Adobe Books

One summer, I audited a graphic design course with absolutely no graphic design background. Completely unfamiliar with Adobe Photoshop, I purchased this book, hoping that I would be able to learn something about the program.

I learned so much more than I ever expected to from this book. The colorful pages and the engaging tone of the author makes this book a great tool. I consider myself 100% competent with Photoshop after reading this book cover to cover. But there is nothing in this book that makes that necessary - other than the fact that it is that interesting. It starts out with the most basic concepts, and slowly details all the ropes of the program.

Three years later, I always refer back to this book (as it is well organized and descriptive). I have also gone on to purchase numerous other books in the series as a result of my positive experience with this one. I highly recommend this book.

I know a little more about Photoshop than they average Joe. But after reading this book, I feel like a begginer. There are so many things in here that are new to me that I wish I had this book sooner. I found Colin because he donates his time to several websites, not his own, and gives tips. He really does not need to do this. All he has to do is sell his book. The only reason I did not give him 5 stars is because he really needed to include a disk that had the examples and pictures he uses as examples. But even without those, this is a very good book to learn Photoshop with.

This book is good for beginners I guess, and teaches you noting else but the basics. I think the manual that comes with your software gives you as much. A big let down. It should be named "how to start with photoshop and nothing else." It shows you couple of tricks at the end of the book but no explanations, tools used nor process but vage descriptions. Like that is a secret you'll find in a book named "How to do Everything with photoshop CS2." Save your money and just play with photoshop without this book. You'll speed you learning.

I think this book has excellent details and instructions for learning Photoshop, but the one thing it doesn't have is a disc or website listed to download the images used in the examples. It is harder to learn the steps when you don't have the images the book uses, so I only give it three stars.

I usually get skeptical when I see titles promising everything, but this book delivers!
Colin has hit on each detail of Photoshop CS2.
I've been using Photoshop since v2.0 and it wasn't until now, I realized that I've been doing things the hard way. Colin's explanations of tools like History Brush and Art History Brush will make my day to day work much easier and make me more efficient. Chapter 5 Advanced Layer Techniques and Chapter 6 Demystifying Channels are two must reads. I found myself really exploring the possibilities after reading these chapters. It was like having the same energy as when a child gets a new toy for Christmas.
The book is layed out in a logical format and it's an easy read for any experience level designer, with step by step descriptions and nice graphics and screenshots.
The bonus section with a behind the scenes look into techniques from other pros is a great inspiration to all designers.
I recommend this book as a great addition to any Photoshop users library. There's something for everyone in this book.

I needed to learn this program to get a coveted job after using Quark & PageMaker for 8 years. So I bought InD2 on an auction site and this book and dug in. I was up and running in just a few days, and this book really helped A LOT. It prepared me with a good solid knowledge of InDesign basics and was able to jump right in to CS2 (I got the job!). Don't jump into this program without this quicky reference!

everything was in order... and my b ook was recieved in a timely fashion

I'm a long-time PageMaker user (from version 3) and unlike the person who wrote a most derogatory review of this book : 'they were text oriented' and did not like the pictures, I thought they really helped me learn to use the software. As they say, "a picture is worth a thousand words"... Why would one wade through oceans of text when they could look at the pictures of the various palettes and get an overall sense of what Sandee is explaining. This is an excellent book, better than The Classroom in a Book, which I abandoned after purchasing Sandee's book

Great book for learning InDesign. Every time I open InDesign, I pick up this book. No book is perfect, but this is close.
--Book Editor/Layout

Use it everytime I am using/learning In-Design. Would be lost without the quick reference. A must have!

This book is great for beginners and people who have been using InDesign for years. Very detailed from start to finish. If you are working on a project and don't know how to do something it is very easy to find answers in this book.

This book is in detail for what Indesign software is made up to do. Easy to understand and to learn. Easy reading.

