- ISBN13: 9780240812595
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
Product Description
A Focal Press Kindle bookAmazon.com Review
Product Description
The Photoshop Darkroom offers limitless possibilities for photographers looking for jaw-dropping results, using powerful and innovative creative post-processing techniques. If you want folks to ask “How did you do that?” then this is the book for you!
The images in The Photoshop Darkroom will inspire you and help you unleash your creative potential. You’ll learn to view your own digital photography with new eyes. Step-by-step directions show you real-world examples of how to achieve the results you want from your photography and post-processing.
*Learn how to work with RAW image files
*Understand the Photoshop darkroom workflow
*Multi-process RAW files
*Extend the dynamic range of your photographs
*Create High Dynamic Range (HDR) images by hand
*Create stunning black and white imagery with Photoshop
*Use layers and masking for compositing
*Create striking color effects using LAB color
Amazon Exclusive: A Letter from Harold and Phyllis Davis, Authors of The Photoshop Darkroom
Dear Amazon Readers,
If you are thinking of buying The Photoshop Darkroom:
We believe we can promise you a Photoshop experience unlike any other. Our ideas–and many years of relevant experience–came together when we created The Photoshop Darkroom.
We can promise you a very practical learning experience. Unlike the authors of many other Photoshop books, we are first and foremost photographers, creators, and experimenters. We do not care about the software bells and whistles that Photoshop provides unless these features are useful in the day-by-day tasks of image creation and photo enhancement.
Speaking of day-by-day, we’ve created The Photoshop Darkroom using our experience working professionally with photography and Photoshop. That’s working everyday, day in and day out, many hours a day–to create award-winning published imagery. We are eager to share the techniques we’ve developed over the years, and have designed our book to be your guide in your own creative journey with Photoshop.
And your own creative journey it is! We didn’t create The Photoshop Darkroom as a statement about how cool or great we are. This book is about you, the learner, and about what you can do next.
Why should a Photoshop book be visually boring? We’ve designed our book to be as exciting and rich as the images you can create in the Photoshop environment itself. With the step-by-step directions in The Photoshop Darkroom, you can extend the dynamic range of your photos, selectively sharpen, paint with LAB colors, and much more.
Digital photography is one part photography and one part digital software. So take the plunge and start on your journey towards becoming the best digital image maker you can be. It’s our sincere hope that The Photoshop Darkroom is your springboard to creating great images!
Harold & Phyllis Davis
A Look at Techniques from The Photoshop Darkroom
Click to Enlarge
The images below are digital photographs enhanced (and in some cases composited with other images) in the Photoshop darkroom using the techniques explained in The Photoshop Darkroom.
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| Utilized apparent transparency and the LAB color space for color adjustments and effects. | Utilized the LAB color space to create an inversion. | Simple photo compositing in the Photoshop darkroom adds a flower to the pupil of this eye. | Three photos are combined in Photoshop to create this exciting composite. |
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| This image uses image duplication and reversal to create a composite. | Black and white HDR conversion of the Cuban capitol building. | An Escher-like effect from a single fisheye shot of a staircase in Photoshop using various techniques. | Starting from one or two photographs one can create graphics that look more like paintings |
Digital Domain: The Leading Edge of Visual Effects, Piers Bizony, Very Good Book
| US $6.98 End Date: Sunday Jun-10-2012 21:29:46 PDT Buy It Now for only: US $6.98 Buy it now | Add to watch list |














Hello,
I absolutely love this book! It has given me so much useful information about post-processing, and my photos really has improved a great deal after I started to follow the steps in this book.
The book is packed with beautiful photos, and I absolutely love the layout and design! Along with the usual step-by-step direction the authors has decided to ad – sort of – handwritten comments here and there, and I think it works really really well. It makes the book a great joy to read!
The topics – no matter how complex – are explained brilliantly in visual steps making them easy to understand. The authors tells you not only HOW, but also WHY – and I think that is essential when you want to try the techniques later on your own photos. I have tried the multi-raw processing and black & white conversion with great success! Next one out is the HDR-process. I can’t wait!
Conclusion: If you are buying only one book about post-processing, and are serious about your work, this book should be the one you buy! Plain and simple! This one is a MUST HAVE!
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
This resource of step-by-step directions for the imaginative use of Photoshop deftly combines hand-written notations with actual program menus and photographic images in different stages of completion. It describes the advantages of RAW files, the process of HDR imaging, the options of monochrome conversion, the useful effects of LAB color, and the utilization of layer masks for photo compositing. Dramatic examples of the author’s published work are beautifully displayed and interspersed evenly with procedural instructions.
//The Photoshop Darkroom// delivers practical ideas in a methodical yet appealing fashion. In comprehensible terms, it manages to reduce the complexity of digital post-production to an art form that is as meaningful as it is enjoyable. Shooting, layering and painting techniques are explained like a basic cookie recipe. If you ever felt that you should have obtained better results from your scans or photographs but were overwhelmed by the technical aspects of digital photography, then this inspiring book is for you.
Reviewed by Richard Mandrachio
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
Photoshop is a huge program, it could take years to learn all its capabilities if you only use it in your leisure hours. As an amateur photographer I wanted to learn which tools to use and a workflow for post processing of digital images. This book is perfect for that task, and is suitable for recent versions of Photoshop not just the current version CS4.
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
I first became aware of author and photographer Harold Davis a couple of months ago through an article he wrote on Selective Sharpening for “Photonet” ([...]). You can review this article on the Photonet Website under the “Learning” tab menu options.
There are many digital sharpening processes (that is increasing edge contrasts) available but Harold Davis’ selective LAB sharpening is the first I have found which is an easily learned selective sharpening; a way to restrict sharpening to the areas which benefit from sharpening. It is necessary to advoid sharpening areas of soft focus, noise and other artifacts as sharpening these areas will degrade rather than improve the image. With this process, the user maintains fine control over each step.
Based on this very well written sharpening article, I researched the author to find that he has published more than thirty computer programming and digital photography books, each to excellent reviews by readers as well as professional reviewers. He is recognized in the digital photography field for his ability to share his expertise through classroom teaching and writting.
In The Photoshop Darkroom, he presents several varied processes for improving and applying special effects to digital images in Photoshop. He expands his selective sharpening presentation through screen shots of the Photoshop steps accompanied by concise notes. He follows this format for each of process presented in this book. He simplifies and improves many of the Photoshop processes I struggled with in learning Photoshop. This book will be helpful for those digital photographers beginning Photoshop through to the advanced users.
(If interested in digital black and white processing, note that Harold Davis will be releasing a book on this subject in April, 2010. I am eagerly awaiting my copy!)
wd
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5
I have been doing photoshop for years and this book is written in easy to understand examples. I say it is a must for everyone.
Amazon User Rating: 5 / 5