Books

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Gets visual learners up to speed quickly on the newest Photoshop release

Photoshop is the gold standard for image-editing programs and is used by professional photographers, graphic designers, and Web designers as well as hobbyists. Designed for those who learn best visually, this full-color guide has been completely updated to cover the newest release of Photoshop. Previous editions have sold more than 150,000 copies.

• Photoshop is the industry standard for image-editing software used in both print and digital media, with more than four million users worldwide; the latest version includes new functionality and enhanced tools  
• People who learn more easily when they can see how something is done will quickly grasp essential Photoshop concepts and procedures in this visual, step-by-step format
• Covers importing photos from digital cameras and scanners, retouching and repairing, enhancing digital images, adding custom 3D effects, editing images for the Web, creating a Web photo gallery, incorporating graphics into desktop publishing programs, color management, using layers and filters, compositing, and more

With step-by-step instructions and full-color screen shots to demonstrate each task, Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop makes learning easy.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.
Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks for Designers

Corey Barker, Executive Producer of PlanetPhotoshop.com and one of the Photoshop Guys of Photoshop User TV, brings you this handy and inspiring volume in the Down & Dirty Tricks series. Yes, this book is an insane collection of some of the most mind-blowing Photoshop effects you’ve ever seen in one place. Ever wonder how that movie poster was created, or how they created that cool magazine ad, or maybe even how to take a seemingly mundane photo and give it the Hollywood treatment? Or maybe you just want to know how to do some really awesome stuff in Photoshop. Well, then, this book is for you! Whether you’re a designer, artist, or even a photographer, there’s something here for everyone. Moving through these projects, you’ll start to see the potential of Photoshop’s most powerful features and how, with a little experimentation, you can open up a whole new world of dazzling effects.

You’ll learn how to:

• Create custom brush effects from scratch
• See type as a design element
• Create Hollywood-style effects that actually look like Hollywood-style effects
• Take mundane photos and turn them into something mind-blowing
• Create eye-popping commercial effects that clients will drool over
• Get creative with 3D in Photoshop CS5 Extended
• Create popular advertising effects you’ve seen in movies, on TV, and on the Web
• Master dazzling photo effects for designers and photographers alike

Plus, there are so many other things throughout the book that you’ll be bursting with new ideas!
Photoshop Down & Dirty Tricks for Designers

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Gets visual learners up to speed quickly on the newest Photoshop release

Photoshop is the gold standard for image-editing programs and is used by professional photographers, graphic designers, and Web designers as well as hobbyists. Designed for those who learn best visually, this full-color guide has been completely updated to cover the newest release of Photoshop. Previous editions have sold more than 150,000 copies.

• Photoshop is the industry standard for image-editing software used in both print and digital media, with more than four million users worldwide; the latest version includes new functionality and enhanced tools  
• People who learn more easily when they can see how something is done will quickly grasp essential Photoshop concepts and procedures in this visual, step-by-step format
• Covers importing photos from digital cameras and scanners, retouching and repairing, enhancing digital images, adding custom 3D effects, editing images for the Web, creating a Web photo gallery, incorporating graphics into desktop publishing programs, color management, using layers and filters, compositing, and more

With step-by-step instructions and full-color screen shots to demonstrate each task, Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop makes learning easy.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.
Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Gets visual learners up to speed quickly on the newest Photoshop release

Photoshop is the gold standard for image-editing programs and is used by professional photographers, graphic designers, and Web designers as well as hobbyists. Designed for those who learn best visually, this full-color guide has been completely updated to cover the newest release of Photoshop. Previous editions have sold more than 150,000 copies.

• Photoshop is the industry standard for image-editing software used in both print and digital media, with more than four million users worldwide; the latest version includes new functionality and enhanced tools  
• People who learn more easily when they can see how something is done will quickly grasp essential Photoshop concepts and procedures in this visual, step-by-step format
• Covers importing photos from digital cameras and scanners, retouching and repairing, enhancing digital images, adding custom 3D effects, editing images for the Web, creating a Web photo gallery, incorporating graphics into desktop publishing programs, color management, using layers and filters, compositing, and more

With step-by-step instructions and full-color screen shots to demonstrate each task, Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop makes learning easy.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.
Teach Yourself VISUALLY Photoshop CS5 (Teach Yourself VISUALLY (Tech))

Professional Portrait Retouching Techniques for Photographers Using Photoshop (Voices That Matter) Reviews

Professional Portrait Retouching Techniques for Photographers Using Photoshop (Voices That Matter)

Each year, Scott Kelby, Editor-in-Chief of Photoshop User magazine and the #1 best-selling Photoshop author, trains literally thousands of photographers on how to retouch portraits using Photoshop through his live seminars, online classes, DVDs, and standing-room only workshops at the Photoshop World Conference & Expo. Now you can learn the same techniques he uses in his own retouching workflow, in the only book of its kind–one written expressly for photographers who do their own retouching.