I've only bought a few computer manuals in my life [and never ended doing much with them but setting them on a shelf] before this, so perhaps I am not the best person to review one. Furthermore, I have never used a desktop publisher program of any kind (beyond WORD) before picking this book up - so I am about as clueless going into this as I can be. But, I had to learn In Design (along with Adobe Photoshop and Acrobat) fast. A design instructor recommended this book.

With just a little time, reading, and playing with direction - I feel like I can use In Design to do my publishing tasks. And that is saying a lot for a computer dummy like me.

There were personal forwards to the chapters that made the chapters easy to understand and that relate the software to technical/design concepts that even someone with no art and little design background can catch onto.

This books works well as a walk-through tortorial AND as a comprehensive reference book. But, unlike a $200 tutorial, this $20 book still has more to answer your questions and easy tables and listings to reference when you've walked yourself through the program.

I actually ENJOYED reading through this manual and playing with In Design- because it feels personal and interactive - without being condescending. And I felt like I was actaully moving along as I progressed through the book.

I have heard that this book may not be quite comprehensive enough for a professional designer who uses the full Adobe Creatve Suite to do professional ad and design work on a daily basis- and who is already comfortale and confident with the program. If that's you - go ahead and look into a $150+ set of manuals. But, if you are the average, even professional, individual who is looking to become familiar with In Design and its uses - then this book is very reasonably priced, easy to read and navigate, easy to reference, and -have to repeat - reasonably priced.

This is the best InDesign book out! Sandee knows this program inside and out! She explains it clearly, quick and concise! I recommend this to every desinger I know. I have a copy at work, and keep a copy for home use too!

Thanks Sandee for sharing your wisdom!

With several InDesign texts close at hand, this is the one I find myself reaching for first. Cohen has an approachable style and the material is logically organized. The linkage of virtually every section of text to one or more illustrations gives the reader "two kicks at every can." Her VQG for CS2 InDesign will be my first purchase after upgrading.

Although I cannot figure out the organization of this book, I have found it very useful in answering most of my Adobe Photoshop CS2 questions. Dave Cross has a writing style that may irritate some people, especially those that take themselves and their work very seriously. That is very easily offset by Dave Cross' expansive knowledge of Adobe Photoshop CS2 and his ability to make some difficult problems disappear. I highly reccomend this book to anyone trying to get a grasp on CS2 unless you are easily frustrated by having to search through the table of contents to find your questions.

This is the most under rated Photoshop book I've ever read! A technical wealth of information contained within a one stop source. I wish I had purchased this book long before I did and hope Dave keeps revising it as each new version of Photoshop is released. Handsomely layed out with an eye-catching cover, I think the title is perfect!

The Photoshop CS2 Help Desk Book by Dave Cross is not entirely what you might expect from the title. It certainly provides answers when Photoshop isn't behaving they way you expect it should. For instance you have a tool selected and you keep trying execute an action, but nothing is happening. This book will provide you a detailed description of how the tool functions and why it may not be working as you expected. But the coverage of this book goes beyond trouble shooting problems. It is a handy reference manual.
It is 259 pages long and is divided into 21 chapters. The opening seven chapters address the meat and potatoes of basic problem solving. They succinctly take you through the basics of Photoshop menus and tool functionality. The next ten chapters continue to function as help/reference for a myriad of different functions but I find them very interesting to consult even when I am not experiencing a problem. They are written such that you can quickly peruse the subjects and pick up little tips and tricks on how to execute an action better and/or faster than you may otherwise be used to doing so.
The last three chapters are dedicated to personalizing Photoshop and making it work for you. Chapter nineteen does a great job of explaining how to automate operations using actions and batch processing. Chapter twenty provides guidance on making your own unique brushes and patterns and then applying them in a variety of different manners. The final chapter addresses customizing Photoshop features like picture package and contact sheet.
I would recommend this book to anyone with a foundation in Photoshop. It certainly is not intended to hold your hand and walk you through the basic functions of the program, but it will help you understand why the program works the way it does, and how to best accomplish the myriad of tasks that Photoshop is capable of performing. And if you are the type to enjoy experimentation there is plenty of opportunity to do so with this book.
To me a review is most meaningful when you know a little something about the person writing the review. I have been an avid amateur photographer since the late 1970's and have been selling my work since 2004. Photography isn't my day job, but it does provide a welcome supplement. I have been shooting with a Canon Professional Digital SLR since 2003 and perform the vast majority of my post processing work in Photoshop. I began with Photoshop 7 and currently work with CS2. I am a member of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) and make extensive use of the abundant educational materials available on the member website. I have read well over two-dozen Photoshop training guides with one overriding goal in mind; producing the best images possible.

