Teach Yourself Photoshop 4 in 14 Days (Sams Teach Yourself) [Paperback]

Bront Davis (Author), Carla Rose (Author), Steven Mulder (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1997

A tutorial that takes the user step-by-step through the features of Photoshop 4.0. The book divides the lessons into days and is designed to give the user functionality with the program in 14 days. The CD-ROM includes a demo of Photoshop.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Weinmann has put together the beginner's book. His writing is clear and concise, and he doesn't try to cover everything in the world. Yet few users will actually outgrow the use of 20 percent of Photoshop's capabilities. Davis offers another good book for novices that comes with the added advantage of having practice images for the lessons included on the CD-ROM.
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Hayden Books (July 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 156830403X
• ISBN-13: 978-1568304038
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 7.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,951,712 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pretty good Photoshop book, November 18, 1997

By 

[e-mail] (Storrs, Connecticut) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Teach Yourself Photoshop 4 in 14 Days (Sams Teach Yourself) (Paperback)

A very good approach to covering the major elements of Photoshop 4. Some excellent exercises with accompanying files on a CD-ROM.

The problem I think was a rush to get the book out by a deadline. The most serious error is that the CD-ROM does not have several of the files that are illustrated in the text. In some chapters it has several more files than mentioned in the text. There are other errors an editor should have caught when the author tries to cover the program for both PC and Mac platforms. For example, a command for a Mac may actually be the one for a PC.

I called the company about the CD-ROM and was sent a new disk (free) with several additional files (not all the missing files, but a definate improvement).

In spite of these problems, I would recommend the book to novice Photoshop users. I learned a great deal!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I was very disappointed in that the CD-ROM wasn't up to par., November 28, 1998

By 

Alice Faur [e-mail] (New Jersey) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Teach Yourself Photoshop 4 in 14 Days (Sams Teach Yourself) (Paperback)

I too purchased this book in the hopes of learning Photoshop, but I was very disappointed that the CD-ROM did not have some of the files that the book called for. I did get some of the files from Macmillan Technical Support,but now that I'm working in chapter 11, I again find that I am missing files. I can say with all honesty that I would not recommend this book.

2.0 out of 5 stars Beginners beware, January 9, 1998

By 

Rick Gates (Eugene, OR) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Teach Yourself Photoshop 4 in 14 Days (Sams Teach Yourself) (Paperback)

I purchased this book because the accompnying CD claimed to have the full color images from many of the examples. This is great for a beginner like myself as it's very useful to be able to follow along with the instructions.

It's good that you can get many of the missing images at www.hayden.com, however there are still numerous mistakes in the book that can make life very difficult for the beginner.

For example, on page 116, when examining CMYK channels, figure 4.12 shows the RGB channels.

In another instance, while learning to load custom textures, the authors ask you to load a saved texture file. While texture files need to be loaded in .psd format, the authors supply only the .jpg. Thus a novice would need to understand that she needs to first save the .jpg as .psd, and then load the new texture. None of this is described.

Finally, there are numerous small omissions and oversights that make following the example more difficult. A complex program such as Photoshop can have many modes and parameters set. The frequent omission of small steps and parameters can make the examples hard to follow.

I've only made it through the first 7 chapters of this book, but I would have a hard time recommending it to anybody, particularly a new user.