Get a FREE fully-working copy of Steganos Security Suite 7 (worth £49.99) when you sign up to the Practical PC Newsletter. Review: Adobe Photoshop Elements 4 Collection
Iain Laskey assesses a book bundle aimed at digital photographers who want to get to grips with Adobe Photoshop Elements 4
| Product | Adobe Photoshop Elements 4 Collection |
|---|---|
| Company | New Riders |
| Web | www.newriders.com |
| Price | From £35.99 |
| We like | Broad selection of easy to follow tasks, layout, author clearly knows his stuff |
| We don't like | Transforming a frown to a smile! |
| Rating | |
| Requirements |
Photoshop Elements 4 has been out for a few months now and whilst not dramatically different from its predecessors, it does have a few new tricks up its sleeve. Accordingly, one of the better books, the prolific Scott Kelby's PhotoShop Elements Book for Digital Photographers has been updated to cater for Elements 4. What we have here though is that new version plus a second Scott Kelby title, PhotoShop Elements Down & Dirty tricks, sandwiched together into one book for a bargain price of £35.99.
You can read our review of the earlier version of the first book here. The updated version follows much the same format of providing step by step guides to a particular task such as changing someone's hair colour, restoring a damaged photo and so on. The layout is good with decent sized images and step by step screen shots making it pretty hard to go too far wrong.
This version includes a section on using Elements 4's organizer to best effect and explains the tagging and searching modes available. Other Elements 4 features that get used include the Magic Selection and Magic Extractor Tools which is a huge improvement for anyone who needs to isolate any areas of an image to work on them.
The images used have in the main been updated. One of the few criticisms we have is that the before and after examples of a better way of converting to greyscale don't seem much different which is odd as in the main the books print quality is very good. Another issue is the images used to show turning a frown into a smile. The previous version of the book resulted in turning someone frowning in to someone who looks like they are about to kill you. The forced smile is dreadful. Well, the updated one is more of the same, the guy looks like he's smiling to disguise the fact he's about to hit you. I'd leave this one out next time guys!
The second title in this chunky sized book is PhotoShop Elements Down & Dirty tricks. This is to all intents and purposes more of the same style wise although the author describes it as a special effects cookbook. This book covers a broad mix of advanced home use such as creating 3D cubes containing photos through to more professional applications combining images and text.
I particularly liked the section on creating fake motion whereby a single shot of a batsman was edited to show the movement of the bat as he made a strike. A Simple but effective trick. Another fun one was faking a magnifying glass held over an image to show an enlarged detail.
As before, the examples are clear and in the main easy to follow and the results certainly looked a lot better than are to be found in similar books. Between the two volumes, I'd be hard pushed to think of many effects or changes I'd like to try out that aren't covered.
Conclusion
It makes good sense combining the two titles in to one big volume and whilst it's a bit of a lap crusher (read it on a desk folks), for the money, it's a great photographer's guide to Adobe Photoshop Elements and will show you how to get the best from your photos whilst opening your eyes to the creative possibilities that you have at your fingertips with Adobe Elements 4. Better yet, it should be useful to users of all experience levels.
