CIS260

Essay for class CIS260.
Rosa M. Weber
Jan/9/2006

I am a current user of Adobe’s Photoshop version 7.0.

As a new photographer in business, I first came across Adobe’s Photoshop by sharing my work with some more experienced colleagues at online Photography Contests and Forum sites. Everybody pretty much agreed on the fact that my digital photographs were creative and cute, but that they lacked professional enhancement and retouching. As I started trying to learn the basics and asking questions, they all said, “Get Adobe’s Photoshop”.

Adobe’s Photoshop is in my opinion the best software available for professional photographers. While there are many programs around that can get away with the basic cropping of photographs, color and contrast adjustments, etc., none of them offer the detail and quality of all of Adobe’s features.

Selective coloring and other color enhancements, for example, become rather easy with the different kinds of lasso tools. Blemishes and some other minor imperfections can also be easily fixed with the help of the healing brush or the clone stamp tools, which are some of my most used features in version 7.0. But of course, after seeing the new improved version, Adobe’s Photoshop CS2, I can’t wait to start using the vanishing point and the spot healing brush tools which are done with the click of a button!

With Adobe’s Photoshop now, I open my digital photos and I crop them and balance the colors, the contrast and the lighting first. Later, I do other things such as adding sharpness or applying filters like Diffuse Glow, I turn the images black and white, sepia (my favorite), I do selective coloring, add borders or vignettes, etc.

Another feature I use quite a bit is the slice tool in order to create html pages for my web sites. It is awesome the way you can design the image you want to display on your site and add all kinds of effects to the objects in it (shadows, bevel and emboss, glow, gradients). Later you cut it into pieces leaving a big blank piece where the main window to display all the web pages will go and that’s all! Adobe’s Photoshop creates the basic html code for your layout.

I currently own a pretty good camera, but not yet the top-of-the-notch one I plan on getting sometime in the future. Consequently, not all my photos are the quality I want them to be at first. It is really amazing to see the photos right after you upload them to the computer and to compare them later to the final version, after applying Adobe’s Photoshop “magic”. Sometimes, I have even gone directly to Adobe’s Photoshop in the middle of a photo shoot proof viewing, to show my customers what a particular photo can become with just a bit of help. They, not being familiar with the software at all of course, become truly amazed at the beautiful and professional results this powerful tool gives.

Another feature I use which helps me a lot with the sales is the automated photo galleries. I rarely do photo sessions at Day Care Centers, but when I do, I need to come home and stay in front of the computer for a couple of days just retouching photos non-stop. Once I am finally done, it is so nice to have Adobe’s Photoshop create the online photo proof gallery for me. Then I upload the files to the computer and I simply send the Day Care Center an email with a username and password so all parents may go to a password protected web site and view their kids’ photos online. I just recently learned somehow that it is possible to create more styles than the ones provided with the software. I believe that I can change the individual html files in a photo gallery to suit me and later upload the new photo gallery files I have created to some folder in Adobe’s Photoshop. The new photo gallery style is this way added to the current list of available designs… question to the teacher: do you know how to do this, Christine?

One more thing; there are some gorgeous photographs which for some reason have a lot of noise when I first upload them to my computer, and some others that simply look better in a much softer and clear version, such as photos of newborns, baby face close-ups, etc. In this case, I go to a wonderful shareware program called “Neat Image” and I let it do its magic. Photographs look just beautiful and soft as they can be after using this program to reduce the noise. I just saw in Adobe’s Photoshop CS2 web site that they have added an advanced noise reduction feature that seems to do exactly the same. I don’t know what else they will keep coming up with, I can’t even imagine how much better digital art and graphic design software can get… let’s give it a couple more decades and we’ll see!!!

Finally, I just want to add that after taking a look at Adobe’s Photoshop CS2 web site and browsing to check out the new features, I can’t wait to learn about smart objects and image warping. They seem as interesting and fun as useful. I currently provide my customers with some photo keepsakes such as T-shirts, photo mugs, Christmas ornaments and other souvenirs that they can order online. What I do is I upload my photos to another web site that offers these photo keepsakes, and after I get a sample image of the product with my babies’ photos in it, I save the image onto my desktop. This way I can offer my customers a product preview using Babies on the Go Studios’ photographs to match the rest of my site. Being able to apply my photography business images to some additional items myself, is something I look forward to.

My goal with this class is to increase my knowledge of the features I already know how to use as well as to learn about all the other features available. I am already enjoying the fact that I have joined this class and how much fun I think it will be. With this class I basically hope to learn as much as I can, and to be able to apply all the learned knowledge to my new little business.


BABIES ON THE GO Graphic Design
Baby graphics 100% mouse drawn with LOTS of LOVE!

P.S. Christine, I am so excited about attending College here in the USA and getting this double Major in Internet Technologies and Graphic Design. I absolutely adore all my classes, I can’t wait do get my hands on all the fun projects that lay ahead. Thank you in advance for taking the time to teach us.

Sincerely,
Rosa Weber, Babies on the Go Studios.
http://www.babiesonthegostudios.com

 

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