Photoshop Elements 12: The Missing Manual
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
I love Photoshop CS, but my school will no longer support the cost of a license. At first, I refused to teach image editing, feeling like any program I used would be inferior to what I should be teaching. I continued with the decade-old CS (not the up-to-date CS 5). No problem with that. Students loved it, found it easy, extended learning to home–and that’s when the problem arose. They–of course–had to buy the upgrade and wondered why I was using such an old program.
This year, I decided to investigate Adobe’s Elements, see if I could make the switch. For that adventure, I purchased Barbara Brundage’s Photoshop Elements 12 (O’Reilly 2013) is an all-around manual for learning and using Photoshop Elements 12. It’s part of the popular ‘missing manual’ series (where you find the software manuals no longer included when you purchase a program), so provides down-to-earth instruction, how-tos, and easy-to-understand skills that make Elements as easy to learn as possible.
I was attracted to this book because I am making the switch in my classrooms from Photoshop to Elements. I love Photoshop–don’t get me wrong–but its expensive, kind of hard to learn in one grading period, and often daunting in the execution of skills. I hoped Elements would be none of these, but instead would offer easy-to-learn image editing that looks spectacular.
I was not disappointed. Included in this book are:
- understanding the program
- how to import/manage/save, manipulate photos
- quick photo repairs
- artistic elements that appeal to all amateur photographers
- lots of examples
- lots of hints
- extras for ‘power users’
Most of what the average person wants out of photo editing software is included with a shorter learning curve and a smaller budget. Highly recommended.
Full disclosure: Personally, I’m sticking with Photoshop. I love the ‘what’s over the horizon’ approach to software, the idea that there’s always something more to challenge my creativity. I think that’s a unique mind-set that I am not going to expect of my students.
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Jacqui Murray has been teaching K-18 technology for 30 years. She is the editor/author of over a hundred tech ed resources including a K-12 technology curriculum, K-8 keyboard curriculum, K-8 Digital Citizenship curriculum. She is an adjunct professor in tech ed, Master Teacher, webmaster for four blogs, an Amazon Vine Voice, CSTA presentation reviewer, freelance journalist on tech ed topics, contributor to NEA Today, and author of the tech thrillers, To Hunt a Sub and Twenty-four Days. You can find her resources at Structured Learning.
Dwindling school budgets can certainly create challenges! Jacqui, in your opinion, is GIMP a suitable replacement for Photoshop—for power users? And for students and lite users, what are your thoughts about Paint.net? Both of these programs are free.
Absolutely GIMP is a good replacement. By the time students are ready for the sophistication of Photoshop (and GIMP), they understand how software works. It’s about tools, toolbars, clicks and shortkeys. Sure GIMP is different, but not harder.
Paint.net–I’m not familiar with. I googled it but got some commercial site.
Here’s a list of other online drawing tools. You might like Sumopaint.
Thanks for the list of drawing tools, Jacqui. Here’s the link to Paint.net: http://www.getpaint.net/.