This is a very useful little book packed full of easy to understand information. I keep reaching for it over and over again.

Dave Cross is a senior developer of education and curriculum: his Photoshop CS2 Help Desk Book comes from a trainer's view and from years of fielding questions at Photoshop seminars. It's this background which led to his identification of frequently asked questions - and to Photoshop CS2 Help Desk Book , which allows users to identify common problems and how to fix them, from re-installing proper settings to understanding common warning dialog boxes and how to remedy common problems.

This is the best Go Live 6 book I have read. It is clear, concise, and get's you up and running quickly. I would reccomend it to anyone!

I've read several GoLove books to get a handle on the basics of this exceptional application. GoLive In 24 Hours is the best. It's easy to understand. Puts first things first. And gives one enough information to springboard into creating some pretty compelling web designs. I recommend it highly.

This guide is excellent, easy to understand and I highly recommend it.

I like to review books and products. I find it interesting that webauthoring and many graphic self help books are mostly text based when they talk and instruct about visual based computer software like golive 5. Even when many books use illustrations, screen shots and graphics to demonstrate commands, features, parts of the program and how to use, their writings are many times confusing, counter intuitive or make the learning process more difficult . Not so for Sams Teach golive 5.

I was hunting for another tutorial llike book to learn more about golive 5 and redo my websites. I wanted a book with more visuals. I stumbled upon this one while considering several other books that had many screen shots and visuals.

The strengths of this book are the way the authors have written this book. Thy write it in the manner that many want to learn - how build websites- not how to use the features. There is a big difference.

The authors actually seem to read your mind as you go through the learning process. I knew many features etc so I was trying to check how well the authors wrote the tutorial type text. Their
tutorials are easy to understand yet comprehensive.

Illustrations are to the point and are synchronized with the visual. While it is structured way of building and working with gl5 , it is very intuitively and flexibly written to tie in different ways to start, develop and produce with the program. In other books, many features are listed in several places in the index and are very hard to find. No so in this book. Most what you have to find is in one place. If there is more , you are directed within the text. No blind hunting is involved.

They usually come from different perspectives. For example, building web pages. They don't assume that there is only one way. You can create from new, modify others, import from servers, import from already made websites. They anticipate the many needs of the person reading the book.

One of the reasons I chose this book over some of the visual based books that have many more illustrations and screen shots is that they had extensive coverage how to use and insert quicktime video, graphics and more.

The book covers windows and mac versions by showing commands to use in the tutorials. At the end of each chapter, there are usually troubleshooting questions that answer some of the perplexing questions I found difficult to solve. Several times, when I had problems, the authors anticipated these with added explanations at the end of chapters. Some may find the little quizes at the end also helpful.

It does not come with a cd and is very reasonably priced compared to some of the other books which is another reason to buy it as a best buy.

I wish I had bought this book when I first bought golive. No matter what version of GL or operating system , I believe you will find this book will help you. Most novice and intermediate and even advanced users will find it very useful.

I am not sure about other books in this series , but these authors really know what they are talking about and have written the book to relay their ample knowledge. There are other GL books but I would recommend looking at this first.

