Re: starting Photoshop 5.5. books?

>Hi Everyone.
>
   I'm going to start learning Photoshop 5.5 and I was hoping maybe 
you could suggest some good beginner's books for the absolute novice.

-----------------


For learning Photoshop, IMO, you have three options:

(1) Adobe Photoshop 5.5 Web Edition, Classroom In a Book, mentioned 
in another reply, is very well written. It consists of a series of 
tutorials to work through, with step-by-step instructions.


(2) Use one of the abbreviated learn-to books.
	(a) Teach Yourself Adobe Photoshop 5 in 21 Days (Sams) is OK.
	(b) There's a Photoshop book in the Peachpit Visual 
Quickstart series that I'm not familiar with. Most of those books are 
OK (but not all), and some are excellent.

(3) Get one of the comprehensive books on Photoshop, These are 
generally eight hundred to a thousand pages. You can skip over 
sections you don't need to know now, and refer back to it later.
	(a) My favorite in this category is Photoshop 5 Bible by Deke 
McClelland.
	(b) Another one is Inside Photoshop 5, Limted Edition, by 
Gary David Bouton and Barbara Bouton.
	(c) Photoshop 5 In Depth, by David Xenakis and Sherry London, 
is a possibility.


There are a lot of other books on Photoshop, some dealing with 
specific aspects of PS, and so not targeted to the novice. The latest 
edition of the Wow! book was mentioned in another reply. It's an 
excellent book, and among the best on Photoshop, but it's not a book 
for a novice to learn the program.

Whatever book you get, be sure it's up-to-date: e.g., don't get a 
book for PS 4 if you're using 5.5. For learning v5.5, you need a book 
that's based on either v 5 or v5.5. (5.5 has several new functions, 
including some aimed at Web graphics; plus some of the 5.5 books 
include ImageReady.)


Jeff

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