Photoshop CS3 is a very "deep" application, and I think that this book can be an excellent resource for virtually any CS3 user (especially those who classify themselves as intermediate users of Photoshop). The author does not assume that you have already read a user manual or other book. He covers in detail many of the tools in detail that are frequently used to color correct, mask and composite images, and do many other common tasks. "Hints" and "Notes" can be found throughout the book in small green boxes, and I found them very helpful. For example, in Chapter 10, the author explains in a Hint box how to apply sharpening settings from one image to a batch of images in Bridge.

Weinrebe supports his lessons with good screen shots throughout the book. Just a small selection of the tools that he covers very well (in a step-by-step fashion) are the Healing Brush, Lens Correction tool, History Brush, the Bridge and Camera Raw (including a suggested Bridge/Camera Raw Workflow), tinting with a color layer, batch renaming, converting to DNG, creating contact sheets, creating panoramas with Photomerge, and actions.

One of the most interesting parts of the book are the artist interviews. These Q&A sessions with such luminaries as John Paul Caponigro, R. Mac Holbert, Pedro Meyer, Graham Nash, Maggie Taylor and Joyce Tenneson generally run from about 4-7 pages and include fantastic imagery and insight about the artists' background, their art, what motivates them, and how they approach and use various technologies. I believe that this series of essays could easily be a very strong coffee table book on their own. They are a really special.

I also like the Chapter Reviews questions and Exercises at the end of each chapter, which can definitely help people to learn more about the Photoshop techniques that were covered in the chapter. Having all the exercise files on a CD in the book is also a nice feature. Also, it really helps that Weinrebe is a professional photographer who has been preparing files for clients for years. His work really shines throughout the book.

As a long time film photographer making the move to digital this book was a life saver. The step by step approach took the mystery out of photoshop.
The language was clear and the examples relevant.

The development of pigments by chemists changed the art of painting
in the Renaissance. Yhe development of film sensitivity changed the
art of movie making in the 20th century. How will Photoshop and
other image processing software change the art of photography?

This book provides instruction in the use of Photoshop, in an
unorthodox manner. Most Photoshop books are organized along workflow
lines, although a few work their way through each of the Photoshop
tools and menus in order. Weinrebe follow his own order, dealing
with light and shadow, curves, black and white processing, color
tools and so forth before dealing with the tools used when first
bringing images into Photoshop. Often a chapter introduces important
techniques not related to the main one, as in the author's
discussion of the use of the history brush in the chapter on curves.
The author recognizes his approach is unusual, and suggests that
readers go through the chapters in the order the reader needs.

The chapters include practical exercises that use images provided on
an included CD.

The book recognizes the version 4.1 update to Adobe Bridge which is a component of Photoshop CS3, although I expect that the update was made available at too late a date for the author to do much exploration of its potential. (There has been a 4.2 update, but the changes seem to have improved code, without adding tools.) How else can one explain the author's dismissal of the new sharpening facility that allows for input sharpening, which is different from output sharpening?

Besides the instruction on using Photoshop, each chapter concludes
with an interview with a famous photographer. Most of these
photographers seem to specialize in montage, that is, the creation
of pictures by combining images.

My biggest question was what happened to "the Art of Photography"
mentioned in the title? Nothing in the material on technique goes
further than to describe what controls and sliders create what
effects on an image. No advice is presented in how to use Photoshop
to create a picture that is more "artful" (whatever that means). The
interviews are interesting but they don't include any information on
how the artists used Photoshop to make their pictures more artful. I
suspect that even Rafael received some instruction from his teachers
on how to use the new pigments beyond how to apply them to canvas.
Certainly, a few books on Photoshop have covered this terrain. I
particularly found Rob Sheppard's "Outdoor Photographer Landscape and Nature Photography with Photoshop CS2 (Outdoor Photographers)" to be useful.

I also have some small complaints about the book. The text always
appeared to be one or two pages behind the related illustrations,
leading to a lot of page flipping. Some instructional areas seemed
to scant the tools being discussed. For example, the chapter on
Adobe Bridge mentions how customizable Bridge is, but neglected to
provide any details in how to do this.

