Books
In this section I'm recommending a few books that are considered 'good' by a large group of people. My advice however is not to buy a book just by following the recommendations. Make a list of the books that interest you and check them out in your local bookstore. Only then you will know if a particular book is suited for you, since we all have different preferences.
You can then decide to buy the book in in that same store, online or buy them second hand on sites like Amazon or Ebay. Needless to say that most older Photoshop books only cover older versions of Photoshop. Personally I don't see that so much as a limitation and you do save yourself a lot of money, because Photoshop books can be very expensive. If an older book doesn't cover the tools of your current version of Photoshop, then you can always turn to the internet or read Photoshop's help.
Important: I want to mention that there are a lot of good books out there that are not mentioned in this section and the reason is simple; there are so many (Amazon lists about 1,400 titles (!) while I'm writing this).
So all
I'm showing you is a small selection of one of the better or more popular books, the ones most beginners or professionals seem to talk about.
You can find Photoshop books by searching for the word Photoshop in the category books.
On the next page you can Sort by: Average Customer Review and click on Go to see the most popular books.
Read the reviews, look at some sample pages if there are any and you'll get a good idea what's available.
Bert Monroy
If you like realism in your designs, then you might be interested in one of Ben Monroy's books.
Visit his gallery to see some of his impressive works: gallery
Peachpit
What I like about Peachpit's books, especially their 'visual Quickstart Guides', is that they are not as expensive as most other Photoshop books. This can be important for those who want to stay up-to-date with their books and don't want to spend too much money (Adobe Photoshop is updated almost every year!). The books might not offer as much information as the more expensive books, but they do offer a lot of information that is well organized and easy to read.
Katrin Eismann
Katrin is a true guru when it comes to Photoshop retouching and has released several books and videos. I can highly recommend her.
Deke McClelland
You can't go wrong with any books written by Deke McClelland.
Adobe
Press
Lots of people seem to recommend the Adobe Photoshop Classroom books.
I have no real experience with them, but that doesn't stop me from mentioning them.
Scott Kelby
Books
Scott Kelby is a very popular writer. Like Deke McClelland he can teach you Photoshop in way that is easy to understand.
Other high quality Photoshop books (not suitable for beginners);
- Creative Thinking in Photoshop (Sharon Steuer)
- New Masters of Photoshop (Tim Bird)
- Photoshop Channel Chops (David Biedny)
- Photoshop Artistry (Haynes/ Crumpler)
- Photoshop Lab Color (Dan Margulis)
- Photoshop Studio with Bert Monroy
- Professional Photoshop - The classic guide to color correction (Dan Margulis)
- The art of Photoshop (Daniel Giordan)
- Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain (Betty Edwards)
- How to Draw Lifelike Portraits from Photographs (Lee Hammond)
- Drawing a Likeness (Douglas R. Graves)
- The Natural Way to Draw: A Working Plan for Art Study (Kimon Nicolaides)
- Keys to Drawing (Bert Dodson)
- Drawing Realistic Textures in Pencil (J. D. Hillberry)
- Perspective Made Easy (Ernest Norling)
