Fun with Photoshop Elements 3: Foto-Fakery for Everyone [Paperback]

Rhoda Grossman (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0672327309 | ISBN-13: 978-0672327308 | Publication Date: February 13, 2005 | Edition: 1

Wish your ex-boyfriend wasn't in that great picture of you with your family? Cut him out! Hate the shirt you're wearing in the picture of you with your best friend? Change the color! You can do all of this and more with Photoshop Elements 3 and Fun with Photoshop Elements 3 can show you how. Get your feet wet and your hands dirty with this cheeky look at how to use the program for fun. Learn the key tools and tricks through objective-based lessons that will show you how to complete a task quickly and easily so you can move on to the next task. By the end of the book, you will be able to combine elements of two photos into one image, perform "head transplants," makeover your clothes or face, edit people into and out of images and graft images together to create giant, mystical creatures. The possibilities are endless-let us help you reel them in!

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Fun with Photoshop^® Elements 3About the Author

Rhoda Grossman is a cartoonist, illustrator, and painter who uses traditional and digital media in various combinations. She has co-authored several books on creative uses for Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter with Sherry London. Rhoda created CD tutorials for Painter versions 6 through 8 without Sherry London. She has taught traditional drawing as well as computer graphics techniques at several brick-and-mortar institutions of higher (and wider) learning. As "Rhoda Draws a Crowd" she creates caricature entertainment (digitally and traditionally) for events from bar mitzvahs to international conventions. Check her out at http://www.digitalpainting.com.

© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Introduction

So, you wanna have fun with Photoshop Elements? You came to the right place. Do you want to create images that are beautiful, funny, or politically incorrect? Pull up a chair. If you want people to think you are on vacation in some exotic location while you're just hanging around the house, I'll show you how to fake the perfect postcard. If you'd like to make outrageous combinations of body parts, environments, or food, this book is for you. Are you dying to distort your spouse's face or make your parents look really old? This book can show you how, but maybe you need to work on anger management, too.

Who Are You?

You are a hobbyist, or recently retired, or a person with a demanding job who just wants to "unlax" creatively. You're a kid or a parent or a grandparent. You are a "shutterbug" who enjoys taking snapshots, or you have absolutely no interest in photography. You have an idea for an image that you need help creating, or you just want to fool around for a couple hours now and again. You definitely want to learn how to use Photoshop Elements as painlessly as possible. You are certainly a bargain hunter, proven by your purchase of Photoshop Elements at a small fraction of the cost of Photoshop CS, while getting about 90% of the features offered in the high-end version.

What Do I Need?

No experience with Photoshop Elements is necessary to start having fun right away, although you will probably work faster if you're an intermediate to advanced user. Appendix B, "Photoshop in a Peanut Shell," at the back of the book serves as a handy reference for basics you'll want to learn or be reminded of.

Although this book is written for Photoshop Elements 3, you can use an earlier version, and Photoshop CS users have not been ignored. There are tips where needed in a project (as well as in Appendix B) to point out any significant differences between the two programs.

Most Photoshop techniques can be performed just fine with a mouse, but there are a few that are much easier (and more fun!) with a Wacom tablet and pressure-sensitive stylus. A scanner will be handy, too, if you want to digitize old photos taken with a traditional film camera (remember those?).

Where Do I Start?

The chapters are self-contained and designed to be used in any order. Within a chapter it's a good idea to start with the first project and work down, but even that isn't absolutely required. So feel free to jump around and do what looks interesting at the moment.

Every project is liberally illustrated with images at various stages to keep you on track. Screen shots of palettes or dialog boxes are all done on an Apple computer, 'cause I don't do Windows. Except for cosmetic differences, these screen shots are identical to what their Windows counterparts would look like, and Photoshop Elements works exactly the same on both platforms. I'll give keyboard commands for both platforms, Mac first. For example: Command/Ctrl means use the Command key if you're on a Mac, the Control key if you do Windows.

What Will I Learn?

I made no attempt to cover every aspect of Photoshop Elements and I must say, with all due modesty, I was very successful. It turned out, however, that most of the important features of this amazing and versatile program got covered. If you do all the projects in all the chapters, you'll have a good grasp of most Photoshop techniques and at least a nodding acquaintance with many others. When you finish Fun with Photoshop Elements 3 and want to continue your adventures in image manipulation, there are resources listed in Appendix A, "Resources," to help you do just that.

Where's the CD?

You won't find a CD to accompany this book on the inside back cover, or anywhere else. We wanted to keep the cost as low as possible and pass the savings on to you. The source images needed for most of the projects are available for download from the Fun with Photoshop Elements 3 website at http://www.samspublishing.com. Type the book's ISBN (0672327309) in the Search field to find the page you're looking for.

