Photoshop CS4: Essential Skills (Photography Essential Skills) |  | Authors: Mark Galer M.Ed., Philip Andrews
Publisher: Focal Press
Category: Book
List Price: $39.95
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Rating:  28 reviews
Sales Rank: 124776
Media: Paperback
Edition: Pap/DVD
Pages: 480
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 2.6
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 7.4 x 1.2
ISBN: 0240521242
Dewey Decimal Number: 006
EAN: 9780240521244
ASIN: 0240521242
Publication Date: December 8, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
This inspirational guide to creative image editing will help you master the essential features and tools of Adobe Photoshop CS4. Broken into three parts to form a structured, self-study guide, Photoshop CS4: Essential Skills covers the foundation skills and more advanced techniques you need to enhance photographs creatively and professionally. Practical, step-by-step imaging projects then give you the chance to practice your skills and see what you can achieve with the right tools and knowledge.
Written by two internationally recognised authors and Adobe Photoshop Ambassadors, this established book and DVD package cuts through the complexities of Photoshop to deliver essential, clear guidance on how to get the best results. Fully updated with the latest CS4 features, it also contains vital information on how to optimize your photography and digital imaging workflow.
Now includes a free DVD, packed with more than 10 hours of detailed video tutorials to accompany the projects in the book, royalty-free hi-resolution images, indispensable RAW files for editing practice and much more.
* Learn to retouch and enhance your photographs, produce sophisticated montages and create special effects with clear instruction and step-by-step practice projects that show the why and the how-to
* Develop an efficient workflow from capture to print, saving time and hassle, and helping you to achieve professional-looking results in Photoshop CS4.
* Watch and learn, with more than 10 hours of movie tutorials on the accompanying DVD to support the practical projects - worth the cover price alone!
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 1-5 of 28
 Good choice for building intermediate to professional skills December 29, 2008
The Irish Patient (Western Massachusetts)
18 out of 18 found this review helpful
I'm a newcomer to photoshop, having bought CS4 the week it was released. I purchased this book because I was impressed by a similar book written by Mark Galer on Elements, and also because it was simply the only book on CS4 that was actually in print at the time of purchase.
I have given Essential Skills five stars due to the quality of the written and video tutorials. The target audience would be someone with preexisting basic skills who can jump over the mediocre introductory materials and get right into the tutorials. For example, there is a tutorial on HDR technique that is far more advanced than anything I have seen online or in any other book. And, believe me, I have spent a lot of hours looking.
I'll grow into this book in a few months and will be very glad I bought it. However, it is not the best choice for someone in my present circumstances. I have since been able to spend an hour or more with Martin Evening's book, Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers, at the brick and mortar store. Evening's book is more readable and stronger on the basics. I would not hesitate to recommend Evening's book as the default choice for a newbie struggling to get started with CS4. The "missing manual" for CS4 hasn't hit the shelves yet, but Evening's book is far superior to any of the prior missing manual volumes.
Update 9-23-2009: Ten months later, I'd give this book (really, the CD) six stars if I could.
First, I regret the snide remark about the "mediocre introductory materials." Flame in haste, repent at leisure. Still, the gist of the thought was correct. The point of this publication isn't to read about color theory, it's to be able to stand over the shoulders of a real professional while he works. For digital photography theory (histograms, diffraction limit, out of gamut colors, etc., etc., etc.), google "Cambridge in Colour." Don't forget the "u" in colour. You'll be impressed by the quality and quantity of the free tutorials, not to mention the artist's gallery.
Second, my title was a bit off. The range is more like beginner to advanced intermediate, with the understanding that "beginner" doesn't include newbie. I recommend The Photoshop CS4 Companion for Photographers by Derrick Story for people who are just starting out from ground zero. Story's book is a good quick start guide, although you'll outgrow it quickly.
Third, I continue to recommend Martin Evening's book Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers: A Professional Image Editor's Guide to the Creative use of Photoshop for the Macintosh and PC, which I now own. Evening's book doesn't duplicate this one at all, being more like an owner's manual or reference publication. You don't sit down to read Evening's book from cover to cover; you consult it as needed. However, I was wrong to recommend Evening's book as "the default choice for a newbie struggling to get started with CS4." Story's book works as a quick start guide; Evening's doesn't.
