Hi,

I am looking into switching from Paint shop pro X2 to Photoshop CS 4 extended the reason for the switch is the company I am doing the bulk of my artwork for wants me to think about moving up to that program and if I'd like to they'd but it for me.

But I want to be certain because I don't want them to make this purchase for me if I am not comfortable with the application. I have never used any version of photoshop I've always done the bulk of my post editing using Paint Shop Pro. So I am on a fact finding search and want to learn as much about Photoshop before my boss makes the purchase. Does Adobe have a trail version of CS4?

Thanks!

Attached Link: Adobe Demo Downloads

Lots to learn but I like it better then Paint Shop Pro... 

I believe you can "try before you buy", I spent $4.99 to have them send me a DVD with all their Photoshop stuff on it and more to boot, or you can download just what you need.

You will have to create an account to access the trial offers, but here's some links direct to the download

http://www.adobe.com/products/creativesuite/design/trial/

and to the Photoshop extend product line

http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/photoshopextended/

yep you can get a 30 day demo of PS (CS4) - i wouldn't try downloading it on a dial-up connection...

as for the learning curve,  there is a LOT that you can do in photoshop, that said, you don't really need to learn EVERYTHING about the program, you just need to learn how to do the stuf YOU want to do...

What i use PS for when i'm dealing with photos in RAW format is totally different then when i'm using photoshop to comp a website, and still quite different when i'm working on a brochure...

i've been with photoshop since 2.5 (still have the floppies) and i'm STILL learning something all the time!

i can tell you, there are a few things that you were able to do "quite easily" in paint shop pro, that will be handled differently in PS and it will drive you crazy!! keep in mind you can still accomplish the same task but if both programs were identical in the process, one of them would be in a copyright violation :) 

if you have any problem we're always here to help.

:)
retrocity

Well I downloaded the 30 day trial yesterday evening , installed it and messed around with it until late last night and I have to say I love the program. And while I still need to familiarize myself with some of the tools, like where the clone brush is, I feel I have the basics down and navigated around the program pretty well. One thing I like is the ease in installing brushes and being able to use .abr brushes instead of going threw the process of running them through abrViewer to import them into paint shop pro at a smaller size.

Mind you I installed CS4 to my dual core 32-bit, 4 gig machine and it worked great I can't imagine how much better it will work when installed to my quad, 64-bit,12gig machine! I'll be using CS4 for mainly post work and texture creation it is definitely a more powerful program.

Don't have Photoshop open, but I think the clone tool is right above the eraser..

There's a pretty good learning curve, yes, but you have a head start. You can adapt a lot of what you know from PSP to Pshop. I also think the book Real World Photoshop is a very good resource, but it's just my favorite. I still have my Real World Photoshop book from like, version 3. There's bound to be a new edition of it, or somethingt similar. Lots of good books out there for Pshop. I tend to like RW because it focuses on the most common things you'll be doing in Pshop as far as working in the real world. The tutorials and help files that come with Pshop are quite good as well. And there are literally millions of sites on the net that freely teach how to do various things, give tips and tricks and tutorials. So the learning curve isn't that bad, really. And if you're in a work situation, Pshop really is the standard professional program.

Get a book, it's the only way to learn it well ...  and there are videos at Adobe to show you how if visual learning is your thing.  You'll love Photoshop, and won't look back after a month or two.

I've found it better to focus on what I want to accomplish, rather than how I do it. I've been learning PS for about three months now after having been a PSP user for many years. I get along okay when I think, "I need to select this part and blur it a bit". I go nuts when I try to zoom in and out with the scroll wheel, which is a hard habit to change.

I'm finding out that there's always a little more around the corner... not matter what I think of to try, PS can go the extra mile and do more than I thought it could.

And, joy of joys, no more trying to translate PS tutorials I find on the web into PSP.

I never use the scroll wheel to zoom. I just use view/zoom in/zoom out. And I use it a LOT. Seriously a lot.

Heck, I use the scroll wheel in PSP instead of sliding around on the image. I scroll in on a spot I wanna fix, scroll out real fast, move the mouse over to the general area I wanna change next, then scroll in real fast again.

It's an old habit now that I'm having trouble un-learning.

