Newbie from England

[Londonjohn]

Hi all,
As the subject says Im a newbie to this forum and restorations.
I would just like to say hello and congratulate everyone for the amount of effort you all put in. The help and advice you give and the way you help people learn.
I hope I will be able to add something useful one day.

One question I have:

As Im fairly new to photoshop, what tools should I concentrate on so that I can do basic restorations.
The one thing I cant seem to get to grips with is "layers"

Regards

Jon

[Leah]

Welcome, Jon! I have to say, layers is the one thing you really do need to master. You might want to check out this thread for some useful pointers.

[Ed_L]

Welcome aboard Jon. As Leah said, layers are extremely important to learn, and it's really not hard at all. Other than layers, I think the most important thing you'll need to do is make good selections. Stick around. This is the place to learn.

Ed

[DannyRaphael]

Welcome, John:

Besides layers (a big one) and selections (very good advice, Ed) the Clone tool (sometimes know as the "Stamp" tool) and the Patch tool will probably become ones you'll frequently use when restoring photos. These will come in handy when you have to repair damaged areas.

What they do, in effect, is allow you to take pieces of a photo that are "good" and copy them over areas that are (say) cracked, stained, torn or in some other way in need of repair. The trick is to make your digitial trickery it look "natural" and seemless. This takes some practice and experience, but once you get it down, these are powerful methods.

Good luck as you continue to learn.

~Danny~

[W. Rose]

Hi John,
Welcome to RP, and you are in the right place if you want to learn photoshop.
Wayne

[Flora]

Hi John,

A big welcome from me too!

In addition to what everybody has suggested already I'd advise Levels and Curves .... as they are the Tools with which you can adjust, among other things, tone and contrast in a very controlled way ...

[CJ Swartz]

Jon,

Take a look at this online tutorial regarding Photoshop layers and see if it helps -- http://tinyurl.com/53826

[Londonjohn]

Hi all,
Thanks for the welcomes and for the advice.
I will start checking out some of the tutorials etc

Jon

[margotshp]

Hi, I'm also in London

[DannyRaphael]

Originally Posted by margotshp

Hi, I'm also in London

You are in good company. Some of our most talented members hail from the UK! I'm glad you have joined us.

[margotshp]

Thanx!!
On the beginning I thought everyone here is from US but now see more and more members from UK... Oryginally I'm from Poland but moved to UK almost year ago and stayed because of some personal circumstances

[deadants]

There's even the stray aussie hanging around as well. I'm really enjoyig all the links and tutorials on this forum. If only I could retain a small percentage of the photoshop knowledge accumulated on RP I'd be a super user in no time.

deadants

[yuppicide]

Welcome from me as well. I probably only joined up here a month or so ago, but I've found a wealth of knowledge. Not that I use all the knowledge I find here, but who knows some day I might.

[margotshp]

Hey, I find a lot of useful informations here too!
I'm working as retoucher but there is so many new things to learn every day...