[janie]

I'm looking at the Katrin Eisman books and ran across this book by Mark Fitzgerald. Any input on Fitzgerald's work. I am leaning more toward his book as he covers CS3, and Eisman covers CS2.

Thoughts?

j

[Swampy]

I'm not familiar with Mark Fitzgerald's work, but have both of Eisman's books and she has been the default retouching guru for years. Eisman's books are relevant to just about any version of Photoshop since 7. Which ever you decide on, make sure you have some kind of access to the sample files, as it is much easier to work along on the same image.

[DanBrown]

Originally Posted by janie

I'm looking at the Katrin Eisman books and ran across this book by Mark Fitzgerald. Any input on Fitzgerald's work. I am leaning more toward his book as he covers CS3, and Eisman covers CS2.

Thoughts?

j

Can you give a link to Fitzgerald's book?

[pixelzombie]

http://www.amazon.com/Photoshop-CS3-.../dp/0470223677

[DannyRaphael]

Ditto what Swampy wrote.

Katrin has a stellar track record. Note the very high ratings / reviews here for all her books:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_b/...katrin+eismann

She is unrivaled in the field on this subject.

Looks like this is Mr. Fitzgerald's first book. Everybody's gotta start somewhere, but why take a risk on a rookie author when you've got a slam dunk on a time tested, superstar author?

Plan B:
For $8, you can get the older edition of Katrin's R&R book (used), 90%+ of which applies to CS3.

CS2-based edition would be fine, too.

[janie]

Originally Posted by Swampy

I'm not familiar with Mark Fitzgerald's work, but have both of Eisman's books and she has been the default retouching guru for years. Eisman's books are relevant to just about any version of Photoshop since 7. Which ever you decide on, make sure you have some kind of access to the sample files, as it is much easier to work along on the same image.

I'll stick with Eisman then. What do you mean, "have access to sample files"?

I'm just about done working through CS3 Classroom in a Book and I love that "I" do the work through the CD and follow along with the book.

[DannyRaphael]

Originally Posted by janie

What do you mean, "have access to sample files"?

Same as "you do 'em" exercise files on CS3 Classroom in a Book CD. I believe Swampy meant to ensure exercise files accompanied Mark Fitzgerald's book, either on a CD or downloadable from the net.

[Swampy]

Yepper, Danny that's what I meant. :-)

[janie]

Do the Eisman's book have tutorials?

[Swampy]

Yes... Excellent tutorials.

[videogal]

I have Katrin's book and I love it. I have learned so much, not just about restoration from the book, but using Photoshop in general as well.

I am on CS3 and did not find any tutorials that I couldn't do due to CS3 vs another version of Photoshop.

Enjoy!

[janie]

Now I'm excited. I almost paid for extra fast shipping But I'll wait!

[TommyO]

Janie,
You will see when the book arrives that Katrin provides a link to her website for downloading all the sample photos. Be sure to download them and place in a sub-folder structure that relates to chapters of the book. She provides zip files per chapter. There is also a single download file that has all the pictures at once (~200MB) and can be unzipped into such a sub-folder structure.
You may be tempted to skip around. But, you will have more overall success if you move through the book as it is designed. Treat it like a class !

Good luck ! ... and yes, her CS2 techniques work in CS3 and are often better than some of the new tools in CS3. It's always nice to know where and how new tools are developed.