Customer Reviews

Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop

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

 

 

I recently gave a 1-star review to this book, but some sort of guilt hit me and I decided to look through the book again to see if I could find some way to up my rating. Well, the author could try putting in a CD with pictures that are included in the book so the buyer could practice the lessons; and a different layout that would be more pleasing to the eyes wouldn't hurt either.

So does this book have some merit? Yes. Is it the best book on Photoshop retouching? No.

This book is going to have trouble competing when so many other books include hands-on tutorials via a CD. The positive behind this book is it's not lengthy, and how I hate buying a book the thickness of the Yellow Pages.

So who would buy this book? Someone who is heavily into using Photoshop and has purchased just about every book there is on Photoshop.

It's not the best, but it's not the worse.

Before reading Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop by Gwen Lute, I had read the following books on the subject:
- 5 stars: Photoshop Restoration & Retouching (Katrin Eismann).
Exceptional book; one of the best PS books I've read on any topic. Check the reviews.
- 3.5 stars: Photoshop Retouching Handbook (Carol Braverman). Pretty good.
- 1.5 stars: Retouching Old Photographs - Photoshop Methods and Solutions (Michael Kiteley). Serious problems. See my review under that title.

In retrospect I should have quit while I was ahead.

Compared with the offerings above, the Lute book is a sham (and a shame). Poorly written, frequently incomplete explanations, very little useful detail, no accompanying CD or web-site for example images, lots of "white border" per page to make it appear "thicker."

I wouldn't recommend it for beginning, intermediate nor advanced PS users. I literally sold this book on the second hand market two days after receiving it.

I noticed there's an updated version of this book on the horizon (projected availablity: 2nd half of 2002). At this point I would not even remotely entertain the thought of acquiring it unless I read many, many stellar reviews proclaiming a complete rewrite.

Most of the other reviews for this book are right on. Don't waste your hard earned $ on this one regardless of your PS skill level.

You may be thinking, "So why didn't YOU pay attention to the other reviews before buying this book?" Fair question...

I'm a PS knowledge junkie... I LOVE to read about and learn new Photoshop techniques. Though I read the not-so-flattering-reviews before taking the plunge (like you are doing right now), I *hoped* they were too harsh. I *hoped* I'd find a few golden nuggets that would be useful to me. Bottom line: It was about the most useless PS book I've ever read (my personal library consists of over 30 PS books).

My advice: If you're interested in this topic, give serious consideration to the first book listed above and some consideration to the second. If you pass on the last one and this offering, you'll be a much happier camper.

From the title of the book, you would expect some useful information on what is, a specialized subject. I found this book: 1. Poorly laid out - Printing very large, little or no content on the particular subject under discussion 2. Oversimplified - To the extent that you are told of a function, and asked to press the button and see what effects you can get! 3. Poor quality examples - No colour 4. No CD rom (to follow examples) 5. No advanced techniques covered, in fact no discussion at all about history brushes, adjustment layers, curves, tonal adjustments, very limited on layers, masks, etc.

A very disappointing purchase to the point where I have returned the book and intend to purchase another. Buyer beware!

This book does give very detailed instructions on how to accomplish some photo retouching tasks. Unfortunately the book is in black and white so the color applications are limited. However, for someone just starting to do photo retouching, this is a good beginner book, albeit a bit pricy. After learning the techniques covered in this book you will want to progress to something more advanced.

I was looking for a book in photo retouching with Photoshop and borrowed this book from a local library. The back cover promised "step-by-step, fully illustrated instructions ..." but when I went over the book, I was disappointed. For a price ......, this book had no sample files from either CD-Rom or downloadable from the internet so you could practice the techniques. The pictures were impressive enough, but without the sample files it just like you read a cook book and expected to become an expert in cooking. Well, at least with cooking you could buy the ingredients elsewhere. So there was no way you can prove the author right or wrong or if the techniques worked! Try Photoshop Artistry, they had before and after files which you can practice!

Also, the instructions were not "step-by-step" as promised. For example, page 23 (retouch wedding picture), step 7 said "clean up the final image using various tools and methods for fine turning (i.e. the rubber stamp tool, the eraser tool, the lasso tool). You can see the image below"

This is not "step-by-step" how could I clean up an image using various tools if I was trying to follow the sample? What various tools? Is the rubber stamp tool first and then the eraser tool? This is vague at it best. I looked at the fimal impressive image and still couldn't quite get how the author arrive there.