Dr. Eric Flescher ...

i have zero web exprerience but wanted a website. my friend was supposed to help but didn't so i got this book and "the adobe golive 5.0 visual quickstart guide" (see my other review). both books enabled me to overcome my fear of the web and get my site done in record time. although i rated both books 5 stars i'd have to say this is the best for the absolute beginner. its very well written and its tone makes the sometimes daunting task of web design fun. if i had to pick one book for a beginner it would be this one. you can see the proof at...if you don't believe me. the site successfully launched today and i owe my thanks to this book. you can actually do quite a lot in golive. if you want a page with just some text and basic links this book will have you up and running in day or two. my site was a bit more involved but only took about a week after finishing the content. this book sells at a great price for all you'll learn. you can even access a website by the authors for tutorials with downloadable images and stuff. believe the title and get it.
-lucky bunny

Wow! I have used Photoshop for 6 years but the classes I took only taught an overview. Every time I used Photoshop, I felt I was stumbling around to figure out how to get a desired effect. Totally inefficient and highly frustrating. Today I began reading these tips and having reached only Tip # 107, I already understand so much more about Photoshop than I ever did before. It will take weeks to go through all the tips but I can already see it will be totally worth my time. A huge amount of information broken down into wonderfully short, understandable and useful tips. Just skip the tips that don't apply to your workflow. Much easier than following complicated lessons that are not necessarily geared toward your own needs.

I purchased this book about six months ago... it's like the Chicago phone book.
I can't believe how many times I've referenced this book to find tips and tricks to use in my designs. There are a lot of great Photoshop books on the market, but this title has helped me on a down-to-earth basis, more than any other book.
Highly Recommended.

This is a great book, i would give it a 5 out of 5 but i dont like one thing in this book and it is that some of the "tips" in here are just to obvious or simple and some of them you would probably never use. the way i see some of the tips in this book is like it would almost tell you how to change the hue of a simple photo or how to change the contrast of a photo. It's a great book but if they would only put some more challenging tips i would give it a 5 out of a 5. :)

This is a terrific book with sections broken down into the quick tips. Although I have had training on Photoshop, I never knew about some of the techniques that are mentioned in this book. I can get in and get out to immediately use the tip. The pictures are extremely helpful as well, since I tend to lean towards the visual side.

This is a great book for someone who is already familiar with the Photoshop 7 or CS interface.

This is not only the biggest book on my shelf, it has become the one I use the most often.

I like the tip format -- when I need a solution, I can turn right to the steps I need to perform.

Anderson's graphic arts skills shine -- he shows how to do cool things with simple operations and graphics (and photo images) anyone can create.

Anyone who uses Photoshop should own this book.

The GoLive 5 Bible is the best book about GoLive there is.
No matter if you are a beginner or more advanced in webpage building, the GoLive 5 Bible gives you all those explanations that you cannot find in the manual or the Help file for the software, and it does it clearly and understandably with many examples and illustrations and a good companion CD with a searchable PDF of the whole book.
Even though GoLive 6 is out by now, you can still use the GoLive 5 Bible for a good reference for a lot of things. It will still be a good reference for yet a long time.

...simple: when selecting books to be given the honor of
"EDITOR'S CHOICE" ..., we
do a little research.

First, we selected several typical questions from the
GoLive mailing list. Then we chose the key words from
the readers' questions, and looked them up in the index
to the book.

Now we judge the book on how quickly we get the answer
to the question, how many pages it took us to get a solution
that would solve the readers' questions, and how clearly
we could institute the directions in the actual GoLive
program, on a real web site.

Deborah's book got ALL TEN QUESTIONS within 2 pages,
and all implementations were in place within minutes.

The other top 5 GoLive books took at least 3 pages of
study to get to the solutions, and, believe it or not, 2 of
the books could not answer the questions at all!

We give GoLive Bible by Deborah Shadovitz top ratings, and the Editor's Choice Award for December, 2001 in the Designers Bookshelf.

