Customer Rating: 
Summary: Helpful!
Comment: Bought this for my son, who found it helpful while taking classes for his graphic design classes.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Worth the price
Comment: Third photoshop book (slow learner) I have purchased and is as good or better than others. Easy to follow if you follow the precise directions. Video on disc that comes with it really helps as it previews the lessons in the book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Decent book for beginners, but buggy with Vista
Comment: Because I could not get the DVD lessons to work on my computer, I have only read the first lesson, so please keep that in mind while assessing my review.
Despite a major effort, I could not get the primary function of the DVD -- the lessons -- to perform using MS Windows Vista (Home Premium). So, for Vista users, I would give this book 2 stars rather than 3. Because I could not use the entire panoply of teaching media, I can only speculate that I might give it 3 or even 4 stars for an XP (or other OS) user.
The video lectures on the DVD are not very good. They don't hurt anything but they were a waste of time for me. The writer/lecturer spends a lot of time hemming and hawing, and the presentation is generally quite slow and lacking good interactivity or "now do this" interactivity. (Again, there is a chance some of the later videos might be better, but these faults are basic and so I doubt it.)
As a comparison, Adobe has free online videos that move like lightning. (I have only used the CS3 version.) You have to stop the Adobe online videos frequently and watch them a number of times -- they move way faster than I can absorb information -- but at least you don't have to sit through an amateurish talking head rambling on about himself, the video, etc.
In summary, for me, the DVD was a total waste of time and money. In fact, it was a major pain in the neck. You are forced to spend time and brain power just learning how to use the book, installing the software, setting up your computer, etc., just to use it well enough to see if you like it. "How to use this book" is 14 pages long.
The book standing alone is competent and useful, but not great. Because there are so many pictures, large margins, large print, heavy paper, etc., the amount of content is limited. Still, as far as I could tell, it gets a beginner through a lot of the basics. Unlike some other reviewers, I found it satisfactory as a beginner. However, I was already competent in PaintShop Pro, so I may have had a head start.
The only mistakes I found were infrequent and very minor, dealing with changing notation for Windows OS. I suspect the author's primary computer (like many graphic artists) is an Apple Mac, and the commands are translated for Windows. This isn't really a drawback for a Windows user, but it leads me to suspect that the DVD may work more seamlessly on a Mac. (And if you are or want to be a graphic artist, you really might consider using an Apple computer.)
To me, the book is not comprehensive enough within the individual segments, even for a beginner. However, all the basic bases needed to use Photoshop are covered.
Edit: I have watched more lesson videos in the CS3 edition of this book. The later videos are very different from the first one; they get to the point without wasting time. At worst, they don't feel like a waste of time, and at best, they are helpful. (The CS3 edition also abandons auto-installation, which is a big help.)
The lesson files are very helpful to using the book. Especially for the beginner, they allow the reader to follow verbatim instructions to get a specific result, which would be a godsend to someone who was totally confused. So I feel that I would give this book "four stars" for someone who uses Windows XP (assuming that it installs correctly on XP!).
Customer Rating:
Summary: Photoshop follow directions and try it.
Comment: This book I am using with a class I am taking. The instructions take a few chapters to get used to the writers style. The author covers a lot of good things that are very useful in photography as well as graphics. The only thing is the guy just can't take very good photos, but you can fix that, learn the basics from this book and take your'e own photo's! There is a lot to learn in this book to adapt to your own style! Go for it!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: The why of Photoshop
Comment: As a web designer whose strength is in coding and scripting, Photoshop has always seemed to be a cauldron of black magic to me. The knowledgible knew how to coax results from the tempermental pot, but we newbies were most likely to get burned. While Photoshop's unfriendly, counter-intuitive environment is partly to blame, a host of "follow this list of steps to make a button/background/fancy text/whatever without learning why these steps are necessary" tutorials - both on the web and in books - also share some of the responsibility.
Thankfully, McClelland's book more than makes up for the lax presentations of scores of wannabe Photoshop authors.
To get right to the point, One-on-One is an exercise in describing the why of Photoshop. While the book is filled with tutorials (a few per chapter), they all fit into a shared context. McClelland doesn't just tell the reader to slavishly follow his steps, but WHY they're necessary and WHY they work. He teaches the reader how to read a color historgram, why relying on Photoshop's auto image adjustment tools are only the first step in editing an image, even rudimentary color theory. I honestly learned more by reading the first chapter in this book then by struggling through a host of inane tutorials.
In short, One-on-One does it right. It's a must-have for any potential Photoshop user.