Quote - Heck, I use the scroll wheel in PSP instead of sliding around on the image. I scroll in on a spot I wanna fix, scroll out real fast, move the mouse over to the general area I wanna change next, then scroll in real fast again.

It's an old habit now that I'm having trouble un-learning.

Don’t need to unlearn old habits….
In Photoshop CS4, go to Edit>Preferences>General>check “Zoom with Scroll Wheel”.

 Don’t need to scroll/zoom back out to go to your next spot…just hold down the “H” key and LMB, which zooms out with a built-in navigator pane.
Or hold down the spacebar and LMB for “Flick Panning” where you can toss your image all over the screen.

See? Still learning, like I said...

Thanks, SWAMP, I've never been one to give up old habits if I can help it.

:biggrin:

Attached Link: http://morris-photographics.com/photoshop/shortcuts/

Yes there's a fairly decent curve. Yes, it's worth it. I'd say most of the differences you're going to encounter is going to be a matter of "geography" since they generally do the same thing for most general purpose projects/needs. Click "here" instead of "there" - get it?

I'm in the same boat as Quest - I'm a keystroke junkie - saves me a truckload of time.

And speaking of saving a truckload of time, learn how to create "Actions" for repeated procedures - set their keystroke shortcuts and memorize them. You'll just get faster and faster.

CaptainJack1 - that (control wheel scroll to zoom) must be infuriating! ;-) I've got a keystroke command old habit they changed on me - which was infuriating when I purchasd CS4 - the new "Select>Modify>Feather" has been changed to Shift+F6 - used to be Crtl+Alt+F. Sounds small but when you do it multiple times for almost every image you work on (and I do a coupla hundred a month!) that's a big freakin' change for me!

And like CaptainJack1 said - you don't have to learn the "whole thing" all at once - just what you'll need to be using to tackle each project. There are entire sections of PS I've never touched (and probably never will)!

Hop this helps-
-Lew

Besides the tutorials here at Renderosity, check out the following sites.

http://www.biorust.com/tutorials/index/

http://www.voidix.com/web_design_tutorials.html  (highly recommended)

Have fun.

Well I am definitely getting the program in the fall I know I've only scratched the surface but I like what PS can do over PSP. The biggest joy for me is not having the need to convert brushes I can use the PS size it was created  you can't do this in PSP all the brushes have to be converted which makes them smaller from the original brush.

See? Still learning, like I said...

I've been using photoshop every day for years and I'm still learning new tricks in it every now and then.  :)

Don't let this frighten you but you might be interested.  A few years ago I was having a beer and discussion with an old friend of mine who was one of the top Photoshop lecturers here in the UK.  I said that he must know just about everything in Photoshop.  He amazed me by saying that he thought that nobody knew everything about Photoshop, not even the Adobe guys.  His theory was that the people who work for Adobe only get involved in certain aspects of the programme that they develop such as layers and masks etc but don't know anything about other aspects of the programme.  This is similar to Microsoft where teams are dedicated to perhaps Office, Powerpoint and  Excell etc and again don't get involved with other parts of the software.  I personally have been using Photoshop since version 2.5 in 1994 and I certainly don't know all the programme.  Bear in mind that Photoshop started out by being a programme for graphic designers, and even today it contains lots of elements that I steer clear off because I never use them.
But compared to today where there are wonderful tutorials on the web and lots of digital magazines with tips and tricks, in 1994 I had to learn the programme from the manual.  Ever tried that?  One other suggestion which might be useful.  You might consider joining the National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP's) that has a fantastic Help Desk.  Many times I have posted them a problem and they have come back with the answer in about 15 minutes.  But go for it.  It's a fantastic programme

Quote - ... in 1994 I had to learn the programme from the manual.  Ever tried that?  ...

Yup! it was 1997 though :-)

To the OP ...

I use PhotoShop 7 at home and CS3 at work. Very much worth the learning curve which really isn;t all that bad. You will most likely perform the same 20-30 tasks from various angles and approaches, so once you have the steps down you can get very fast, very quickly.

