Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers [Paperback]

Martin Evening (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 15, 1998

Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers has become a classic reference source written to deal directly with the needs of photographers. Whether you are an accomplished user or are just starting out, this book contains a wealth of practical advice, hints and tips to help you achieve professional looking results.


The book begins with an introduction to working with digital images, providing essential information on everything from file compression to proofing and output issues. Practical workshops show you how to master the essential techniques, such as adjusting brightness, colour and contrast, toning a black and white image, advanced retouching techniques, adding filters and so on. Each technique is described in step by step detail, showing exactly which command to use, whether you're working with a Mac or PC.

The book comes with a free tutorial CD-ROM with full multimedia walkthrough movies of the techniques described in the book. A unique interactive filter section allows you to try out the effects of different filters - saving you hours of time. Free tryout software includes a digital watermarking system that helps protect your images.

If you are just beginning to work with digital images or are looking for new ideas, the best techniques and ways to improve the quality of your work - this is the book for you!

Martin Evening is a professional photographer who has been working with digital images and Photoshop for many years. He works mainly in studio based beauty photography for PR and direct clients. The use of the computer has played a significant role in Martin's work, with nearly everything being retouched or manipluated in Photoshop. This is a regular everyday experience and one which has enabled him to gain an extensive, specialist knowledge of Photoshop.

Martin writes regularly about digital imaging for leading photographic and computer magazines. He has presented seminars on Photoshop techniques in the UK and United States and acts as a digital imaging consultant for design and photographic studios. He is a founding member of the Digital Imaging Group, London and is co-listowner of the Prodig mailing list - a Photoshop discussion list on the web.



practical techniques show how to master the essential functions: adjusting brightness, colour and contrast, advanced retouching techniques, toning a black and white image, adding filters etc.
comes with a free tutorial CD-ROM with walk-through multimedia presentations of techniques described in the book
illustrated with stunning colour images throughout, including real-life assignments from leading professionals

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers bridges the differences and illustrates the connections between traditional, hands-on, chemically intensive photographic processing and manipulation and its computer-based alternative. With its graphically rich examples and detailed diagrams of Photoshop 5.0's user interface, this book will easily transition users with an eye for images into the digital methodology.

Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers makes no assumptions about the reader's level of proficiency with the popular software. Instead, it begins with an examination of the many means of acquiring images (the fuel for Photoshop) through digital cameras, scanners, and from CD-ROM collections for your PC. Once you've set up the necessary hardware, the book walks you through Photoshop's tools in thematically arranged sections like "montage" and "image repair and retouching." Traditional photographic savvy is well-placed throughout the book, particularly during the discussion of color-toning images (like those in sepia-toned photos) in which this book contrasts the chemical bleaching and dying method of old with Photoshop's Duotone tool.

The accompanying CD-ROM includes tutorial movies related to the examples used in the book. Any "through the lens" photographer considering abandoning the darkroom for a graphics workstation will find Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers to be required reading. --Ryan Kuykendall

Review

"Someone has just re-written the bible, the Photoshop bible...Whether you are an expert or a beginner, this is a book that talks your language."
Digital PhotoFX ...

"You are a photographer and new to digital imaging and Photoshop - this is just the book for you. A teaching CD-ROM of short walkthrough movies enhances the value of the book as a really sound instruction manual - likely to be revisited many times as experience grows"
The Photographic Journal ...

"A mine of useful information, aimed at not only helping photographers to produce the very best quality images, but also gives techniques for image manipulation. For anyone involved with image processing this is a must have book!"
Photo Technique ...

"Whether you're a newcomer to Photoshop or a more experienced user seeking some guidance, Evening's easy to follow book is the only guide aimed specifically at photographers".
Amateur Photographer ...

"Every instructor of photoshop should have Photoshop for Photographers in their library and use it as a resource"
A photoshop student ...

"A great choice for the photographer who has finally been dragged into the brave new world of digital imaging"
Online photoshop book review ...