Still, a photographer looking for an introduction to Photoshop will
be able to get started with this book. On the other hand, those
looking for a more detailed introduction might want to look at a
favorite of mine, "Photoshop Artistry: For Photographers Using Photoshop CS2 and Beyond (Voices That Matter)by Barry Haynes. It doesn't cover all the
changes made to Photoshop in its later versions, but it will provide
an understanding of the software that may even include a little bit
about injecting the artful into one's images.

The development of pigments by chemists changed the art of painting in the Renaissance. The development of film sensitivity changed the art of movie making in the 20th century. How will Photoshop and other image processing software change the art of photography?

This book provides instruction in the use of Photoshop, in an unorthodox manner. Most Photoshop books are organized along workflow lines, although a few work their way through each of the Photoshop tools and menus in order. Weinrebe follow his own order, dealing with light and shadow, curves, black and white processing, color tools and so forth before dealing with the tools used when first bringing images into Photoshop. Often a chapter introduces important techniques not related to the main one, as in the author's discussion of the use of the history brush in the chapter on curves. The author recognizes his approach is unusual, and suggests that readers go through the chapters in the order the reader needs.

The chapters include practical exercises that use images provided on an included CD.

The book recognizes the version 4.1 update to Adobe Bridge which is a component of Photoshop CS3, although I expect that the update was made available at too late a date for the author to do much exploration of its potential. (There has been a 4.2 update, but the changes seem to have improved code, without adding tools.) How else can one explain the author's dismissal of the new sharpening facility that allows for input sharpening, which is different from output sharpening?

Besides the instruction on using Photoshop, each chapter concludes with an interview with a famous photographer. Most of these photographers seem to specialize in montage, that is, the creation of pictures by combining images.

My biggest question was what happened to "the Art of Photography" mentioned in the title? Nothing in the material on technique goes further than to describe what controls and sliders create what effects on an image. No advice is presented in how to use Photoshop to create a picture that is more "artful" (whatever that means). The interviews are interesting but they don't include any information on how the artists used Photoshop to make their pictures more artful. I suspect that even Rafael received some instruction from his teachers on how to use the new pigments beyond how to apply them to canvas. Certainly, a few books on Photoshop have covered this terrain. I particularly found Rob Sheppard's "Outdoor Photographer Landscape and Nature Photography with Photoshop CS2" to be useful.

I also have some small complaints about the book. The text always appeared to be one or two pages behind the related illustrations, leading to a lot of page flipping. Some instructional areas seemed to scant the tools being discussed. For example, the chapter on Adobe Bridge mentions how customizable Bridge is, but neglected to provide any details in how to do this.

Still, a photographer looking for an introduction to Photoshop will be able to get started with this book. On the other hand, those looking for a more detailed introduction might want to look at a favorite of mine, "Photoshop Artistry: For Photographers Using Photoshop CS2 and Beyond" by Barry Haynes. It doesn't cover all the changes made to Photoshop in its later versions, but it will provide an understanding of the software that may even include a little bit about injecting the artful into one's images.

the book is well worth the cost: it is well organized and presents all of the capabilities of Photoshop in a pseudo-textbook fashion that are easily understood. At the end of each of the 12 chapters, the author presents a review: questions that the reader should be able to answer and exercises covering the CS3 capabilities that had been explained in that specific chapter. Also, the author includes interviews with 12 noted creative photographers such as Maggie Taylor and Lois Greenfield.

Photoshop is incredibly feature-rich software, and frequently perceived as overwhelming. Weinrebe breaks it down into easily understandable bits while still providing useful tips for very experienced users.

And the interviews with renowned photographers add a unique element, opening - at least a little a bit - a window on their varying perspectives and workflows.

Well done. This book is a valuable addition to every photographer's reference library.

I've been using Photoshop for years. Several times I have beaten my brains out trying to set up actions/batch processing for large groups of photos. I always failed. Within two minutes after I first opened Weinrebe's book, I had successfully set up an action and put it to work automatically resizing and optimizing a huge load of wedding photos my wife shot last weekend.

Most software manuals are written by people who don't have the imagination to put themselves in the position of a non-expert user. This book gives you all the steps, in straight clear language, so you can do with Photoshop what you want to do. Further, you will gain artistic perspective, not just technical info. The author's love of photography is infectious.