As a pro photographer himself, Scott understands that photographers make their living shooting, not retouching. But, delivering fully retouched images is now expected by clients. That’s why Scott put together this amazing resource for teaching photographers the quickest, easiest, and most effective ways to create professional-looking, retouched final images without spending hours grinding away at painstaking, detailed techniques.

LEARN HOW THE PROS DO IT

It’s all here–the step-by-step methods for fixing, enhancing, and finishing your portraits in Photoshop. Using the techniques in this book, you’ll create images that will absolutely wow your clients. You’ll learn:
• How to soften skin and still retain detail and texture

• The best tricks for beautifully enhancing eyes, eyebrows, and eyelashes

• How to selectively sharpen portraits without complicated masking

• How to create gorgeous-looking lips

• How to remove blemishes fast and keep the most detail

• The pros’ tricks for body sculpting

• How to make your subject’s hair look fabulous

• How to give your retouches that natural look that sets them apart

• Plus, you get Scott’s complete 5-minute, 15-minute, and 30-minute start-to-finish workflows

If you’re ready to learn the “tricks of the trade”–the same ones that today’s leading pro photographers use to retouch, tuck, tighten, and tone their images for that pro-retouched look–you’re holding the book that will do exactly that. It will radically change the way you retouch your portraits from here on out, and give you the best-looking, most natural retouches you’ve ever done.

Professional Portrait Retouching Techniques for Photographers Using Photoshop (Voices That Matter)

Creative Photoshop CS4: Digital Illustration and Art Techniques Reviews

Creative Photoshop CS4: Digital Illustration and Art Techniques

If you are a digital artist, illustrator, cartoonist, graphic artist, designer, or serious hobbyist looking for new and interesting ways to use Photoshop, this is the book for you! You already know how to use Photoshop as an image editing tool; now, challenge yourself and discover the more artistic aspects of the program with one of the world’s best teachers by your side.

In addition to four brand new chapters on real world projects, this new edition of award-winning digital artist Derek Lea’s bestselling Creative Photoshop contains several brand new features such as “What you’ll learn in this chapter” summaries, so you can quickly find projects using the specific tools you’d like to focus on, and supplementary information at the end of each chapter, containing useful resources and additional gallery images to provide further study and inspiration. As you work through Derek’s fantastic artistic methods, be sure to visit www.creativephotoshopthebook.com for more information, including the project files for each chapter, available for download for you to work with, a reader forum, and more.

*Stunning images from award winning digital artist Derek Lea inspire you to push your own creativity further than you even thought possible
*Compatible with previous versions of Photoshop
*Explore Photoshop from an entirely unique perspective as you learn how to create graffiti, antique effects, stencil art, and so much more
*Fully updated throughout for CS4, plus four brand new chapters on real world projects that combine traditional art methods with Photoshop to create tactile images
Creative Photoshop CS4: Digital Illustration and Art Techniques

100% Photoshop: Create stunning artwork without using any photographs

100% Photoshop: Create stunning artwork without using any photographs

Just when you think you’ve learned all that you could ever know about working in Photoshop, digital artist and photomontage king Steve Caplin comes along with yet another masterful method for creating incredible works of art in Photoshop. This time, he’ll show you how to create complete images, from start to finish, entirely within the software program. No source material, photographs, or existing files from other software packages are needed, saving you valuable time and resources. The techniques you’ll learn in this ground-breaking new book will help you combine your artistic vision and skills with an understanding of how to manipulate the built-in Photoshop filters to produce impressive, eye-catching artwork.

