Good Photoshop Books? (1 Viewer)

I'm having more fun with my new digital camera than should be allowed

I'm starting to play around more with Photoshop. Does anyone have any good recommendations for books? I'm especially interested in tips for unusual effects.

I did manage to do this today.

(Yeah, the world really needs another colorized phony B&W picture of a stupid flower. It's going to get one, anyway.)

If you go to a borders or other outlet that carries international magazines, the latest Digital Camera World comes with a nice free booklet that covers the major features of photoshop. Its a UK mag.

Sam

http://www.mccannas.com/pshop/photosh0.htm

http://www.planetphotoshop.com/tutorials.html

Adobe Photoshop 7.0 Studio Techniques by Ben Willmore is decent. It has a good share of proofing errors, which is annoying, but at least he has them documented on his site. Despite its flaws the book is helpful in explaining the nuts and bolts behind the functions in the program, for example what radius and threshhold actually control. Many tutorials I've come across just don't explain that and give some generalized starting point for settings with no explanation why. It's also the book that turned me onto using Curves, which up until then I just didn't understand.

I recommend good-tutorials .com . It's updated hourly and there's also a search engine to look up whichever specific effects you'd like to learn.

How well do you know Photoshop? I find the Adobe Classroom In A Book series to be very good at getting an initial grasp on Photoshop. Knowing all the basics is much more important and powerful than just playing around with filters to make unusual effects.

I don't know it well but want to ramp up pretty quickly to the unusual stuff

Thanks for all the suggestions.

I have Real World Photoshop. A very good book, because it focuses on theory and techniques for fixing up less-than-perfect digital photos (sharpening, resizing, layer masks, etc.). Also covers important topics such as color profiling and printing - particularly on print accuracy.

It's not the typical step-by-step book, as it also explains why a technique is used...

I've heard raves over this book:

Photoshop Restoration & Retouching, Second Edition, by Katrin Eismann.

I think I will get this book next...fixing color casts and smoothing over skin blemishes are tough. :frowning:

You did not say which version of Photoshop but if it's CS try:
The Photoshop CS Book for Digital Photographers by Scott Kelby

Photoshop CS Down & Dirty Tricks by Scott Kelby

Scott Kelby is the Editor-in-Chief of
Photoshop User Magazine The official publication of The National Association of Photoshop Professionals.

The guy is a wiz. His books are step by step & easy to follow. Check out the magazine as well.

I teach digital imaging, and use the Adobe Classroom in a Book as a text. It is an excellent book for beginning / intermediate Photoshop.

While many of the "tips and tricks" type books are interesting and show you some neat stuff, a "bottom up" tutorial book like the Classroom series gives you the knowledge you need to be proficient with Photoshop. I recommend using the "Classroom" book, along with a Google search for Photoshop tricks - mix up the nuts and bolts with the fun stuff to keep you interested.

-Scott