Advanced Photoshop Elements 4.0 for Digital Photographers

The author has done an excellent job of leading you through different processes to fully use Photoshop Elements. You'll be able to understand "layers" and how to apply them without disturbing the original picture. By following the instructions, you will be surprised how adept you can be in giving photos new life (and some pretty nifty effects). After reading this book, I became a real pro with Photoshop Elements 4.0 (the version I use currently). If you buy one book to learn Elements, this is it!

There are a lot of books out there that claim to be for photographers or digital photographers but Phiiip Andrews' approach to his latest book focus on the Photoshop Elements as an extension of your digital camera experence. Missing are endless pages of running reharsh of material that is well covered in the user manual. In its place you will discover well laid out explainations of the essential features in Elements that can transform interesting photos into prize winners. He could have devoted more space to Raw conversion but as a Photoshop Elements author I am aware of the cold hard facts that exteremely few Elements users actually use Raw format so any additional coverage of the topic would have been a waste of ink and paper. If you are a digital photographer that wants to move beyond the point-and-shoot world of vacation photos this is the perfect guidebook. I would be remiss if I failed to point out one major flaw in the book. While the photos in the book are beautiful, the author insists that the photos are colour. If you can overlook the fact that the author has a misguided devotion to the UK spelling of color you won't find a better book on this topic.

I find myself wondering why manuals and 'textbooks' can't be written in this same easy-to-read style. Philip Andrews has now become my 'author of choice' in regards to all things photographic or digital, or a combination of the two. This latest book is done in his easy style - whether you're 'novice' or 'advanced' (or somewhere in between), he 'talks' to us all. The added advantage of 'Advanced Photoshop Elements 4' is that it also gives you tips for earlier versions of Elements - and a 'novice' need not be afraid to read through it. So, whether you're just starting with Elements 4 - or still using version 2 - you're bound to pick up some time-saving (and / or creative) tips. The big plus with Philip Andrews' style is that he caters to photographers (who create 'visually' - that is, they like to look at photographs, and photographic styles, and create graphic images). So his books are filled with photographs - and COLOUR photos at that (which is how most of us like to view images). But for the Black & White purists, there are B & W techniques, as well. Whether you're involved with web pages - or puzzling through the 'mysteries' of printing - or pining for a great panorama (it explains about 'Nodal Points' - but simplifies the explanation if you DON'T want to know about technical details) - or correcting, or making, distortions - being more creative - or just finding out HOW all those tools in Elements work - this is THE 'textbook' or 'Bible' for Elements-users to have in their library.

This book is more than just a Photoshop Elements software manual, it includes chapters on scanner and camera techniques and printing tips. Other chapters cover both basic and advanced tasks. Throughout there are sidebars with step-by-step workflows. The book is filled with color illustrations and screen shots. All versions of Elements are covered here but I'm not sure why this might be needed in an advanced book. The arrangement of articles makes some things harder to find - for example the section about tinkering with the depth of field is in the chapter on Panoramas. Each section includes an indication of related techniques and difficulty level. This book has to be compared to Scott Kelby's Elements 4 book. In general the Kelby book is more advanced - it includes a chapter on RAW processing for example where this Andrews book only has 2 pages. The Kelby book is better organized but it is limited to just advanced Elements procedures. If you are an intermediate user this Andrews book is probably the one you want.