I've read the other reviews and quiet frankly I feel that they are not only unfair, but seem a bit one sided. Most of the ones that gave the first edition a bad rating and then blasted the book don't even have the decency to try the second edition which was a complete re-write and much better than the first edition.
As I understand it Adobe has asked Mrs. Lute to provide an insert for the next version of Photoshop Express. Do you think Adobe would ask Mrs. lute if she was as bad as the lame reviews seen here?
I really enjoyed the book, and it helped me figure out a big problem with Layers and Masking, which has helped to quadruple my referrals.
The big question here is why has Amazon failed to have a different set of reviews for the second edition? I don't feel that Amazon is providing proper customer service by showing reviews for the wrong book.
I'm a professional photographer specializing in Virtual Tours for Real Estate, Bed and Breakfast Inns, Hotels, and Private Clubs. And Gwen Lute's second edition of Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop was one of the best Photoshop books I've read.

Do yourself a favor, spend your money on a really good book such as Katrin Eismann's "Photoshop restoration and retouching" instead of buying this one. I read both; I enjoyed the Eismann's book and felt that I learned next to nothing reading the Lute's book. I think, there are two major reasons why I felt this way:

1. This is yet another step-by-step tutorial without images to work with. There is no CD and no downloadable files. Since one has to have images quite similar to those in the book (and due to the nature of the tasks discussed in the book these images may be hard to find) in order to reproduce the tutorials, I found that the only way how I could learn anything at all was is to play the steps of image processing in imagination. I discovered a couple of useful tricks while doing it, but certainly the concept "learning by doing" does not work well when the "doing" part is stripped off. The most ridiculous thing in the book is that the author sometimes suggests something like "click anywhere in the blue background". Come on, this book is published in black and white, there are no tutorial images, what are you talking about?!

2. The approach is based on tools, not on problems. Katrin Eismann's book starts with identification of what is wrong with the image - e.g., its too light, or its color balance is wrong, or it has scratches, etc. - and then suggests solution to each particular problem. Each section in Eismann's book is about a particular problem in the image, and a variety of ways how to solve this problem. Gwen Lute's book starts from the tools and techniques; each section is dedicated to a certain group of tools, and it is shown how they can be used. For instance, there is a cection on layers and masks, another section on filters, etc. As practical as this approach is, it does not give you a systematic knowledge how to identify problems in a photograph, and how to solve them. The best you get from this approach - a review of the photoshop tools. You are not getting any better in retouching, though!

Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop

By Gwen Lute Amherst Media, Inc.

I noticed one negative review of this book and am surprised. I had quite a different experience reading Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop. This book is very well written. It makes Adobe Photoshop easy for even a beginner like me. I followed the directions for a couple of the tasks explained in this book and had no problem getting the results I wanted. Chapters cover topics from "a Historical Perspective" of photo retouching to marketing your work. Lute explains computer terms, such as plug-ins, hard drives, RAM, and external hard drives. Suggestions for buying a computer are offered along with what hardware and software may be best for your purposes. Capturing the digital image is discussed as are scanning techniques. Then the fun begins--and I do mean fun. Just learning Adobe Photoshop myself, I know how frustrating it is to follow directions when working in Photoshop. After working for hours, getting the effects wanted in your photograph seems impossible. Not a problem with Photo Retouching with Adobe Photoshop. Each step is clearly explained and illustrated. It is impossible to get lost or forget a step if you follow the script. For instance, chapter three ("Restoring an Image") talks about "Using a Layer as a Mask." Accompanying the text for each project are charts, photographs and the list of Adobe Photoshop tools as they will be seen on your screen is illustrated. The first section tells the reader how to remove an unwanted object from a picture. Fourteen easy-to-follow steps take you through the process. Several more projects are discussed and illustrated and each of the twelve chapters, subjects and projects are just as thoroughly explained and illustrated. Author and photographer Gwen Lute is a photo retoucher with over thirty-years of professional experience. Along with these talents, she lectures to professional photographers on traditional and digital retouching methods. Because I actually worked on my own projects following the instructions in this book, I can say without reservation this is a helpful and valuable book.

Very good step-by-step instructions with pictures and illustrations of tools make this an easy but effective how to reference book. I reccommend it.

I have had photoshop for about a year now and I seen this book and thought that it would help me a lot more with understanding the different aspects of the program. When I recieved it I was extremely dissapointed! It was all stuff I already teached myself and the different ways they pictured what they done after they worked with the photo was poorly done! If I would have known that this is what it was going to consist of them I would have never wasted the time and money in trying to get it!