Photoshop 5.5 for Windows & Macintosh, Second Edition (Visual QuickStart Guide) [Paperback]

Elaine Weinmann (Author), Peter Lourekas (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0201699575 | ISBN-13: 978-0201699579 | Publication Date: September 21, 1999 | Edition: 2nd

Adobe Photoshop is the application of choice for digital image manipulation, but its complexity can be daunting for beginners. Photoshop 5.5 for Windows and Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide is an accessible, how-to guide to basic photo editing, manipulation, and correction techniques that will have you up and running in no time. In addition to the basics, you'll find full coverage of the latest features in this newly Web-enhanced version of Photoshop, which includes ImageReady 2.0.

With this guide, you don't have to wander through menus or wade through text. Concise, step-by-step instructions walk you through each task, and the numerous pictures and captions reassure you that you're in the correct dialog box, pop-up menu, or entry field. The book is full of updated material on using Photoshop effectively for Web images, and also covers the higher-end changes in Photoshop 5.5: improved color management, editable PostScript type layers, the new History palette and brush, 16-bit channel support, and other new palettes, actions, and tools.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Adobe Photoshop is the application of choice for digital image manipulation, but its complexity can be daunting for beginners. Photoshop 5.5 for Windows and Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide is an accessible, how-to guide to basic photo editing, manipulation, and correction techniques that will have you up and running in no time. In addition to the basics, you'll find full coverage of the latest features in this newly Web-enhanced version of Photoshop, which includes ImageReady 2.0. With this guide, you don't have to wander through menus or wade through text. Concise, step-by-step instructions walk you through each task, and the numerous pictures and captions reassure you that you're in the correct dialog box, pop-up menu, or entry field. The book is full of updated material on using Photoshop effectively for Web images, and also covers the higher-end changes in Photoshop 5.5: improved color management, editable PostScript type layers, the new History palette and brush, 16-bit channel support, and other new palettes, actions, and tools.

About the Author

Product Details

• Paperback: 448 pages
• Publisher: Peachpit Press; 2nd edition (September 21, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201699575
• ISBN-13: 978-0201699579
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,413,606 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Elaine Weinmann and her co-author, Peter Lourekas, write, design, and illustrate the best-selling Visual QuickStart Guides to Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. Their books have been translated into 25 languages and have sold more than 2.4 million copies worldwide. She has also taught computer graphics courses at the New School Computer Instruction Center and Pratt Manhattan; he has taught at the Cooper Union School of Art and Parsons School of Design. View their blog at elaineandpeter.com Twitter @elaineweinmann

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

65 of 66 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear, complete, easy to use., November 30, 1999

By 

Frederick Morris (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Photoshop 5.5 for Windows & Macintosh, Second Edition (Visual QuickStart Guide) (Paperback)

If you don't have the Photoshop user manual, this book is the next best thing. Each of Photoshop's many features is clearly explained in thorough, illustrated, step-by-step instructions. The large index and well-organized table of contents makes it easy to find the information you need quickly, and the price makes it the best bargain in town. Other books on Photoshop may focus on special effects or professional-strength production techniques, but this one is a serious nuts and bolts guide that any Photoshop user (novice through pro) will find useful.

31 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not a "how-to", April 13, 2000

By 

storyscribe (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Photoshop 5.5 for Windows & Macintosh, Second Edition (Visual QuickStart Guide) (Paperback)

It's true what other reviewers have said. this book will NOT teach you how to use Photoshop or how to do cool stuff with it or how to get the most out of it. But what it will do is put the complicated menus, commands, keyboard shortcuts, etc of this fabulous but MASSIVE program at your fingertips in a way that is easy to search and find what you need. I think Adobe's user guide that comes with the program is poorly written and organized. If you're opening PS for the first time, just clicking on the menus is a daunting task and Adobe's guide doesn't really help.

This VQS guide from Peachpit will help you make sense of basic commands, where things are and how to get to them. It makes the groundwork of the program easier to understand. Keep it by your side as you need to find a command or a shortcut as you work through one of the mnany great tutorial books out there which this is not.

I guess in a nutshell, get this book if Adobe's documentation is clear as mud to you as it was to me. It's the user's manual you probably need. But don't get it if you're looking for a tutorial book that will help you make an actual picture with PhotoShop. The nuts and bolts of the program are here in a very clear, easy to find your way around format but it will not sub for a tutorial book.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Long on detail, short on pedagogy, March 1, 2000

By 

Stewart Kiritz "bookish" (CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Photoshop 5.5 for Windows & Macintosh, Second Edition (Visual QuickStart Guide) (Paperback)

The words "teach yourself Photoshop" on the cover of Weinmann and Lourekas are apt, however I would disagree with the words which follow -- "the quick and easy way." The problem is that while the text is comprehensive in its cataloguing of the details of this complex program, there is almost no attempt to rely on guidance or even logical organization of material to help the novice navigate through the learning process. The very first sentence of the book is telling: "To choose a tool whose icon is currently visible, click once on its icon. Press and drag to choose a hidden tool from a pop-out menu. Or choose a tool using its shortcut (study the next two pages)." No attempt is made to explain when and why you would use a tool, what function tools play in the process of manipulating an image, how the toolbox fits in with the program as a whole, what photoshop is used for. The rest of the book follows a similar pattern in providing disparate lists of functions and how they work without setting a context for when and why they would be employed. It is as though the authors are phobic of excess verbiage and in love with sparceness. So I would not recommend this book to someone just starting out with photoshop, but more as a reference book for looking up details of the program and learning how they work. I don't doubt that you can "teach yourself photoshop 5.5" from this book, but I would have liked a little more assistance from the authors.