Artist's Photo Reference: Water & Skies

Book Description

Artists can't always wait for perfect weather and lighting conditions to paint a dramatic sky, or drive to a distant coast to paint a stunning seascape. That's why reference photos are so essential--they save artists hours of time, frustration and unnecessary work. The Artist's Photo Reference: Water and Skies makes finding those much-needed images easy, by placing hundreds of magnificent, high-quality photos at the artist's fingertips.

Streams, rivers, waterfalls, waves and breathtaking cloud formations are just some of the themes that will be sure to spark creativity. Also included are 6 step-by-step demonstrations by a variety of artists, painted from some of the actual photos included in the book. A special introductory section instructs readers on how to take their own inspiring photos.

Customer Reviews:

Just Wonderful.......2004-01-21

I just absolutely love this book. I bought this with the Landscape part of the series, with the hope to get more water. This book has it. It has a wonderful selection of snow scenes and even frost!!! It then has several different types of beach and ocean scenes. The one thing that I was really looking for that this book didn't have, which is why I gave it a 4, was that there was no rain. There were plenty of fog and mist, which were wonderful, but not a single rain picture. They had a few rainbows, but no rain. I thought it was interesting, but perhaps its just really that hard to take a picture of rain. So if your looking for a book with rain, I would suggest looking elsewere. If your just looking for a great book with lots of water and sky, this would be my pick!!

Artist's Photo Reference: Water & Skies.......2003-06-07

What a fantastic book! The photos and the art are all Breathtaking. Its a must for any landscape artist's book shelf. I've used it time and time again.

Book Description

Use the latest version of Photoshop Elements and this easy-to-understand book to create professional-quality images for print and the Web from your very own digital and scanned images. This guide will show you how to take advantage of the flexible tools and versatile output options so you can be more creative than you ever imagined!

Customer Reviews:

Cover Art as a Loss Leader.......2005-02-05

The only well printed page (in color) is the cover. The book is printed in material that is virtually newsprint -- extremely hard to read and illustrations are poor as a consequence, some to illegibility. The book is in no way an improvement over the original Adobe manual -- or rather, it is in no way comparable. A waste of time and money.

Not very elegant.......2004-07-31

Digital photography is all about color. Why would any publisher release a book on the manipulation of color images in Photoshop with mostly black and white examples?

Save your money

Might have been a great book with color.......2004-03-13

I found the book well-organized and quite lucid. The author clearly understands the program well. The book's Achilles heel (and probably the reason for its relatively inexpensive price) is that there are only a few color illustrations in the center. All of the other illustrations are done in low resolution B&W, making it nearly impossible to appreciate the techniques or changes in images. If the publisher had raised the price a few dollars and done the illustrations in color, the book would be vastly more valuable.

My Best Photoshop Elements 2.0 Reference Book.......2003-01-03

I have three other PSE 2.0 books, but this is by far the best one. Plotkin takes you through every element, tool, method, etc. He has two chapters (52 pages) on layers alone, which to me was especially important. Although he doesn't have a lot of color pictures (using less expensive black and white), the explanations and effects are quite clear and easy to understand. I was really only scratching the surface of PSE 2.0 before I got this book.
I highly recommend it. It is also very reasonably priced as compared to some others I considered.

How to Do Everything with Photoshop Elements (How to Do Everything)

Average customer rating:

Very informative

How to Do Everything with Photoshop Elements (How to Do Everything)
David Plotkin
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Adobe Photoshop | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

Digital Photography | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Graphic Design | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Software | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0072262672

Book Description

Edit, organize, and show off your photos using Photoshop Elements 4.0 and the expert tips in this full-color guide. You’ll learn to customize the program to suit your preferences, and then get started retouching, repairing, and enhancing digital images in no time. Step-by-step examples show you how to crop images, fix color, focus, and exposure problems, eliminate defects, manipulate images, add special effects, and much more. You’ll also get tips for getting high-quality prints and creating a Web gallery.

Customer Reviews:

Very informative.......2006-08-31

Great help guide which is easy to read and follow. Best how to guide I can remember reading and really helps get the value out of the software.

How to Do Everything with Photoshop(R) Elements 3.0 (How to Do Everything With--)

Average customer rating:

A Bible for the Newcomer
Photoshop Elements 3.0
Great book, but missing details...

