Photoshop CS Power Session DVD

Featuring Scott Kelby

www.peachpit.com ISBN:0-7357-1424-X

Reviewed by Maureen Shannon, NJPCUG

One of a series of Photoshop CS training videos by featuring Scott Kelby that will help you to understand and use Photoshop CS more efficiently. This DVD walks you through the features of Photoshop CS and shows you how they work.

Photoshop CS Power Session covers 13 chapters. Topics included are: the File Browser, File Browser Automation, Batch Renaming, Match Color, Color Replacement Tool, Shadow/Highlight, New Documents, Camera Raw, Type on a Path, Layer Comps, Filter Gallery, Photo Filters, and Histogram.

This is one of 3 training sessions that I have and each has been extremely informative and helped me to understand and get more out of using Photoshop.

The image to the left is a screen shot of the File Browser. The File Browser had been updated and now has gone from its former dockable palette style to a full blown browser with an outstanding set of features and capabilities.

The File Browser, first chapter, introduces the viewer to targeting folders, customizing the file browser, sorting and flagging images, metadata, keywords and searching. A very thorough overview shows you how to to everything from setting up the preview and thumbnails from an assortment of available sizes to making your own customizable size. You will see how to enter metadata, flag photos, and save customized browser looks for future use. This is a rather simplistic explanation of the basics but it offers Photoshop users an excellent browser that you will quickly come to appreciate.

 File Browser Automation is the second chapter topic. Here the viewer learns about PhotoMerge, Web Photo Gallery, and PDF Presentation. The Automation features are just amazing. They help you speed up your work and do things that would have required you to go into other applications to complete before Photoshop CS.

PhotoMerge (seen on the left) will produce a panorama from several photos you have taken. Shots must follow around so that they stitch together and not be random shots you try to piece together. PhotoMerge will assemble and blend them seamlessly together. If a seem is not to you liking, an advanced blend mode will fix that and if for some reason the merge feature rejects the third image, the demonstration shows you how to manually add in the final piece of the panorama photo

The Web Photo Gallery takes a series of photos you need to place on the web site, say for client approval, and generates the work for you. You point the application to the image folder, select the option that says you want to make an html page, enter your email address and chose a feedback form from the form options, click OK and it creates your web site complete with thumbnails and optimized images including a feedback form for each images approval or disapproval and comments. It will then launch your browser and show you the generated html pages. How amazing is that!

PDF Presentation is another item has refined time saving features to a fine art. Now you are able to create a slideshow, saved in a PDF format, with all the necessary security settings you need to protect your work from unauthorized copying (or printing) without ever exiting Photoshop CS. You have the choice of either a PDF document or a presentation. The presentation is what I am writing about here. I wasn’t aware of this feature until I saw it demonstrated in the Wedding Photographers training DVD. When I saw it, I was very impressed. Professionals can now do all of their editing and presenting within Photoshop making their work flow easier than ever. The presentation even has transitions to add style to the slideshow as it runs. After choosing your preferences and entering the information, it creates the secure document for you. The image above is a Panorama shot I created of three of the Presentation screens. Even though they had no edge and were not a real set of panorama photos, I was still able to manually place the images side-by-side, stitch them together, and create one large image that included all the information I wanted to show here.  I didn’t have to take the three photos and manually try to combine them into one image for demonstration purposes…….not the intended use of the PhotoMerge feature but it worked for my needs!

Next is the Batch Renaming feature (chapter 3). This feature is not new to Photoshop CS but it has been updated. Through batch renaming you can take a collection of images, for example with camera identification numbers, and tell it to move the renamed photos to a new folder (entered through the dialog box) with a name you choose, select the image extension and numerical settings (two numbers, date selections, serial numbers, etc.), image names, and then the new update lets you tell it what number you want the first photo to begin with. Batch renaming is located in the browser section in the automation section.

The Color Match feature is in the fourth chapter. Another quick solution to the problem of varying degrees of tonal coloration is the Color Match ability. If you have two photos (that will be included in a layout, for example) and one is in warm tones and the other in cool and you want them to match, you simply sample the color from the photo that has the color you want to use and match it to the other photo. This is done by choosing

 Image>Adjustments>Color Match and then select the source you want to match from the two photos you have open.

The One you want to change should be the selected image when you go to the adjustments. Then you choose the second one as the source to match. It’s simple and a quick fix that works very well. In the photo example shown here, the first photo is warm tones and the second is cool. I want to match the tone in the second image. Following the steps mentioned here and using the cool photo as my source the Color Match feature matches the tones for me. No more fiddling around with adjustments or filters in an attempt bring some sort of tonal equality to photos that do not match but need to. These simple steps save a tremendous amount of time and for a busy professional, time is money….but it’s appreciated by all who use it.

The chapters 5 through 13 explain how to use other great Photoshop features. Chapter 5 is the Color Replacement Tool: how to change the color of objects to a specific color, changing eye color, and how to fix a red eye problem. This works so well and is so easy to do, that you will be delighted with it the first time you try it.

Chapter 6 is Shadows/Highlights: it introduces you to increasing the detail in shadows, decreasing highlights, and how to create your own default settings. This is another tool that rates high marks. No longer do you have to struggle with a variety of settings in an attempt to recover details or adjust highlights and shadows. This tool will fix the problem with a few moves of its sliders and if more tweaking is necessary, a  drop down menu brings up another complete list of settings for fine tuning. The owl example shows how the bright white washes out the feathers details…..using the Shadows/Highlights adjustment, the owl on the right is darker and the feathers are more pronounced and have more texture. The face has also deepened it’s color and the eyes no longer look washed out.

Chapter 7: New Documents: how to create preset sizes and how to change measurements; Chapter 8 Camera Raw: how to open raw images in the file browser, adjust the image in camera raw, and apply settings to other images.

 Chapter 9 explains the new Text on a Path feature and how to add it to your work.

Chapter 10 introduces you to Layer Comps: it defines how you can create and view multiple versions of a layered document, update altered versions, and turn the layer comps into a web gallery. Chapter 11 is the Filter Gallery: here you will see how to apply multiple filters to an image and then change the order and settings of filters. Chapter 12 is about the Photo Filter’s changing the color tone of an image using a Photo Filter Adjustment Layer. The last chapter covers the Histogram features: “Using the Histogram for Feedback” and “Changing the view in the Histogram palette”.

I got a lot out of watching this video…it helped me get up to speed on all the newest features of Photoshop CS very quickly. It not only introduced me to Photoshop CS’s new features but clearly explained how to use them properly. Using training session DVDs, you become a more informed user, advance your knowledge, and in turn your work and the amount of time spent working improve dramatically. I recommend this DVD to those who want to learn more about Photoshop CS in a very pleasant and well developed training session. The DVD lists for $39.95 and is available through PeachPit Press’s web site and the author’s web site (www.photoshopvideos.com).

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