Each chapter opens with a complete double page illustration, created entirely in Photoshop. Then, carefully laid out step-by-step instructions show you how each element in the illustration is created, and how they are all combined in the end to make a convincing final image. Using Steve’s proven methods for success, you’ll be able to produce images that reflect a more finely crafted, hand drawn approach, whether you’re an artist for your own enjoyment or a working professional looking for a leg up on the competition.

*The only book of its kind that does not rely on any external images whatsoever – each and every element is created directly in Photoshop

*A chapter covering the basics of using specific filters and textures and a chapter providing a summary of common techniques and tools will help you brush up on your general Photoshop skills so you can move through the rest of the book successfully

*Be sure to visit Steve’s website at www.howtocheatinphotoshop.com for even more Photoshop tips, tricks and advice

Product Description

Just when you think you’ve learned all that you could ever know about working in Photoshop, digital artist and photomontage king Steve Caplin comes along with yet another masterful method for creating incredible works of art in Photoshop. This time, he’ll show you how to create complete images, from start to finish, entirely within the software program. No source material, photographs, or existing files from other software packages are needed, saving you valuable time and resources. The techniques you’ll learn in this ground-breaking new book will help you combine your artistic vision and skills with an understanding of how to manipulate the built-in Photoshop filters to produce impressive, eye-catching artwork.

Each chapter opens with a complete double page illustration, created entirely in Photoshop. Then, carefully laid out step-by-step instructions show you how each element in the illustration is created, and how they are all combined in the end to make a convincing final image. Using Steve’s proven methods for success, you’ll be able to produce images that reflect a more finely crafted, hand drawn approach, whether you’re an artist for your own enjoyment or a working professional looking for a leg up on the competition.

*The only book of its kind that does not rely on any external images whatsoever–each and every element is created directly in Photoshop
*A chapter covering the basics of using specific filters and textures and a chapter providing a summary of common techniques and tools will help you brush up on your general Photoshop skills so you can move through the rest of the book successfully
*Be sure to visit Steve’s website at www.howtocheatinphotoshop.com for even more Photoshop tips, tricks and advice

Working in Photoshop is just about the most fun you can have without breaking the law. Its power and elegance means that we’re limited only by our imaginations: we can combine images to make a political point, to show off a product, or simply to create a beautiful piece of artwork.

These days, it’s easier than ever to find the images we need. The internet is awash with royalty-free image libraries, often selling images at very low cost–or giving them away for free. We may turn to Wikimedia, the resource center of Wikipedia, to find a specific shot; we might choose the cut rate photographs at iStockphoto.com; or we might pick one of the thousands of free images available from sites such as www.morguefile.com, or the stock exchange at sxc.hu, or the myriad free surfaces at www.mayang.com/textures.

But even with the vast range of images readily available to us, we sometimes find that the perfect shot of the ideal object simply doesn’t exist. Sometimes we have the physical object at hand so we can photograph it; often we don’t. In these cases, the only real option is to draw it ourselves.

There are several reasons we might choose to draw an object, or a texture, or a background, directly in Photoshop. For one thing, it means we can get exactly the view we want, without having to trawl through a thousand images. But for me, the main reason to draw directly in Photoshop is for pure, unadulterated fun.

Creating a piece of artwork entirely from scratch is hugely enjoyable–and extremely satisfying when we get it to work out the way we saw it in our mind’s eye. 100% Photoshop contains dozens of examples of drawn objects and textures, at a level that just about any Photoshop user could achieve. Along the way, we learn new techniques and approaches, and hone our Photoshop skills. But mainly, drawing in Photoshop gives us a level of satisfaction a mere montage can never hope to equal.

(Photo © Kate Garner)

1. Always draw the basic object in a mid-tone gray. Whether you then add highlights and shadows with the Dodge and Burn tools, or adjust the contrast with Curves, or add a metallic effect with Layer Styles, you only need be concerned about the luminosity: there’s too much opportunity for color images to go haywire. Add the color later, when the basic object has been built.

2. Duplicate, duplicate, duplicate. Make copies of your layers after each successful stage. It can be frustrating to get near the end and find there was a mistake early on in the process–but if you have an earlier version to return to, you can correct your errors far more easily.

3. Name each layer as you create it. If you use a filter, consider naming it with the settings you used – such as “Unsharp Mask, 2, 150, 0″–so you know how the effect was achieved.

4. Always experiment on a copy. Photoshop is ideal for tinkering and trying out new ideas–but make sure you keep a copy of the original before you start down an unknown path.