How to Do Everything with Photoshop(R) Elements 3.0 (How to Do Everything With--)
David Plotkin
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Adobe Photoshop | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Graphic Design | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Software | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

Look Inside Computer Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books
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ASIN: 0072258055

Book Description

Get the most out of Photoshop Elements with help from this easy-to-use, full-color guide. Learn to fix images, remove red-eye and other flaws, restore photographs, use layers, create photo collages, work with filters, add type, and more. Plus, get tips for printing your images and posting them to the Internet.

Customer Reviews:

A Bible for the Newcomer.......2006-06-05

Covering Adobe's lack of a decent manual, David Plotkin has put together a bible for the newcomer to Photoshop Elements 3.0 including all the features available in Elements to enhance, retouch and repair digital images. In addition, Plotkin has included sections on preparing panoramas, web galleries and image printing.
Photoshop Elements consists of two major sections; the Organizer (used to manage the huge volume of images you hope to have) and the Editor (used to make improvements in your images). Many Elements how-to books open with the Organizer, which tends to bore people who bought the program for its editing functions. Plotkin, however, jumps right into the Editor with a discussion of the Workspace and the Tools available. After sections on global editing (changes of the entire image), he moves easily into Selections (working only with a portion of the image) and Layers (segregating change steps or inserts in a recoverable work pattern).
Directions for effective use of the Organizer functions follow, as well as the Panorama and Web Page development.
This book is a good choice for the image editing newcomer. (Reviewed by MiltK)

Photoshop Elements 3.0.......2006-03-07

I first checked this book out from my local library. I found it to be useful and purchased my own copy. The author does a good job explaining the various functions available to the user. "Tips" and "Notes" are included, throughout the book, to help the user learn software features that might otherwise be discovered only through trial and error. The index is well done, making it easy to find information on a particular subject. This is a great book for people who are getting started in digital photography and want to learn more about how to use Photoshop Elements 3.0

Great book, but missing details..........2005-08-23

When I first begain working with digital photography I started with the Jasc Paintshop Pro...big mistake. The program was hard to learn on your own and offered very few books or programs to teach you the power of it. When I upgraded to a bigger and better camera when my son was born, I decided to try out Photoshop elements. Again, when I purchased the software, I was at first completly lost. The manual that comes with it basically is worthless. So then I turned to this book...

I have sense then finished reading through the book and following along with it on the actual program. I can now do the basic editing along with some advanced techniques used by professionals. The author of this book does a very good job at explaining the techniches and how to perform them, the only bad thing I have noticed is that he doesn't so much go into WHEN you would want to use some of the editing tools. So on that account, much of it has been trial and error.

Overall, I would highly recommend this book to newcomers to Photoshop Elements 3. It is a great place to start and learn what the software can offer.

How to do Everything with Photoshop Elements

Average customer rating:

Could have been better
Learning Digital Imaging
disappointing imaging
Great book for the beginner
A Helpful Resource

How to do Everything with Photoshop Elements
Molly Joss
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill Companies
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Photography | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

Equipment | Photography | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

Adobe Photoshop | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

Digital Photography | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Graphic Design | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

General | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0072191848

Book Description

Another release in our popular How to Do Everything series, this friendly, solutions-oriented book is filled with step-by-step examples that illustrate how to create professional-quality digital images for print and the Web from your digital and scanned images. Each chapter begins with the specific how-to topics that will be covered, and within the chapter, each topic is accompanied by a solid, easy-to-follow walkthrough of the process.

Customer Reviews:

Could have been better.......2004-12-23

Her writing reminds me of mom, but I didn't plunk in $24.00 to
read some cookbook style of conversational writing, and It's
suppose to be a photo editing book, then why the black and white
examples and a sorry lot at that, the few colored ones are about
texture examples, they're important, but not that important to
waste color on them, better to have used color on the real
examples. I wasted my money, save yours.

Learning Digital Imaging.......2002-08-25

This book misses a lot of details and "How to"..
Many examples are difficult to complete and results are not easy to achieve..And does not answer the questions.
Not good for beginners in Photoshop Elements.

disappointing imaging.......2002-03-26

I bought this book the day I bought elements. I don't believe the author spent quality time on those issues which were important to me. I'm terribly confused on layers,filters etc. and her examples not only being in b&w were hard to discern, the examples didn't seem apporpriate. I thought I would learn how to maximize the use of an 8 by 11 piece of photo paper by bringing as many different images as I could to that one sheet, but nothing was written to help me. Confused and disappointed.

