Adobe Photoshop CS3 One-on-One by Deke McClelland is the best book I’ve found for learning how to use Photoshop.
For a long time, I avoided buying a book on Photoshop. There are so many tutorials available out there for free; why would I want to spend money on a book?
But I’ve discovered that most of these tutorials lack depth. They’re like recipes: Do this, this, and this, and Voila! your logo will look like it’s on fire. You don’t really learn how Photoshop works; you learn a neat little trick.
This book is different. For example, instead of just telling you that the Auto Color command is a good tool for correcting color imbalances in a photo, McClelland tells you how the Auto Color command works, and how it differs from Auto Levels and Auto Contrast.
And in each chapter, I keep finding new details about Photoshop that I didn’t know before, even though I took a Graphic Design class in college where we spent a lot of time on Photoshop.
This book is an excellent textbook for anyone teaching themselves Photoshop, full of depth and interesting details about the most powerful photo editor around.
(Just a reminder: As always, I am not paid for any of my reviews)