Customer Reviews

Sams Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 7 in 24 Hours

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

 

 

In light of some negative comments about this book, the editor asked me to take a look at it. I am an Adobe Certified Expert in Photoshop, the Help Desk Director of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP), the author of "Special Edition Using Adobe Photoshop 7," and a nationally-known authority on Photoshop.

I have done a full technical edit of "Sams Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 7 in 24 Hours" and found a few typos, but no significant problems. There is one (and only one) omission that could lead to confusion for the reader or inability to complete an exercise: On page 208, the reader must click the Work Path button in the Options Bar after selecting the Pen tool in Step 2. By default, the Pen tool creates a shape layer rather than a work path. The button is identified visually on page 217. This error likely occurred because of late changes to the program prior to its release and after completion of that chapter.

If a novice Photoshop user starts at the beginning and works through the book, there are no steps left out (other than that identified above) and the instructions are not "lacking." The lessons build beautifully, one on another. (However, if one were to jump around from section to section, there might be confusion.) Each of the techniques, when followed step-by-step, will produce the result stated by the author.

This book is clearly marketed for (and to) beginners. To compare it to an Intermediate/Advanced book, such as "The Photoshop 7 WOW! Book" or "Photoshop 7 Down & Dirty Tricks," is inappropriate. Creating and using Actions, styles, and macros are beyond the scope of this beginner book.

I whole-heartedly and without reservation recommend this book as a lesson-based learning tool for those new to Photoshop and for those transitioning from Photoshop 5.5 or earlier to Photoshop's version 7.

Peter Bauer
Help Desk Director, NAPP
Author "Special Edition Using Adobe Photoshop 7"
Contributing Writer, "Photoshop User" and "Mac Design" magazines
Adobe Certified Expert
Featured Columnist, PlanetPhotoshop.com

This book was nothing but a let down.

As a novice PS user, I found the instructions to be sadly lacking with steps left out, and directions that just didn't work.

I had assumed from the name--Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 7--that the book would be geared to beginners. It wasn't. Maybe if I had used PS 6 or the like in the past I would have known, for example, that step 1, 2 and 3 were implied and that the author was starting at step 4. As it was, I was just confused.

I also wonder if the book wasn't rushed into print too fast without the needed editing. There were quite a few techniques that I followed (many times) step by step that just did not work the way the author said they did.

All in all, I would recommend that anyone interested in learning Photoshop do what I'm doing now and find a better instructional book.

Book Bytes is a fan of the 24-lesson approach used in Sams Publishing's well-tested series of tutorial books. Photoshop is so vast and complex that breaking down its introductory features into small component exercises is a perfect solution for newcomers.

Many worthwhile aspects in this book:

* each of the 24 assignments is complete within itself, and comes in handy sooner or later during future (or sometimes previous) chapters

* all screen shots are taken from OS X's version of Photoshop 7

* a special URL can be reached via the Sams main web site, containing every image used in the text, downloaded either one unit at a time or all together as a 13MB file

* Carla Rose's conversational writing style is friendly and inviting, with occasional humor, taking the edge away from PhotoShop's tendency to intimidate inexperienced users

* individual lessons and tutorials are concise, and numbered sequentially for easy following along

Any complaints? Yes, one: the color photo insert is bright and bold, but the many helpful grayscale images are feeble in comparison; higher grade inking would help.

Each of the 24 "hours" in Sams Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop in 24 Hours ends with a useful Q & A, plus a quiz (with answers) and some exercises targeted to the material in the unit. Readers who make the effort to study and work through each chapter will be intermediate Photoshoppers before long. Subject topics begin with the absolute basics and finish with substantial techniques presented.

This book is easy to understand, friends, and well worth a rating of MacMice Rating: 4 out of 5 for people new to Photoshop.

WOULD I BUY IT? Definitely.

WOULD I USE IT IF IT WERE THE ONLY PHOTOSHOP BOOK AVAILABLE? Yes, indeed.

DO I RECOMMEND IT? Without any hesitation

Contrary to what has been said before, I found this book to be very helpful in learning Photoshop 7. I was able to easily access the pictures used in the book ..., entering my ISBN (no hyphens) and then downloading the pictures. This book is a powerful reference for obscure Photoshop tools and a great reference for learning the program. As a Mac user, I appreciated that most of the screenshots were in OS X, but Windows users will still be able to follow along very easily, as Photoshop is basically the same on both platforms. Highly recommended, as are any of the other Teach Yourself series (I own this, Flash 5, and HTML/XHTML).

As I have been wading through this book for the past week, I have found it more and more difficult to understand. This book's glaring omission in my opinion is its lack of physical graphic images that I can manipulate. We need to see before-and-after examples done with our own hands that explain what she is talking about. The first image that you can download on line is well into chapter 3. I got the most frustrated with the "Cut and Paste" section in chapter 3 which had no photos on line for me to recreate with her, and her explanation of how to Paste was non-existent. It was at this point that I decided to move on to another book.

This book, like many of the SAMS 24 hour series, is a good and fast introduction to the program. If you don't have the time to wade through a thousand page tome on Photoshop this book will quickly get you up and running.

My only complaint is: the download for the images used in the book only contains one picture per chapter. Not every illustration as mentioned earlier.

... even after reading the above reviews I decided to give this book a shot. Bad idea. There are a few typos in the book that are annoying, but not really enough to lead you completely astray. Unfortunately that is about as good as the book gets. There is a complete lack of really good visual aids, diagrams, pics, and step by step "how-to's". Carla Rose also will use terminology that isn't explained until later on, making things more confusing. Additionally all the screen shots are in Mac, not Windows, which may or may not effect the examples. This book is not for the beginner. I would look else where.

Steps omitted, no visuals for icons and also mentioning a feature and then saying nothing else about it. I don't care what the "so called expert" had to say, the book is bad. Try another one.

don't know how long it's been since I've been so disapointed in a book. Here's the problem. Photshop is a fully featured program for professionals. This book spends way too much time on filters that you won't normally use and not enough time on what you really need. I went out & bought the book right after I got the program a few weeks ago. At the time it was all that I could find, but it has little or no info on creating & using actions, styles or macros. It doesn't teach you the fast ways to do tasks. I learned a bunch more from The Photoshop Wow book which also has a CD of really great styles & actions. Photoshop 7 Down & dirty tricks is also great.

Another book where the author is tech savy and assumes the beginner already knows something about photoshop. Many basic steps are left out or assumed and this makes learning and moving on to following chapters almost impossible. Not for teaching yourself if you are new to adobe photoshop.