Here's where you'll find pictures of people, places, and things created by professionals and obtained from stock photography companies. ShutterStock.com has been especially generous. You'll also find some "unprofessional" images donated by my family and friends. For some projects you'll have access to exactly the same images I worked with, and in other cases reasonably similar photos are provided. Many projects can and should be done with your own photos. Wouldn't you much rather distort the faces and bodies of your family rather than some total stranger? See Appendix A for more info on image resources.

Legal Stuff

If you scan images printed in books or magazines or search the web for digital pictures, be aware that such items might be copyright protected. That's not a problem unless you want to publish your edited versions. Copyright law gives the original creator of an image all rights to it, including derivations thereof (or is it "wherefrom"?). How much would you have to change an image to make it legally your own and not just a derivation? Are you willing to go to court to find out?

When it comes to using the likeness of a celebrity, things can get complicated. Are you infringing on the copyright of the subject or the photographer who created the photo? Maybe both! Famous people have the "right of publicity" to prevent others from making money with their likeness, even after death. On the other hand, ordinary folks have the right to privacy, so you need to get a "model release" signed before you can legally publish their face.

There are exceptions to copyright protection, called fair use. For example, you can publish doctored images of famous people for satirical purposes. How about drawings? As a professional caricature artist I need to publish examples of my work, using famous faces to demonstrate my skill. Not a problem, legally...unless it's Jay Leno. He's kinda prickly about stuff like that, maybe 'cause he's such a popular target. Anyhow, some of my colleagues have gotten "cease and desist" suggestions from Leno's staff. 'Nuff said.

Copyright expires 70 years after the death of the creator, at which time the image becomes public domain, so anything goes. An image like the Mona Lisa is way in the public domain, even though the painting itself is owned by the Louvre in Paris. Ownership of a piece of art is completely separate from usage rights thereto.

The images made available to you on the Fun with Photoshop Elements 3 website are provided only for your personal use in working the projects. All other rights are reserved by the copyright holders.

I'm glad we had this little chat. Now, go have fun with Photoshop!

© Copyright Pearson Education. All rights reserved.

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Sams; 1 edition (February 13, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0672327309
• ISBN-13: 978-0672327308
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.1 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,409,794 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Don't waste your money!, August 1, 2005

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Teacher/Photographer (USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Fun with Photoshop Elements 3: Foto-Fakery for Everyone (Paperback)

I teach Digital Photography to 8th graders and thought this book would be filled with ideas for fun projects.

The poor quality of this book's printing means that you cannot see the "marching ants" that the author demonstrates in her examples of selections. Worse, images that she has combined (such as a person's face with an animal) are so poorly done that they look completely fake and unprofessional. (My own students, novices at Elements and only age 13, did a much better job of photo composites and selections than the author, whose renditions look like really bad tabloid front page fakery!)

While I can appreciate a juvenile's fascination with "gross-out" effects, the author's use of Elements to manipulate photographs is simply mean-spirited. Is showing people at their worst (making a woman look like she has oral herpes is one example that comes to mind) her idea of "fun?" I feel sorry for the models used in this book, since she used stock photos (not requiring their permission) to make them look like repugnant freaks.

No, there is nothing "fun" about this book, which is a pity, because Photoshop Elements CAN be used creatively and effectively to enhance and alter photographs. (Examples include Surreal Digital Photography by Huggins and When Pancakes Go Bad by Muchnick, and some of the WOW! books). Don't waste your money on this offensive, poorly executed book.

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Showcases just what can be done for fun with Photoshop, May 10, 2005

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Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Fun with Photoshop Elements 3: Foto-Fakery for Everyone (Paperback)

Photoshop expert Rhoda Grossman's Fun With Photoshop Elements 3: Foto-Fak-ery For Everyone superbly showcases just what can be done for fun with Photoshop! Extraordinarily informative, even the most novice user of Photoshop software can immediately engage the program and turn out fun and useful projects. Readers will learn all about key Photoshop Elements tools in a thoroughly "user friendly" and hands-on approach. Sidebars provide additional information for Photoshop CS users. The diverse projects provided as learning templates and examples include: combining the best elements of two photos into one finished image; head transplants; background switches; extreme makeovers for your face, clothes, and home; grafting animal images together to create comical beasts undreamed of through evolution; editing people into and out of images; creating artistic greeting cards, outrageous T-shirts, personalized calendars, phony product labels, fake street signs and so much more. 224 pages.

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fun Tricks, August 22, 2005

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B. Smith - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Fun with Photoshop Elements 3: Foto-Fakery for Everyone (Paperback)

Easy to understand instruction for many of the manipulations you can do in Photoshop elements.