Finally, I really can't say enough good things about the video tutorials. You'd pay at least five times the price of this publication to take a CS4 class. Galer's lessons are good enough on the first viewing, but where they really begin to shine is when you start to work on some prize photo of your own and remember that a photograph he worked over had the same problems that you're now facing. Unlike a class, you can go back and find that lesson, and go over it as many times as you need to figure out the details of his technique. As much as I enjoy what Photoshop can do, it has to be understood that the interface is truly wretched and in need of a top to bottom overhaul. No one, no matter how bright, can learn to use CS4 effectively just by reading from text.
Step-by-step guidance from beginner to pro-level skills March 4, 2009
Abjet (Melbourne, Australia)
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Galer and Andrews' book is perhaps one of the best resources I have found related to learning digital image retouching and image manipulation, and allows the reader to develop skills at a pace they can set themselves.
I am a student of photography at RMIT University in Australia, which offers one of the best courses in commercial photography in the world. This book is the basis of 2 years worth of education we receive relating to digital imaging (and image manipulation)---and most of us come into the course with no background in Photoshop. If you cannot afford to go to uni, but can get yourself a copy of this book---you're in good hands! :o)
The book provides sound foundations and background knowledge regarding the digital imaging workflow---while not everyone might be interested in such information, grasping this material significantly improves the quality of one's work.
Other books I have referred to often skip steps assuming that reader can "fill in" the gaps on their own, or may not contain the files needed to
complete a project. Such short-cuts on the part of authors can be frustrating and demoralizing for the reader, particularly for those who are beginners.
In marked contrast, this is the only book I know of that explains in painstaking step-by-step detail every step of the process involved in each project---then backs it up with a full-length video tutorial for each project *and* includes all the RAW/stock image resources that are needed to complete each task. You simply cannot get it wrong with this kind of support.
If you have the passion and consistency to work through (and understand!!) each exercise, this book will help you every step of the way towards gaining professional level proficiency---even if you have no background in the use of Photoshop.
For those who may be interested, my website contains images created using skills I have learnt from this book: http://www.abjet.net
PS- I recently purchased this book for an 80+year old Photoshop novice who is already going from strength to strength with their skills!!
The Ultimate guide to CS4 July 6, 2009
tachi1 (Miami, FL United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The title says it all: "essential skills." Everything a photographer will ever need to know to process their capture into the print that they envisioned when they shot it is covered in here. Furthermore, it is covered clearly, in detail, in both text and full color photos. (If the book wasn't enough, there are hours of on-point video tutorials on the DVD.
In my opinion, the target audiences are professional and serious amateur photographers with some experience in previous Photoshop editions. However, the book's sequential structure also makes it useful as a reference (not as a course) for serious beginners who want to start out on the right foot. It has a progression of information (what you need to know, when you need to know it, why it's important) and a logical chapter framework. This enables the reader to begin with setting up preferences and getting wide overviews of the different Photoshop components he wants to master (Bridge, ACR, and Photoshop) and then proceed by general category to specific procedures in order of complexity.
The book was what I'd hoped it would be:
* An intelligent guide that would refresh my overall skills, but especially bring me up to speed regarding the CS4 edition of Photoshop (one of the most feature-packed editions in a long time and one that has made radical changes to our workflow and completely redesigned the interface).
* A serious book, one that respects my time and my intellect, and is free of silly humor and useless tutorials (like how to imitate the look in a magazine advertisement or a movie poster.)
* A book, primarily aimed at photographers of all levels and interests, and not aimed so much to print professionals (no wild text effects, a minimum of advertising-geared "product" images).
* Explanations of certain obscure options (sliders, modes, and options) that tend to make certain tool or filter dialogs a bit confusing. I had never had it explained so intelligently.
Like the author, I am a believer in shooting RAW. Unlike the author, I was beginning to feel a bit confused and overwhelmed by the increasing complexity of the ACR interface. The chapters that address RAW processing have made me feel confident again and given me a tremendous appreciation of all the possibilities that reside with the ACR interface (which turns out not to be as intimidating as I though). I am now getting almost 75% of my total processing done in ACR and some images only go into PS for final sharpening.