5. Be creative with filters. The Plastic Wrap filter doesn’t just wrap objects in plastic, it can be used to create liquids of all sorts. The Clouds filter may produce lousy clouds, but it’s a great random texture generator. And give the Wave filter another chance, it’s better than it looks.

6. Don’t erase anything. Use a Layer Mask instead. That way, you can always reveal pat of a layer you’d previously hidden. Once it’s erased, it’s gone.

7. Rather than applying a Curves or Color Balance adjustment to a layer, use an Adjustment Layer instead. The effect will be the same, except that we can go back and change the adjustment at any time–or copy it to a new layer.

8. Learn to use the Pen tool. It’s the single scariest Photoshop tool, and many users just give up on it. Take a day to master it and you’ll value it for the rest of your life.

9. Don’t forget the shadows. Shadows on objects, shadows beneath objects, shadows on the wall behind objects. Once the composition is finished, it’s the shadows that really bring it to life.

10. Convert layers to Smart Objects in complex compositions. Each time an object is scaled, rotated or distorted, some quality is lost. With Smart Objects, we can tinker as much as we like without losing any quality. It can be heartbreaking to see an image looking soft or ragged, simply because we changed our minds one time too many.

A Look Inside 100% Photoshop
Click to Enlarge
The images below are all drawn entirely in Photoshop, using no photographs.

The box uses a variety of textures and shading techniques.	The record is a surprisingly easy object to create: the shine makes this one zing, in just a couple of steps.	The watch seems to be a complex object, but in fact it’s straightforward enough for anyone to draw.

The iPod is a straightforward object to draw; the shine on the screen brings it to life.	The only part that takes time when drawing the ruler is the tick marks.	The racquet is a complex object, bending the wood texture around the top and interlacing the strings.

Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers: The Ultimate Workshop Reviews

Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers: The Ultimate Workshop

If you already have a good knowledge of Adobe Photoshop and are looking to advance your skills, Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers: The Ultimate Workshop is the book you’ve been waiting for.  Renowned photographers Martin Evening and Jeff Schewe impart their Photoshop tips and workflow, showing you how to use a vast array of rarely seen advanced Photoshop techniques.  Whether the subject is serious retouching work, weird and wonderful compositions, or planning a shoot before you’ve even picked up a camera, you can be sure that the advice is based on years of practical experience.

Full of inspirational photographs and hundreds of full-color screenshots to show you how it’s done, this book features:

-Advice on becoming a retouching master with advanced masking and compositing techniques -A detailed workflow for preparing your images for the best possible output, showing you how to meet both deadline and budge without sacrificing quality -26 movie tutorials on the included DVD, offering over 3 hours of movie content

The ideal companion to Photoshop CS5 for Photographers, this is a must-have resource for any serious user of Adobe Photoshop.

* Gain a unique insight into a professional Photoshop workflow with industry experts Martin Evening and Jeff Schewe
* Become a retouching master with advanced masking and compositing techniques
* Prepare your images for the best possible output, showing you how to meet both deadline and budget
Adobe Photoshop CS5 for Photographers: The Ultimate Workshop

Photoshop Elements 10 For Dummies (For Dummies (Computers))

Photoshop Elements 10 For Dummies (For Dummies (Computers))

Perfect your photos and images with this “focused” guide to the latest version of Photoshop Elements

For most of us, the professional-level Photoshop is overkill for our needs. Amateur photographers and photo enthusiasts turn to Photoshop Elements for a powerful but simpler way to edit and retouch their snapshots. Photoshop Elements 10 For Dummies, fully updated and revised for the latest release of this software product, helps you navigate Elements to create, edit, fix, share, and organize the high-quality images you desire. Full color pages bring the techniques to life and make taking great photos fun and easy.

• Introduces you to the work area
• Shows you how to upload images to your computer
• Reviews ways to view, find, organize, and manage your photos
• Details how to modify your photos to your specifications
• Distills working with layers, contrast, color, clarity, filter, effects, styles, and type
• Explains how to print your creations, create a slide show, and optimize images for the web

Written by veteran digital imaging and print authors Barbara Obermeier and Ted Padova, this handy reference is a highly readable and enjoyable way to learn this powerful image editing application.

Photoshop Elements 10 For Dummies (For Dummies (Computers))