The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers
Category: Books,Arts & Photography,Photography & Video
The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers Details
Amazon.com Review Some people make their living with a camera, and for these people the maturation of digital photo technology means a significant shift in their trade. The Photoshop Book for Digital Photographers is for people who are already adept with a camera, and pretty much up to speed on the peculiarities of digital photography, too. The book teaches these people how to use Adobe Photoshop, the standard photo-editing software package. More accurately, the book explains how to use Photoshop for the kinds of work professional photographers do. Case in point: The removal from photographs of what are politely called skin blemishes. Author Scott Kelby (the editor of Photoshop User offers two strategies: One you can use to remove all traces of a mark but which requires a fair amount of time, and another procedure that delivers "pretty good" results and which can be done on many pictures (such as a set of class portraits) rapidly. Kelby teaches by means of heavily illustrated procedures, each between five and 20 steps long and spanning several pages. A good way to use this book is by scanning the table of contents for a procedure that interests you (say, "Fixing Underexposed Photos," or "Pro Wrinkle Removal"). This will enable you to spot Photoshop techniques you hadn't considered. --David Wall Topics covered: How to use Adobe Photoshop if, for you, the program is one tool out of many in a photographic kit. Tricks teach you how to recolor hair, whiten teeth and eyes, modify unflattering body contours, dodge and burn, apply filters for effect, assemble panoramas, and do a score of other slick photo jobs. Read more From the Back Cover Finally, a Photoshop book that is written expressly for professional photographers and hi-end serious amateurs that doesn't talk about F-stops, exposures, and how to frame a shot (you know all that stuff already--if you don't¿I hate to say it, but this isn't for you). This new book, from Photoshop User magazine editor and bestselling author Scott Kelby, starts at the moment your digital camera photos come into Photoshop, and he shows you the Photoshop pros techniques for managing, correcting, retouching and outputting your photos to knock your client's socks off, and turn you into a Photoshop production wizard. This book is absolutely ideal for traditional photographers who are making the jump to digital photography, and Scott's casual, step-by-step, plain-English style makes even the most complex Photoshop techniques seem so easy and accessible. It's the type of book that makes you smile and think "Ahhhh, so that's how they do it" and then immediately you realize "Hey, I can do this!" The entire book is graphically rich, in full color cover-to-cover, and best of all it's packed with real-world project-based tutorials that will take you through the process of sizing your images with the proper resolution (and the secret to doing so without losing image quality), how to deal with High ISO noise, blue channel noise, and other common plagues introduced by digital cameras; you'll learn how the pros color correct their photos for output on everything from inkjet printers to printing presses, and the secrets to getting perfect fleshtones no matter where it¿s output. You'll learn the sharpening techniques today's top digital photographers use, and how the leading retoucher's perform "digital plastic surgery" in Photoshop, plus professional facial retouching techniques using Photoshop 7.0's amazing new tools. Plus, you'll also learn how to manage your photos, "digital dodging and burning" tricks, dealing with common problems, making client presentations within Photoshop and on the Web, and the inside tips on how to work faster and more efficiently than you ever thought possible. If you're serious about digital photography and Photoshop, this is book you've been waiting for. Read more See all Editorial Reviews
Reviews
Scott Kelby's book is a recipe book for certain discrete problems that the Photoshop user may encounter, as well as some little known information about some aspects of Photoshop that you might not otherwise learn. If you find a recipe that fills a need that you have, the book will be a good investment. But if you are looking for an overall approach to using Photoshop this is not the book for you.Right from the first chapter, with his discussion of ways to use the Photoshop browser, you make pick up another way of dealing with a Photoshop function that you didn't know about. On the other hand, some of the material will be old hat to an experienced Photoshop user.Some of the techniques, like color correction of digital images, will appeal to almost any Photoshop user. Those who have philosophical questions about what I call montage may not be interested in chapters on removing the wrinkles in an elderly person's portrait or removing the love handles from a slightly overgrown physique. On the other hand, these certainly are bread and butter issues to some photographers.Kelby's method of holding your attention is by making a number of breezy wise cracks as you go through the book. For example he says in the chapter on masking techniques "If I were elected President, one of my first priorities would be to sign an executive order requiring all registered voters to carry with them a white seamless role at all times" He then goes on to speculate how easy this would make Photoshop selection. That stylistic gadget may make you laugh the first time you encounter it, but after the 50th encounter you want to tell the author to take a break.The title of this book might lead you to believe that this book would start at the beginning of the photographic process, when an image is being captured in a digital camera. If the book didn't intend to cover this, why say it's for "digital photographers"? After all, every picture manipulated in Photoshop is digital - it has to be to get into Photoshop - but it could have come from a photo-cd or a scanner. But this book starts when the photo is already in the camera.I got very interested when I saw that there was a section of the book on Photoshop's Camera RAW plug-in. But all Kelby gives you is a rehash of the information that Adobe provides you with the RAW software with a lower level of detail. You get no help on how to use that software to make a better picture.I occasionally think Kelby takes a more complex approach to a problem than one needs. His section on "Color Correcting Digital Images" advises setting the tonal highlight, shadow and midpoint with the curves function, but most users would probably find it easier to do this with the levels functionThere is no magic bullet that will help someone learn the fundamentals of Photoshop. The new user is best served by sitting down with a book of tutorials, either like those provided by Adobe or like Photoshop 7 Artistry by Barry Haynes, and working through the exercises. After that you can come back to this book and get a few tips in using the Photoshop functions that you know.