Summary: Helpful!
Comment: Bought this for my son, who found it helpful while taking classes for his graphic design classes.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Worth the price
Comment: Third photoshop book (slow learner) I have purchased and is as good or better than others. Easy to follow if you follow the precise directions. Video on disc that comes with it really helps as it previews the lessons in the book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Decent book for beginners, but buggy with Vista
Comment: Because I could not get the DVD lessons to work on my computer, I have only read the first lesson, so please keep that in mind while assessing my review.
Despite a major effort, I could not get the primary function of the DVD -- the lessons -- to perform using MS Windows Vista (Home Premium). So, for Vista users, I would give this book 2 stars rather than 3. Because I could not use the entire panoply of teaching media, I can only speculate that I might give it 3 or even 4 stars for an XP (or other OS) user.
The video lectures on the DVD are not very good. They don't hurt anything but they were a waste of time for me. The writer/lecturer spends a lot of time hemming and hawing, and the presentation is generally quite slow and lacking good interactivity or "now do this" interactivity. (Again, there is a chance some of the later videos might be better, but these faults are basic and so I doubt it.)
As a comparison, Adobe has free online videos that move like lightning. (I have only used the CS3 version.) You have to stop the Adobe online videos frequently and watch them a number of times -- they move way faster than I can absorb information -- but at least you don't have to sit through an amateurish talking head rambling on about himself, the video, etc.
In summary, for me, the DVD was a total waste of time and money. In fact, it was a major pain in the neck. You are forced to spend time and brain power just learning how to use the book, installing the software, setting up your computer, etc., just to use it well enough to see if you like it. "How to use this book" is 14 pages long.
The book standing alone is competent and useful, but not great. Because there are so many pictures, large margins, large print, heavy paper, etc., the amount of content is limited. Still, as far as I could tell, it gets a beginner through a lot of the basics. Unlike some other reviewers, I found it satisfactory as a beginner. However, I was already competent in PaintShop Pro, so I may have had a head start.
The only mistakes I found were infrequent and very minor, dealing with changing notation for Windows OS. I suspect the author's primary computer (like many graphic artists) is an Apple Mac, and the commands are translated for Windows. This isn't really a drawback for a Windows user, but it leads me to suspect that the DVD may work more seamlessly on a Mac. (And if you are or want to be a graphic artist, you really might consider using an Apple computer.)
To me, the book is not comprehensive enough within the individual segments, even for a beginner. However, all the basic bases needed to use Photoshop are covered.
Edit: I have watched more lesson videos in the CS3 edition of this book. The later videos are very different from the first one; they get to the point without wasting time. At worst, they don't feel like a waste of time, and at best, they are helpful. (The CS3 edition also abandons auto-installation, which is a big help.)
The lesson files are very helpful to using the book. Especially for the beginner, they allow the reader to follow verbatim instructions to get a specific result, which would be a godsend to someone who was totally confused. So I feel that I would give this book "four stars" for someone who uses Windows XP (assuming that it installs correctly on XP!).
Customer Rating:
Summary: Photoshop follow directions and try it.
Comment: This book I am using with a class I am taking. The instructions take a few chapters to get used to the writers style. The author covers a lot of good things that are very useful in photography as well as graphics. The only thing is the guy just can't take very good photos, but you can fix that, learn the basics from this book and take your'e own photo's! There is a lot to learn in this book to adapt to your own style! Go for it!!!
Customer Rating:
Summary: The why of Photoshop
Comment: As a web designer whose strength is in coding and scripting, Photoshop has always seemed to be a cauldron of black magic to me. The knowledgible knew how to coax results from the tempermental pot, but we newbies were most likely to get burned. While Photoshop's unfriendly, counter-intuitive environment is partly to blame, a host of "follow this list of steps to make a button/background/fancy text/whatever without learning why these steps are necessary" tutorials - both on the web and in books - also share some of the responsibility.
Thankfully, McClelland's book more than makes up for the lax presentations of scores of wannabe Photoshop authors.
To get right to the point, One-on-One is an exercise in describing the why of Photoshop. While the book is filled with tutorials (a few per chapter), they all fit into a shared context. McClelland doesn't just tell the reader to slavishly follow his steps, but WHY they're necessary and WHY they work. He teaches the reader how to read a color historgram, why relying on Photoshop's auto image adjustment tools are only the first step in editing an image, even rudimentary color theory. I honestly learned more by reading the first chapter in this book then by struggling through a host of inane tutorials.
In short, One-on-One does it right. It's a must-have for any potential Photoshop user.