I found this book to be very time wasting. Very few procedures 'get to the point'. At least 20% of the book is personal comments that have little to do with the subject at hand. The text meanders around a subject constantly without completely explaining how to do whatever the subject is. Almost all the figures in the book are from Mac systems while the text is referencing Windows. Most references to items in pull-down menus are for the Mac, which do not exist in Windows. It can take 10 or more pages to get through a procedure. The 'notes', 'cross references', 'tips', etc., have one going all over the book and never finding anything that completely describes whatever it is one is trying to do. The URLs mentioned in the book are very close to all being non-exitant.

The book is not one for those that are at the lower levels of web creating. It is very apparent that is was written by one who is somewhat familier with Adobe GoLive for those that are somewhat familier with GoLive. This book, along with the massively poor operational characteristics of GoLive has forced me to go back to Dreamweaver.

Usually Bible software books are pretty complete and extremely informative. However, they dropped the ball on this one. Golive Bible is as helpful as the manual that comes with the software. They both are poorly written with incomplete steps to solve or do things with Golive. When I often found myself using both.

The previous reviewer is full of hot air. This book is great. It covers all aspects of GoLive, from the most basic to the very advanced, in an easy-to-read and easy-to-learn approach. GoLive is an amazing piece of software, and no matter how hard you try, you can NEVER describe ALL of it in one book. However, Deborah Shadovitz's GoLive 5 Bible has a succeeded in addressing all the major points of the software and explaining those minor points which are of use to Web Designers and Developers who use this application in the real world. It beats any other GoLive book I have (and I have them all!).

This is a dense book of how-to's and why's. An excellent book for advanced users of Photoshop.

I concur with most of the positive things that have been said about this book, BUT ... it is limited as a learning tool

Unfortunately, the images printed in the book are not included in the CDROM. The author's excuse is that they are copyright images and therefore can't be included. My view is that he chose the wrong photos, since it is now impossible to follow along with his book in photoshop.

My second beef is that his descriptions are sometimes unnecessarily complex and lack clear direction. Again, I am looking at this book package as a source of learning.

The big shortcoming is the lack of alignment of the CDROM with the book. I felt badly let down. If you forget about the CDROM, you will be much happier and probably give him 5 stars.

Excellent book! As the title says so, most of the techniques are inclined towards photography retouching and enhancement, but it will appeal to most photoshop users. The 1st few chapters touch on fundamentals and serves as an instant guide, much better than the user guide. The other all-important criteria that I always look out for: FULL COLOR! I cannot imagine using a book on photos in b&w....how to see instant results to ease following the steps/techniques? The only bad thing is that most photos shown in the book are copyright and you will have to find comparable images yourself to work on.

An excellent companion book would be Photoshop 5 Artistry.

The biggest advantage, and I consider it a must, is the examples are in color, not B&W. Do not waste your money in any Photoshop book printed only in B&W.

Most of the techniques were illustrated in the examples in the color figures (inserts) in the chapters. The advantage of this approach is that you can see the changes and steps as the examples progress. The problem is that there is not enough room in the illustration to fully explain the techniques involved. Sometimes the author assumed that you had the prior knowledge required. There were a few important techniques that I had to go through it a few times before I got it.

The other shortcoming is that most of the pictures used in the important illustrations were not included in the CD. So, I was not able to practice the technique as illustrated.

I love the "Shortcut" chapter, which gave me all the keyboard shortcut keys to all the functions. This is a must when you do some heavy duty editing.

I think any author of Photoshop books should concentrate in the version of Photoshop the book is about. There is no need to go back and forth of any prior version because anyone who purchase a book like this is probably a new learner without any knowledge of prior version.

The CD has great video that outlines some very important techniques. I found it very helpful.

All in all, I rate this book a 8.5 out of 10, which is much better than most of the ones I've seen.

