Photoshop for Wedding Photographers DVD

Featuring Scott Kelby  
ISBN:0-321-34869-9

www.photoshopvideos.com

Reviewed by Maureen Shannon, NJPCUG

Not just another boring training video…..Scott Kelby makes learning fun and keeps you awake and waiting for more in this fascinating lesson for photographers (or anyone who wants to turn photos into Photo Album Fabulous pictures)!

There is nothing worse than spending good money on a training video or DVD and it turns out to be so boring or the instructor has such a droning voice that you can’t keep your eyes open when you view it. Many a time I have popped in a training session and been sound asleep 15 minutes later and completely missed what I had hoped to learn. This DVD session is like sitting in a classroom with a lively instructor and having him talk to you as he teaches and not “talk at” you. The subject matter is well covered, the information is excellent, and his lively talk helps make the session go quickly as well as being fun to watch. This was the first of Scott Kelby’s Photoshop training DVD’s I watched and when I saw how much I could learn from it, I didn’t hesitate to try others. One thing I should mention, he works with a Mac computer and he gives you the commands for both the Mac and PC, which is great way to pick up these very helpful key commands…. but by the end of the sessions I was saying “Command” plus whatever the next key was instead of “Control” which is the PC equivalent! It didn’t matter at all but I had to laugh at how quickly I started saying command instead of control for the necessary key.

This Photoshop training video was designed to show photographers how to make templates that they can reuse over and over to save time when processing those special effect photos for the very popular style of story book wedding albums. Do the work once, save the template, and all you have to do is update the photo information the next time you use it. Simple, fast, and for the busy professional time is money. Scott shows you how to save time using shortcuts when working in Photoshop. I have watched it several times and have learned to use more key commands from this DVD than I ever used before. One you begin to do it, you will discover how easy it is to do it.

Following the step-by-step directions, I turned the photo above into the lesson image shown at the left. How great is that! The lessons are clear, easy to understand and follow. This is a sure fire hit for any one with a digital camera and the desire to make their personal or professional photos in something special….worthy of any good photographer’s album! I have to tell you I was very impressed with what I learned from the training DVD and was amazed at how easy he made it all look. Even more so when I actually repeated what I learned and turned out exactly what I was supposed to. This photo is from the first lesson – the Color Cutaway. This effect highlights the main focus of the photo and makes it stand out from the rest of the image by changing the background settings. I love this effect!

This photo example is from the second lesson….it’s the Photo Stack. In this design, another story book album effect, the main image is filled with other photos that weren’t quite up to album standards but still had photos that could be included in this type of design idea. Again by changing the background the focus is on the stack of smaller images that are enhancing the main photo. 

Scott walks you through the how-to’s involved and then shows you how to save the template for future use so that all you have to do is drag and drop the new photos into place and change the text.

Using some recent photos I took at a mini family reunion of the Gustafson & Shannon boys and their wives and babies, I followed the lesson, made my own template, and then put my photos in it.

I am really delighted with how easy it was to follow the instructions and then repeat them for my own use. The instructions are clear and very well demonstrated. There are no printed how-to’s included so I kept the DVD session open and Photoshop and switched back and forth as I watched and then repeated the steps as I worked through each chapter.

The third chapter explains how to create “Photo Blends”.

This effect takes as image and reduces part of it to black and white. It is blended from the color portion of the image to the black and white part. You can take this design and combine it with the stack effect and have another complete new look. The image here shows the blended photo where I have dragged and dropped the stack boxes onto the photo but the are not filled with other photos.

Throughout the training you will be shown examples of how to combine what you learn in one chapter with an effect from another so that you can further expand the number of designs you can work with.

The next chapter explains how to create a slideshow in Photoshop CS. Who knew? This is a new feature that should make work flow a whole lot easier for anyone who have to present their work to clients after working on the photos. No more jumping from application to application to include all the elements you need to display your work. Photoshop CS will allow you to make a simple slideshow complete with transitions. So you say that’s great but as soon as you’ve handed over your work some savvy person is going to print out or copy those photos and your will be out the money for you work. Not so…..this has security built into it. Just select the options you want set on your slideshow and when it’s run the print function and other methods of reproducing your work without your permission are removed from the Photoshop CS menu. Your work is safe and you have been able to edit, enhance, and display all within Photoshop CS. (The photo effect above is an image changed to black and white and then the color is restored to the bride’s bouquet. I took it one step further and also restored the color to the ribbon.)

The DVD concludes with a chapter that teaches us how to add a variety of Story Book effects to photos. It takes you through making spotlight vignettes, ghost blurs, text ideas, photo cut in effects, and even teaches you to make some of your own edge effects. If you want to try your hand at making your own edge designs, Scott teaches you how to create a torn edge and a film strip. Each is taught from scratch.

I thoroughly enjoyed this training DVD. It has excellent ideas that anyone can learn and then apply to their own photo albums. Any type of photo album will be all the more special when you add these effects to it. I would recommend this to anyone who has digital images and is looking for ideas to add impact to their photos. Combine the techniques learned here with some great photo album software and your photos and albums will look like they were made by professional photographers.

The DVD sells for $49.99 and is available from KW Computer Training Inc. www.photoshopvideos.com and through PeachPit Press www.peachpit.com. Interestingly enough a second version was just released under the title “Photoshop for Wedding Photographers Personal Seminar”. When I ordered it I wasn’t sure from the description if it was the same DVD or and new session but when I checked the ISBN’s, they were the same. It comes with a guide and it lists for $45. The running time of the DVD is 100 minutes. It is the same DVD and the guide does not have the DVD lessons in it but covers more effects that can be used from what was learned on the DVD and then combine them with other effects. I had hoped initially that the guide would show me the effects from the DVD because I’ve been taking notes as I go along but having a booklet with even more suggestions for enhancing photos is great too.