Great book for the beginner.......2002-01-27

As a magazine editor, I've worked with the author on a number of articles in graphic arts. She always presents information in a to-the-point, easy-to-read manner, and "How to do Everything with Photoshop Elements" is no exception.
There's a targeted audience here -- the consumer and the business user who's not a graphic artist -- and the book does an excellent job of teaching photo-editing basics using Photoshop Elements. Instead of the command-by-command approach of two-inch-thick guides, this book focuses on the most-common jobs of occasional users: simple color correction, sharpening, cropping, etc.
The book also deaks with some non-photo work, such as drawing and text effects. For the graphics pro, these are tasks better suited for a program such as Adobe Illustrator; however, for the general audience Joss aims for, the details show a great way to get the most power and value from Photoshop Elements.
This isn't a book for power users, but Photoshop Elements isn't a software for intense graphics work, either. "How to do Everything with Photoshop Elements" provides some friendly, non-technie instruction that provides basic skills.
So why three stars? The writing and instruction are easily four to four and one-half on the rating scale; however, the book could've used more color illustrations of commands and techniques. The book's layout and art quality (including the missing chapter-title art) shows some slap-dash work and inattention by the publishing company; Joss' clear writing and good instruction deserves better.

A Helpful Resource.......2002-01-10

Design professionals may want something slicker, but for all the rest of us, this book is exactly the help we need. Clear, step-by-step directions and real-life examples.

Average customer rating:

How to do Everything with Photoshop Elements
Molly W. Joss
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill Companies
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Adobe Photoshop | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B000OG1HRA

Average customer rating:

How To Do Everything With Photoshop Elements (how To Do Everything)
David Plotkin
Manufacturer: Mcgraw-Hill Osborne Media
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Adobe Photoshop | Digital Photography & Video | Computers & Internet | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B000OFRBIK

Book Description

From his outstanding illustrations for "Magic-The Gathering" card series to the lovingly rendered and authorized portraits of many "Babylon Five" stars like Claudia Christian, fan-fave Douglas Shuler has carved quite a unique career. Now, for the first time, many of his most popular pieces, a well as all-new drawings, are collected into one edition. A must for fantasy art buffs, as well as those who love their fantasies in the buff!

Customer Reviews:

THE STUNNING FANTASY ART OF DOUG SHULER.......2005-12-14

Dough Shuler is an enormously talented artist...just pick-up this book and see for yourself! SQP presents this book of Shuler's work featuring both sketches and finished pieces. Shuler has made quite a name for himself in recent years working in the gaming industry and providing art for companies such as Steve Jackson Games, Game Designer's Workshop, Iron Crown Enterprises, FASA, TSR, Mayfair Games, White Wolf, West End Games, and Wizards of the Coast (including many pieces for Magic: The Gathering) and more recently doing art for video and computer games. This 64 page book highlights many extraordinary examples of his work, complete with capsule commentary by the artist himself that gives valuable insight into his creative process.

One of his earliest pieces is also one of his own favorites, and mine as well, which is a drawing of the warrior maiden Cerridwyn. "Trick or Treat" is another favorite of mine, a newer piece showing off a woman in a provocative bat costume. Then there is "Dragon Wyne" showing a beautiful women lying in comfort on the tail of her dragon partner, both with sly, knowing grins on their faces. "Leslie" is a departure from the fantasy motif that shows off an exotic blonde in leather boots, black fishnet stockings, and an outfit made of criss-crossing leather straps. In the same vein is "Hell's Angel", depicting a gorgeous nude angel riding a motor cycle. Another favorite is "The Beach" which is a parody of the old Coppertone sun tan lotion ads, but this one has a cute little dragon tugging on the bikini bottom of a hot sun goddess. And I would be remiss if I did not mention "The Sheriff" that features a buxom peace officer in lace stockings and bustier.

Another thing I like about the book is that there is a photo gallery of several of the models who posed for Shuler's pieces. I think it's a great touch to give the models their due as well as many times they are overlooked. Nice touch from Shuler and SQP! It's a great book for lovers of fantasy art. Check out Doug's website for even more great art.

Reviewed by Tim Janson

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