In his 'The Hidden Power of Photoshop Elements' books, Richard Lynch
provides a CD that adds Curves to Elements toolkit as well as some
other nice add-ons.
ScottGee1
On 11/7/05, Chuck Norcutt <chucknorcutt@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> I find that for my tastes, after a while, Kelby's attempts at humor get
> in the way of getting on with the business at hand. For working on
> photos I recommend Katrin Eismann's "PhotoShop Restoration &
> Retouching". This is my bible. This book assumes you are a
> photographer and not a graphics artist. It's very direct and to the
> point and is intended to teach you specific techniques, usually in a
> half dozen pages or less. Highly recommended. The third edition is
> just now coming out and will be available soon. I have the second.
>
> <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0321316274/qid=1131381832/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/102-7391642-2729728?v=glance&s=books>
>
> If you only have Elements you'll have to figure out something different
> when curves come into play but I think the vast majority of what's in
> Eismann's book can probably be done with Elements 3.
>
> Chuck Norcutt
>
>
>
> ScottGee1 wrote:
> > Right place, right time, right product! Cool!
> >
> > If you haven't already done so, you might want to consider getting one
> > of Scott Kelby's books on Elements. He consciously takes a somewhat
> > different and, IMO, refreshing approach than other books. There's
> > even a bit of that humor stuff sprinkled throughout.
> >
> > Also, Wacom has a LOT of educational material both at their site and
> > via by request CD/DVD. You might want to give 'em a call -- nice
> > folks!
> >
> > Enjoy!
> >
> > ScottGee1
> >
> >
> > On 11/7/05, AG Schnozz <agschnozz@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> >>The other thing that happened this weekend was the purchase of a
> >>new computer. Ended up getting one of those nifty (but large)
> >>laptops that are classified as "workstations". Definitely a lot
> >>of horsepower and a bigger, higher-quality. Also picked up a
> >>WACOM tablet while I was at it.
> >>
> >>I went with a Gateway (7330GZ). I know, I know, but these days
> >>no choice is safe. I've got Compaq and HP laptops here at work
> >>and their failure rate is pretty brisk. Dell was probably my
> >>first choice, but I wanted to do a little comparison shopping.
> >>First went to C*mpUSA and they tried to jam a $2300 beast down
> >>my neck. Like that was going to happen. Next, went over to
> >>B*stBuy and looked at the shmuck that they had there. But
> >>lo-and-behold, here sat one lonely beast of a laptop that was
> >>priced really well. Oh, and that screen was sooooo bright and
> >>contrasty and sharp! (it also displayed the test images from
> >>dpreview the best too) No other laptop (except for a high-end
> >>Mac) had a screen anywhere as good and the screen was much
> >>better than nearly all of the desktop LCDs. Spec-wise, the
> >>thing just blew away the T*shibas and H*Ps laying there.
> >>Something's wrong here with the price. I checked it over and
> >>saw that it had a built-in Compact-Flash slot as well as
> >>FireWire.
> >>
> >>Ended up snagging one. We took the unopened box over to the Geek
> >>Squad (really!) and had the guy with the broken glasses,
> >>misbuttoned shirt and greezy hair do the system checkout.
> >>(seriously, I'm not kidding). My major concern was that I
> >>wanted a screen with ZERO dead pixels. That seems to be a
> >>rarity these days. Every LCD in my department has multiple dead
> >>spots as well as my wife's laptop. So, I really wanted to make
> >>sure that mine was as good as possible. Nadda, not a single
> >>dead pixel. I didn't use a magnifying glass, but came pretty
> >>close to it.
> >>
> >>Got home and looked at the receipt. Bummer. The WACOM was
> >>supposed to have a $25 instant rebate. I didn't catch that at
> >>the store. Well, the next day I went back to the store and got
> >>that taken care of. Just out of curiosity, I walked over to the
> >>laptop displays and did a double take. The price changed on the
> >>laptop. Overnight it went up $150. Talk about timing!
> >>
> >>Anyway, to the important stuff...
> >>
> >>The new laptop is a real dream for working with images. The
> >>screen's extremely-wide viewing angle has very little gamma
> >>change when moving your head around. The colors are quite
> >>accurate and the depth of detail is uncanny. I'll do some
> >>additional profiling on the screen, but from what I've seen so
> >>far, my onscreen test images are very close to the printed
> >>output. I only had to do very minor tweeking of the gamma. I
> >>could stand to put in some more RAM, but this thing is easily 10
> >>times faster than my desktop it replaces and for processor
> >>intensive things, it's probably 20-30 times faster. Never had a
> >>computer with 1GB of processor cache before. (Pentium P4 mobile
> >>3GHZ something). RAW file conversion went as fast as three
> >>seconds per file, but averaged about five seconds each. I can
> >>live with that. This computer processor is a power-hog and I
> >>can see that cranking through a few hundred RAW file conversions
> >>could really toast the battery in a hurry. Probably should get
> >>a couple more batteries...
> >>
> >>The WACOM will take quite a bit of getting used to, but I've
> >>wanted one of these for a long time. It also came with
> >>Ph*toshop Elements 3.0 (I know, 4.0 is now coming out). I
> >>didn't know that 3.0 could convert both Minolta RAW files and
> >>Olympus RAW files. Doesn't do too bad of a job except the
> >>colors look a little pasty in comparison to Olympus
> >>Viewer/Studio. They are a bit sharper, though. That
> >>shadow/highlight and noise-reduction aspect isn't bad either. I
> >>just need to figure out how to get the colors a little snappier
> >>and skintones back where I want them. No biggy either way as
> >>I'm pleased with Viewer, except for the fact it won't process
> >>Minolta files and I typically shoot events with the cameras
> >>interchangeably.
> >>
> >>Speaking of the Minolta A1 files, I did try Elements 3.0 at
> >>converting a couple of my Grand Canyon shots. Very impressive!
> >>The noise level (even with the noise-reduction turned off) is
> >>about half that of the Minolta converter. When pixel-peeping, it
> >>looks like the alignment of the bayer pattern is more accurate
> >>with Adobe's converter. The colors are yucky, but the sharpness
> >>(at least a full step on an USAF lens res chart) increase and
> >>noise reduction are definitely a nice offset. Talk about
> >>breathing new life into an old camera--this might delay a new
> >>camera purchase by another year which by itself would pay for
> >>the laptop.
> >>
> >>Ok. I don't want to ramble and this definitely isn't a "brag"
> >>post. I just wanted to pass on some info on a purchase that I'm
> >>very pleased with for photographic applications. I thought it
> >>represented an acceptable "bang for the buck". It met and
> >>exceeded my expectations and requirements. My only beef with it
> >>is the rather whimpy feeling case. Must be a little more
> >>careful than with one of my old bricks.
> >>
> >>AG
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>__________________________________
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> >>http://farechase.yahoo.com
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