learned basic skills in Painter, but even with long experience, I found I needed a text for learning how to get the most out of this powerful but sometimes difficult software. The book is complete in that it contains Basic instruction, tricks, and techniques --for example, how to paint in watercolors and oils. If you've used the software at all, you probably know how to do this. But looking at the fine examples of artwork in the book can help to suggest how to get more from the basics. Where The Painter 6 Wow book really shines is in learning the more difficult techniques such as working with layers and shapes (drop shadows, dynamic text, melting text into water, photo enhancement and especially now to do montage/collage and terrain maps.) There are some nice examples of art work using these techniques. Painter 6 software added some features for working on web images and animations--these are also covered and for me, were the reason I really wanted this book. It's nice to have the CD-ROM with extra textures, and other goodies. There are some trial software programs like Photoshop demo, a collection of stock photos, some "fabulous fonts", some backgrounds and video clips. WELL WORTH THE PRICE.
Rating:
Summary: An Art Atelier: Mode d'emploi
Review: Let's face it: Painter is everything but an easy-to use application. This probably most beautiful graphic program even is known to make new user try-and-abandon it. This results, though, from misunderstanding Painter as an image processing app, while Painter is what it is: A 'Natural Media Painting' tool, a well-equipped art studio, with every tool you'd even dream of directly at your fingertips. Considering the above and the fact that the original Painter manual explains most of the technical aspects almost perfectly, there'd be a question: What such a 'Painter Wow!' book could be about? Well, Cher's book is about techniques, too. But, first of all, it's about the art. There were many Painter artist involved, giving detailed, step-by-step instructions and tutorials, revelating their secrets to you. This is a book from an artist for the artists. The computer-technical aspect is reduced to the minimum; instead, the esthetic aspects are pushed. This statemend will be accented by the precious book layout: there is no one noting-saying place in the whole book, even the bage backgrounds try to tell you something - without overload. Of course, you can go and follow the tutorials, working them through step-by-step. But you can just read in the book as well, and let youself inspire by the variability of artowrk, of problems and solutions. Just go on and look how the other people are "doing this". I have been using Painter since version 1.6, but The Painter Wow! Book made me upgrade from Painter 5 to 6 and go and try what I missed as far :-) If you like Painter, you will also like Cher's book.
Rating:
Summary: An incredible wealth of information
Review: The Painter 6 Wow book is incredible in its' depth in detail of the features, tips and hidden gems of Painter. The first thing to do is flip through the book a few times to build up the anticipation of working through it, and then start to read it from cover to cover. The tutorials are practical and are also non restricting in that you are not learning projects but techniques that you can expand upon. There are new things to learn on every page, and you will find yourself saying, "Ah, so that is how to do that", over and over again. This book makes learning the software a fun and wonderful adventure. Also, the book is expanded from the previous edition with 80 full pages, and ALL of the information is updated for Painter 6. This book is a MUST have.
Rating:
Summary: Think out of the box
Review: The Painter 6 Wow! Book is a must have for 2 reasons: It will explain the application in simple steps, and it will inspire you with it's examples of how others use Painter. The value in a book like this is seeing Painter applied in real world situations. These examples caused me to go back and learn sections of the program that I'd never used before. I highly recommend the book, the author is an excellent writer and teacher.
Rating:
Summary: Painter 6 Wow for beginner to advanced
Review: This book is one that I will continue to use for a very long time. It is suitable for beginners who have some computer graphics knowledge to advanced users. I am a beginner with Painter 6 but not to other graphics programs. I have found Painter 6 a bit intimidating. For the last 2 months Painter 6.03 has been loaded on my computer, but each attempt to use it has left me frustrated. The art that was in my head, was not being translated into the picture that I was making on my computer. So I was looking for a book to guide me. Painter 6 Wow was exactly what I needed. This book is lavishly illustrated. There are color illustrations on every page. I enjoyed looking at those illustrations for inspiration and then using the the same step by step techniques that the artists used to complete my own digital art. I was easily able to complete several beautiful digital paintings using the information that I found in the book. I also enjoyed reading about the various aspects of the program. The debth and power of this program is amazing. As I continue to use Painter 6 Wow, I am growing more confident with the program, Painter 6. I am not out growing Painter 6 Wow. There is enough material in the book to keep me inspired through countless art projects.
Rating:
Summary: Good Book
Review: This is a very good book. Amazing and clean explanations. All is great, but... where?s the trial of Painter 6?. There?s trial for Photoshop 5.0, Fireworks, Dreamweaver, etc, but... NOT PAINTER 6!!! How can happen this?!
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