Advanced Photoshop CS2 Trickery & FX (Graphics Series) (Paperback)

~ (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description

Advanced Photoshop CS2 Trickery & FX takes the digital artist to the next level of creativity by teaching them how to blend their artistic talent seamlessly with the powerful tools of Photoshop CS2. The book assumes a fundamental level of skill with Photoshop and builds upon those skills by helping users learn how and why Photoshop does what it does. With this knowledge, users will be ready to take on new challenges and work through the practical and fun tutorials throughout the book. Many new features have been added to Photoshop CS2 and these are explored and put to work throughout the book. Some of these features include, working with High Definition file formats, the enhanced Camera Raw interface, the exposure merge program, an improved brush engine, new filter & special effects, and more. In addition, all of the core tools of Photoshop used for effects will be put to use in the projects covered throughout the book. So buckle up and put on your creativity cap – it’s time to create!

KEY FEATURES * Teaches artists how to harness the creative power of Photoshop CS2 to create masterpieces from their own digital photos * Explores the interface changes and highlights the new features of Photoshop CS2 through practical and fun tutorials * Explains how to use the exposure merge program to gain control over image shadow, midtones and highlights * Explores the changes and improvements to the brush engine * Covers the new effects in the special effects menu * Includes a companion CD-ROM w/ the files needed to do the tutorials, all the book images, demos of Photoshop CS (PC) and Nik Color Efex Pro (PC & Mac)

About the Author

Stephen Burns (Encinitas, CA) began as a photographer 25 years ago and then moved toward the digital medium. His influences include the great Abstractionists and Surrealists. He has been a corporate instructor and lecturer in digital art and design for 8 years. He won first place in the prestigious Seybold International Digital Arts contest. In addition, he works in 3D animation and digital video special effects editing, and is the current president of the San Diego Photoshop Users Group (sdphotoshopusers.com). He is also the author of Photoshop CS Trickery & FX.

Product Details

• Paperback: 346 pages
• Publisher: Charles River Media; 1 edition (November 9, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1584504471
• ISBN-13: 978-1584504474
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,012,308 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Going beyond the Standard Uses, January 9, 2006

By	John Matlock "Gunny" (Winnemucca, NV) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Note the word 'Advanced' in the title of this book. This is the second book by the same author and it is on things that the experienced Photoshopper can do above and beyond the normal retouching efforts covered in the standard introductory books.

In this book the author is doing things to images to convert them from standard photographs of things that exist to something more artful. And he takes images of things that never existed, such as space ships and adds things to them to make them suitable for use as book covers or other uses. In doing this, the book shows what can be done to convert a photograph into something you or your customer wants.

The things he is doing with photoshop require the use of tools that come with Photoshop, but which may not be used on a regular basis, and may not be covered anywhere near this depth in other, more general purpose Photoshop books.

The CD supplied with the book contains all the files needed to do the projects described in this book along with a demo of Photoshop CS 2, nik Multimedia Color Efex Pro, and nik Sharpener Pro.

This book contains information that isn't commonly seen, and covers it in a very well written manner.

20 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Don't judge a book by it's Title, June 18, 2006

By	PixelGeek "H" (PA) - See all my reviews

I've been using Photoshop for many years and bought this book looking for complex techniques and insight. I hate to disagree with the other reviews, but the book's title is misleading. (Please note that this is just my opinion)! I think the "trickery" examples in this book are somewhat basic and anyone with a general understanding of Photoshop (and a bit of creativity) can produce better results.

Although the topics and ideas in this book may "wow" beginners, advanced users should look elsewhere. At most, "intermediate" would describe this title better!

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Learn How To Create Sci-fi Digital Art, February 2, 2006

By	Diane Cipollo (Editor at BellaOnline.com) - See all my reviews

Have you ever wondered how to create great Sci-fi digital art? Did you ever want to create a human with animal features, flying spaceships with glowing exhaust or tornados with swirling debris? This book by Stephen Burns will show you how to create this type of digital art with Adobe Photoshop CS2.

The first two chapters cover the Photoshop CS2 interface and the techniques you will use in the tutorials that follow. You will learn how to create animated brushes, use layer blend modes to create composition images, advanced selection techniques and layer masks, and the new Photoshop HDR 32-bit High Dynamic Range merge techniques. You will also use third party filters such as nik Multimedia Color Efex Pro (on CD) for adding visual FX effects to your compositions.

Photo compositions and Sci-fi filter effects is the theme throughout this book and the step-by-step project tutorials in each chapter give you hands-on practice using techniques for manipulating your digital photos. The projects I enjoyed the most were the night scene of a futuristic architecture, Sci-fi droid in a nature setting, and non-human textures and features added to human subjects.

Stephen Burns has been a photographer for over 25 years and a digital artist for 10 years. He also works in 3D animation and digital video. He teaches beginner to advanced workshops on his Photoshop digital manipulating techniques and has written the previous version of this book. He has won the Seybold International Digital Arts contest and is the president of the San Diego Photoshop Users Group.