Interested in Photoshop

Hello there all!

Recent switcher here, was wondering, where the best place would be to start learning about photoshop/editing tools.

I'd really like to be able to put pictures together, add cool special effects and designs. Nothing in particular but along those lines.

Any help and feedback is appreciated!

P.S. What is the difference between all of the PS's and PS Elements etc out there?

I would go and get one of the many books available. It's a far better option than the online tutorials, which good as they are, can't be referred to quickly.
Photoshop for Dummies or the official Photoshop books are a good place to start.

Under the help.

PhotoShop Tutorials
More

And YouTube is a great source as well.
And as Kev said too, books are great

Cheers

Let me give a plug to fellow ATPM editor Lee Bennett's series ATPM - Archives - Photoshop for the Curious. The first article in the series is at the bottom of the list. There is a wealth of good information there.

I found this site to be very helpful
Adobe Creative Suite Tutorials and Reviews for Photographers, Designers, Illustrators and Developers | Layers Magazine

Photoshop Elements: a simplified, consumer-oriented version of Photoshop aimed specifically at simple photo editing and scanning. Costs about $99

Photoshop (any other version): a complex and incredibly powerful art and pixel manipulation tool, aimed at print and web primarily. Absolutely insane levels of manipulation it will take you a lifetime to totally learn and master. Costs about $600 or so depending on which version (current versions are CS5 and CS5 Extended).

really? a lifetime to learn?

I agree with all that's been said above. Books are much easier to learn from than internet tutorials, as they actually build your skills with Photoshop as opposed to simply instructing you about specific projects. I haven't looked at a copy of Elements for a few years now, but as I remember it, it had plenty of functionality to get you started and exploring.

I know it's not what you asked, but if you're looking for a bargain way to get into some of the tools and techniques in Photoshop, you might want to try Pixelmator. It's got a lot of the same functions of Photoshop (layers, masks, filters, etc.). It definitely has less power than the beast itself, but it's only $60 and worth every penny. I used it in the interim while Photoshop CS3 wasn't cooperating with Snow Leopard, and I found it did a lot of what I wanted for photograph post-processing.

Another vote for Pixelmator here...

As all had given you so many links about tutorial you can easily learn from them or making a google search about a good photoshop tutorial. I had learned it by just directly using it I means learnt by my self you can also try it. It will be more easy rather then going in tutorial help It will never let you you to forget any functions that you will use. It might happen that you will make mistakes but I am sure you will find some of the extra ordinary things that might not be in tutorials. I hope this will help you.

oneijose said:

I found this site to be very helpful
Adobe Creative Suite Tutorials and Reviews for Photographers, Designers, Illustrators and Developers | Layers Magazine

Click to expand...

Great link, thanks a lot! ;D