By: Harold and Phylllis Davis, 2010 (Focal Press)

This gorgeous 4 color paperback book inspires the artist, photographer, and designer alike to turn to Photoshop as a means to further one’s creative expression.  The techniques in this book hover between elementary and advanced; it is not really a beginners book so it often feels like basics could be browsed over in favor of more in depth coverage on the functionality of the particular tool they are describing.  You’ll want to have a heavy duty processor and massive RAM available on your computer to tackle these projects.  I found my 1.6 GHTZ 4 GB state-of-the-art laptop laboring over the multi-raw processing. 

In particular, I thought the technique of creating a black box was a brilliant way to trick your scanner to capture high resolution images of three dimensional objects like flowers while ensuring that selection and subsequent cut outs are a breeze to accomplish with the magic wand.  This relieves the necessity for tripod, SLR camera and expensive macro lens.  All in all a lovely read.  I would categorize it as “bench tricks for Photoshop”.