"If you're one of those people who hates manuals - this book comes as a breath of fresh air."
British Journal of Photography ...

"Covers all the most useful features in understandable terms. This book will save you hundreds of hours of heartache."
Total Imaging ...

"This publication is a must for all photographers, independent of your level of experience with the package, as it's written by a practising professional photographer with you, the photographer in mind"
The Association of Photographers ...

"Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers is a great choice for any
photographer who has finally been dragged, perhaps a little reluctantly (or perhaps kicking and screaming), into the brave new world of digital imaging."
David Herman ...

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 320 pages
• Publisher: Focal Press (September 15, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0240515196
• ISBN-13: 978-0240515199
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 8.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,289,031 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A flawed but useful book, November 29, 1999

By 

Leigh Perry (Sydney) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers (Paperback)

Firstly, Martin Evening is a Photoshop wizard. Unfortunately he has difficulty conveying his knowledge. Reading this book is a bit like listening to an expert mumbling away to himself about his field of expertise. You have to strain to glean the information, but it is there nevertheless. Furthermore, he has assumed an odd starting position of the reader. He assumes you have years of experience with commercial printing, and that you are familiar with older versions of Photoshop. He wastes too much space explaining how things used to work in previous versions. This book will not teach you Photoshop. Learn Photoshop (read the Adobe manual), become a power user, and then read this book (a few times to make sense of it).

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars can be improved in the next edition, November 1, 1999

By 

+++ (OR, United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers (Paperback)

I think it is a very useful source of information how to use Photoshop to improve quality of scanned photographs or digital images. Unfortunately, the book has several significant drawbacks, which hopefully will be improved in the next edition. First of all, the enclosed CD-ROM does not contain the images presented in the book, so there is no simple way to get "hands-on" experience with the techniques discussed in the book. The description of the steps suggested to solve each particular problem is sometimes way too short to follow, and is difficult to memorize because you cannot reproduce the suggested steps on your computer since you do not get the tutorial files. The first half of the book, a short description of Photoshop 5 for the users of the previous versions of photoshop, is rather useless, from my point of view: I think that those who have recently upgraded to Photoshop 5 already know how to use the new features, while those who never worked with Photoshop will not understand much from that short description. Putting this all in one sentence, this book contains great material, but the presentation of it could be much better.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good book for photographers on Photoshop 5.0, October 2, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Adobe Photoshop 5.0 for Photographers (Paperback)

This is the first book I've seen that is about Photoshop specifically from the photographer's point of view. I found this a great attraction in buying the book.

The book has a lot of information which I have found in no other place. The sections on color management in Photoshop are especially important and relevant. The sections on photographic image manipulation are well done and useful.

I would recommend the book to photographers who are serious about digital imaging, manipulation, and printing.

However, I do have some complaints about the book which annoyed me, and also may "put some others off". It is for these reasons that I think that this is not a "5-star" book.

1. The job of editing the book is poor. Not a small amount of the English used is oral-jargon, and as such, is much more difficult to read than it would have been to hear. It makes the reading quite confusing in places. The editors should have picked these usages up and corrected them.

2. Though the reporductions of dialog boxes, etc., are of good quality, many of them are reproduced in such a size as to make reading the contents very difficult. The effective type size in some of these boxes is less than about 6 pt. These illustrations needed to be much larger.

3. A lot of the magic process of digital imaging is done -- needs to be done, and should be done -- at the scanner level. Doing the same sorts of corrections in Photoshop is much less effective. The author (understandably; this is a book on Photoshop) gives scanning short shrift. In my opinion, he should not have done so.

4. Similarly, the issue of printing from Photoshop to ink-jet, sublimation, etc., printers is also given short shrift. The bias of the book is printing through bureaux. This is understandable, but the current stampede direction of users is in the direction of inexpensive, high-quality desktop printers, making this a serious omission.