Keyboard shortcuts are your friend :-)

I think I was using Photoshop 4 when I decided that it was time to stop fooling around and really learn it. I was really struggling. So I got a real book. It was Deke McClelland Photoshop 5 Bible if I remember. I started at page 1 and went all the way to the end. After doing that, I really felt that I had an understanding that I didn't have before and the program seemed easy. That was such a great feeling! So get a really good comprehensive book that tells you why you do things rather than just to do them. Ben Willmore is also an excellent teacher and has several books out. CS4 has so many changes from earlier versions that it's important to only get books that deal with the new version. Deke also has a CS4 Bible out.

Having said that, yes, the learning curve is fairly steep but it's amazing how quickly things seem to make sense. I can't use Paint Shop Pro without wanting to scream and end up closing the program very frustrated because I can't do the simple things that I can do in Photoshop, like resizing and moving a selection before it's placed, moving things on a layer just with the arrow keys, using arrow keys to change highlighted values including the brush rotate value that makes rotating a breeze, zooming in and out with Ctrl + or -, etc. So many seemingly simple things that become invaluable when using every day and are almost unconscious. Can you do them in PSP? Haven't been able to figure out how.

If I were learning this version of Photoshop, that's what I would do. I never tried to learn the program using the manual and use it now just to look things up that I've forgotten. Sometimes it helps having the gentle hand of someone who really knows how to teach you to use the program even if that's in book form.

Good luck with Photoshop. I think once you really get used to using it you'll see how absolutely elegant it is in comparison to anything else. And learn as many keyboard shortcuts as you can. They are absolutely necessary for some functions and overall make working in the program a breeze.

And another thing. If there's one way to do something in Photoshop, there are at least 10 other different ways to accomplish the same thing. So you can really tailor the program for your specific needs. And Jack's right. Nobody knows everything...except maybe Russ Williams. What's great is finding out how to do something after years of using the program, or an easier way to do something that I've been doing for years.

Sorry if I was long winded. I just love Photoshop.

More:  http://www.photoshopdaily.co.uk/  This is a pretty good site.

Now, anybody here know how to use Collada to export out of Poser Pro and into CS4 Extended? I don't know what options are right and what size increase I need and why my exported figure shows up with a big, blank empty screen! I really just want to be able to work on textures so don't need rigging, etc. But it ain't working. I'll so see about asking in another thread.

 I have to agree with Jack, NAPP is well worth the money. I was a member up until this last year, when the company i work for decided not to renew and with a daughter in college, i didn't have the money aside so the membership lapsed. i''m planning on picking it back up soon.

:)
retrocity

NAPP member here as well - in fact, going to a training session all day tomorrow with Corey Barker.
Definitely worth every penny!
-Lew

Hi Lew

Wow!  I'm jealous.  Corey's work is fantastic

Hey Jack-

Yeah - been to one with Bert Monroy about using Paths, and Dave Cross about various ways of sprucing images up and presenting them - looking forward to Barker's Down & Dirty Tricks seminar!

Now, if only I could find a Joe McNally seminar outside of CA - I'm in VA... bit of a hike...

-Lew

There is a bit of an initial learning curve, but once you learn the basics, you'll be able to do just about anything you need to do. I've been using it since Photoshop 2 (no layers and fewer goodies). I struggled a little at first but took some classes at my local community college and it all made sense in no time. It's a great program. As far as the comment about nobody knowing everything about Photoshop, that's probably true. I talked to another user at a local photo supply shop and he told me that Adobe has a separate team for each tool in Photoshop to come up with more things to do with them. We agreed that there is probably no limit on what you can do with Photoshop. Have fun with it. I've found that's the best way to learn is by just playing around with the tools and functions.

I started out as a Corel user and didn't get started with Photoshop until version 6. Now I know I would probably never want to go back. Although there is a learning curve, there are so many resources that can teach you what you need to know quickly. Just as 2436mm says*" The best way to learn is by just playing around with the tools and functions"*, is a very good start. Also all PS comes with a getting started guide built right in.

Good luck to you. :)

Lornix

I was puzzled by your comment  "Yup.  It was 1997 though".  Can you explain?

Yes and No, But it need a lot of practice for hands on experience. thanks to this Great forum new, I got a lot of help here and I would like to say that learn, learn and just learn.