The book is very well written and seems to be complete. The Author has made several assumptions that may limit the usefullness and readablity of the book. He assumes that we are all planning to be commercial photographers with our work being prepared to be published and he seems to think that we have unlimited budgets and can afford scanners, cameras and printers that cost several thousand dollars apiece. One other small complaint is that the author being English has used numerous terms and measurements that are unfamiliar. A good book for advanced photographers

This book is very good, especially if you have some previous experience with Premiere. The only thing I regret about it, is that there is not a version to cover Premiere CS3 (yet). I am not going to explain any further about this book's qualities since all the other previous positive reviews cover everything already. All I can say is that I can recommend this to anybody who is not a complete novice on Adobe Premiere.

I highly recommend this book to anyone with very little or no Premiere experience.
This book covers all major topics on video editing with PPro. It also gives you an insight in video post production, basic camera setup, lightning and special effects.
I would recommend using this book as a reference, not as step by step guide. Keep practicing.!

Maybe Premiere Pro is too complex for average users, so this book could not cover it all. But I wish the book started by follow one example in steps, the explain in details of some special features in additional chapters.

This book is not organized in a way to teach you how to use the software, rather just some special features, not very complete on all the features, either. But this is the only book about Premiere Pro..

This book is great for the beginner. It will start you out by teaching you the basics of file management and setting up your computer to handle video editing and will lead you through a series of 'projects' to teach you the basics of video editing.

It also includes media with video clips to use in case you don't have any to begin with.

It's great book if you have never done any editing, or if you have never done editing with Premiere. Even one version behind on the software version, it is still a very useful book.

Jacob Rosenberg's Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0 Studio Techniques is great whether you're a Premiere newbie, or a seasoned vet.

I myself fall somewhere between those two, so it worked out perfectly. Jacob writes in a way that makes you feel comfortable - you can easily tell he is an avid user of Premiere Pro (not to be confused with an Avid user...video editing humor, anyone?). From his thorough yet laid back instructions to his various real-world examples, it's clear that he's not just authoring a paint-by-numbers look at some new piece of software. Jacob has been with Premiere from it's early stages of life, and in some cases has even had a hand in its evolution.

I specifically wanted this book for its insight on editing workflows, especially in regards to 24p and 24p HD projects in Premiere Pro. The included companion DVD has chapters devoted entirely to his experience onlining the HD feature documentary, Dust to Glory, with Premiere Pro on a PC...so this book was a no-brainer!

I was even able to contact the author himself and meet face to face to discuss the various intricacies of conforming an offline edit to an online all within Premiere Pro for a feature I'm currently working on. He was/continues to be incredibly helpful, and is truly the most knowledgeable person on Premiere Pro that I've ever had the pleasure to meet.

Bottom line, buy this book if you want insight on Premiere Pro.

This book is exactly what it says. I would not have bought this book if it wasn't required for a class. For one, it is just a list of fonts on every page with different point size examples. Two, it will not help you with typography in any way. I prefer to make my own style books based on the fonts that I own. It is frustrating to look at fonts in a book that has fonts that I do not. The best thing about this book is the fact that it is what it is, a font style book. I will probably never open it again and will probably just use it to buy time with a client that doesn't know what kind of typeface they want.

I love this reference book!
It helps designers to choose a better typeface in an efficient way. Over 2,000 gorgeous fonts are arranged very well. Thanks for the make-up, paper and book-binding, you can browse these fonts pleasantly.
Basic OpenType introductions are included in English, French and German. Small icon shows glyph supported indicates the range of using of each typeface.
If you were a font afficionado, you would not miss it!

This book is everything that I expected it to be. It sits on my desk and gets pulled out everytime I'm working on a project. Great investment.

Provided a nicely printed display of the fonts in fontfolio 10. Helps with clients choosing fonts they would like to use in thier designs as expected. Would have been nice to have in a hard cover since it is used a lot.

Any serious font user should have this book. Even you do not own the font, show it to your client and then buy when you need it.