Image management and workflow are also covered logically and sequentially from the moment the images are transferred from the flashcard to the moment the final version is saved. NOTE: don't overlook the bonus chapter in the DVD having to do with bit depth, choice of file format, color spaces, etc. The PDF is worth printing out.
The only topic I did not find covered was the importance of backups--of having at least 3 copies of your images in different places and of saving copies of your RAW files (your negatives) also in different places. (Ex: your computer, a DVD version, and another in an external hard drive that is not always connected to your computer.) It doesn't matter how well you process your files or how efficiently you organize them, if you have only one copy and your computer fails.....
Another note: for American readers (especially readers accustomed to the Kelby-esque approach to Photoshop instruction) you might find the language and tone a bit different. This book is not only more serious, but it uses slightly different terminology than that to which we are accustomed. Since it was written in England, slightly different terms are used. Ex: layer masks are "associated with" the thumbnail, not "linked to" the thumbnail; instead of "clicking on" the thumbnail, you "make it the active component." It is not a problem that affects your comprehension, quite the opposite in fact; sometimes having the same information presented in a different way makes it "click." I just had no idea that Photoshop could be made to sound like such an elegant program.
Not another PhotoShop book!!!! Wait...this is a bit different... July 11, 2009
Yo' Vinny (Houston, TX USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I picked up this book through the Amazon Vine program. I can only suspect that I was suggested to review it since I own just about every other Photoshop CS3, CS4 book published! :-)
I'll start with the shortcoming.....there's only one. The content is broad and not deep. What I mean is that there are a number of topics covered but the extent that any one topic is covered goes beyond the beginner level and into the intermediate level. It typically stops there, so if you are looking for the holy grail of ALL Photoshop information to the expert level, stop looking. By the way, there isn't a book that has that. If there was it would be about 5,000 pages long.
Everything else is an absolute positive. Becase Galer and Andrews don't attempt to cover things at the most granular level it provides for the opportunity to cover a number of areas. Some of those areas are even a bit more metholodology with the toolsets. For instance, I've seen lots of Photoshop books that talk about what the things in Photoshop do. That's great if I want examples beyond the online manuals. Galer and Andrews instead show HOW you CONNECT these tools elements into photo editing solutions. Their chapter on Workflow walk you through a best practice of RAW capture, potential tethering, downloading the files, library management, processing steps (in the CORRECT order and why it's correct) and then output to file. They include the typical chapters on Bridge and RAW processing, but I really like how they include a chapter most books miss on digital printing including details of how to insure correct color management to paper output or print service. There are other typical, but still good, chapters on layer blending, selections, filters and retouching. What also is very good is that about 1/5 of the last part of the content is focused on projects where they are a bit like a photographic assignment. If you are not a professional you will find this entertaining as it feels like you are on an actual assignment doing work, with the help of the authors to walk you through all those wonderful skills you learned in the earlier chapters. On top of all this textual good, it also includes a 10 hour DVD to walk through visually many of the learned lessons from the book.
As I completed the review it occurred to me that this really is a full Photoshop training class to take someone from a beginner level to an intermediate level in Photoshop. It has text, it has multimedia and it has projects. If you've got 40 hours to invest to this content, I recommend that you invest the time with this book and DVD. It will definitely improve your Photoshop skills.
Strong Materials with good examples July 24, 2009
H. M. Oh (Norwalk, CA USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Essential Skills identifies photoshop skills necessary for every day hobby users of DSLR to advanced users facing the CS4 Photoshop a new set of skills through the projects included in the book. I read from page 1 through 322 and found the explanation and photographs most essential and important as a refresher for people like me who have been around to use previous several evolution of photoshop. The pages that comes after to about page 450 are the creme of the crop as to speak of. I am going to utilize the lesson here which is meant for intermediate and advanced users with at least an intuos Wacom bamboo to best utilize the skills refinement that are illustrated in the book. Every project is sorted to fit certain needs. For example, HDR panorama is in my radar so to speak. I am going to work on the panorama project and getting the hair from a background and superimposing on another background. Those are very valuable lessons that are not found on other books. This is really great reference for people who are updating their skills. It's a must have book for anyone who wants to refine their skills and those especially trying to be a professional.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 28
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