Customer Reviews

Mastering Camera Raw with Ben Willmore DVD

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This DVD by Ben Willmore is as good as one of his live lectures. He gives tips that I could not find in other photoshop material plus I can watch it several times. The DVD is cost effective in that his classes are more expensive and you need to be available on his schedule.

I am now shooting pictures in raw format and need to understand the different features of the RAW processor. Ben reveals the ins and outs of each tab and slider and why it is needed. The photoshop literature is very thin on explaining the details and never explain why. I can recommend this DVD to anyone interested in shooting pictures in the RAW format. In addition, Ben illustrates the interaction between this new format and the new file manager "The Bridge".

Title: Masterting Camera Raw
Author: Ben Willmore
Publisher: Peachpit Press (April 26, 2005)
2 DVDs (150 total minutes)
ISBN: 0321358341
List Price: USA $49.99

Mastering Camera Raw is divided into 11 chapters within
2 DVDs. The documentation states that these DVDs are
optimizedfor playback on a computer. I found satisfactory
results on my TV with a DVD player. The audio quality of the
DVDs is clear yet it was recorded low. You will need to turn
up the volume on your computer speakers or TV. The video
quality is good but could be sharper and clearer.

Here is a summary of the contents:

Chapter 1 - Introduction - This is a very brief introduction by
Ben.

Chapter 2 - Adjust Tab. This chapter describes exposure,
shadows, highlights, white balance, contrast and saturation
settings.

Chapter 3 - Detail Tab. This chapter describes the
sharpness, Luminance smoothing and color noise
reduction settings.

Chapter 4 - Lens Tab. This chapter describes the
"Fix Red/Cyan Fringe" and "Fix Blue/Yellow Fringe"
settings and vignetting.

Chapter 5 - Curve Tab. This chapter describes
how to adjust the curve setting.

Chapter 6 - Calibrate Tab. This chapter describes
how to calibrate your camera raw files from
your camera with the camera raw application to
create a custom profile.

Chapter 7 - Start to Finish. This chapter describes
the workflow of adjusting a camera raw file
using the lessons learned from the previous
chapters.

Chapter 8 - The Bridge. This chapter provides
an overview of the Bridge application as it
relates to camera raw files. You will learn
how to adjust more than one raw file at a time.

Chapter 9 - The Cache. This chapter describes how
Camera Raw uses cache files with your raw files.

Chapter 10 - File Formats. This chapter describes
the various file formats created/used when working
with raw files.

Chapter 11 - Power Tips. This chapter describes
key board short cuts, using the image processor
via Bridge and embedding raw files in Photoshop.

Summary: If you have never used Camera Raw before
and you are a visual person (you learn best from watching
someone perform a task rather than reading about) then
this 2 DVD set is for you. The DVDs will get you up to
speed on the all features of Camera Raw faster and better
than any book. You will also pick up some helpful tips
along the way to save yourself time and work more
efficiently with raw files. The 2nd DVD also contains
the raw files used in the examples/tutorials to practice on.
At a list price of $49.99 for 2 DVDs containing just 150 minutes
I believe this is a fair value. Fortunately, this DVD set can be bought online
(at Peachpit.com for example) at a substantial
discounted price, making it a very good value. I highly
recommend this product. Ben is an excellant teacher and
presenter with the knowledge of the topic to back it up.