Customer Reviews

Illustrator CS2 Bible

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I like the 'Bible' series of technology books from Wiley, and I've got quite a collection of them at this point. I am currently updating my knowledge of Illustrator with this book, covering CS2. I can't cover every chapter, but let me summarize with a list:

* Great appendices - nice coverage of key commands and shortcuts, as well as the reference URLs for websites that I haven't even scratched the surface on yet.

* Good coverage of the Illustrator desktop and some of the new features as well - it always changes a bit, so the first part of the book was a good summary.

* Chapter 9, 'Working with Type' is great... I do copywriting, both with designers and with my own stuff, so this chapter was very useful to me.

* Chapter 16, on 3D objects and drawing, is fun. I'm still working on my skills here, but the coverage of the tools in Illustrator is great.

* Chapter 18, on printing with PostScript, is also a must for me. I submit so many printing jobs to various printers, that this helped me understand some of the limitations (and options) that I sometimes encounter.

Overall, no complaints with the book. I've come to expect a certain level of coverage from Wiley's Bible series, and this one makes the grade. If you are new to Illustrator and want JUST THE FACTS, I can recommend this new edition with confidence.

J

I rate this book at a 4 because when I got IDCS I had no knowledge of it and never considered desk top publishing. Not only did it get me going, but it help gave me a good overall understanding of working with a commercial printers, typography, and other concepts I had never heard of or considered. Using it I was able to do a personal project (multi-language calendar) from start to finish with good results.

Great price, so much information. I read it the whole way through and it really is thorough and clear in the uses for Illustrator.

Indeed a marvelous tool, if you know where to look for something specific. Can get a bit technical for me. But great resource.

You will get a lot of information from this book. I love this book. I was so excited to receive the book. I tried some things just to see if the information given would be easy to follow. It is and I am going to become very knowledgeable in Illustrator CS2

Illustrator CS2 Bible claims that its Reader Level is "Beginning to Advanced", I say: it is NOT a good book for beginners, that is, one who has never used Illustrator before or someone who uses Illustrator only very occasionally and who tends to forget things after a few months of non-use. Also I feel very strongly that it is certainly not the only book on Illustrator CS2 (or CS5 ? maybe) that an occasional user (like me) should have on his bookshelf in fact I'm not even sure that I need this book at all.

Have a look at the Bible's Chapter 2 "Understanding Illustrator's Desktop" and compare it with: Chapter One "Illustrator Interface" from the excellent for a beginner; "Illustrator for Windows & MacIntosh" by Elaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas ... You will understand what I mean !

The Bible's description of the "document window" is pitiful, such as: the Artboard and Artboard boundaries not properly described and/or graphically shown, the "Page", mentioned but not properly described or graphically shown, same for the Page Boundaries not described or shown, nothing about the "Imageable area and its boundaries", nothing mentioned about the "Scratch Area". Wrong terms are used such as "Menu" instead of "Menu Bar", "Tools" instead of "Toolbox". Tools (individual tools should be "tools" not "Tools") and should refer to individual tools NOT to the Toolbox which contains several tools.

The Bible Toolbox's tools and their descriptions and graphic images are simply pitiful when compared to the afore-mentioned book, they are way too small and difficult to see and read and the individual tools are not described for referencing later on in the book. The Bible says:"The toolbox holds all the tools you need to draw in Illustrator", nothing mre,that's it ! Yes I know, much later in the book they do cover the tools individually, but again, with smallish, insignificant "crappy" graphic images.

Conclusion: Not a good book for a beginner nor for the occasional user who needs a top notch description and reference of the interface to remind him what the "Imageable Area etc" is in the Illustrator's Idiom. Finally, the Bible is printed in black and white only on a yellowish paper, the antithesis of what Adobe Illustrator really is. This is my first "Bible" book ...

This book covers a lot of different aspects of the Illustrator program. The only thing I didn't like about it was the texture of the paper it was printed on.