To all GFX Team members.
I got the Photoshop trial today, as I'm doing Visual Media for school. I then thought, why don't I start using it for making sigs/avatars etc? My question to you is, how did you start learning to use Photoshop? Also, do you recommend Photoshop or any other software? Did you use tutorials or just have a play around with it to get the feel of it?
Hi Jaidyn,
It's a combination of playing around with the software yourself and following tutorials. If you are completely unfamiliar with Photoshop (CS or Elements), then you will probably feel rather lost (I did). Once I started reading up on tutorials, I could concentrate on individual features and their functions and later decide which ones I wanted to use for which kind of sig.
Also, I have a very good friend who is a Photoshop fan, plus my GFX mentors over here ;-D If you have...
1) friends or know people who are Photoshop fans and can "mentor" you
2) where to download which tutorials (there are different levels: beginners, intermediate etc.)
3) a lot of passion, patience, time and stamina (you also have to be ready to get frustrated every now and then)
...then you'll enjoy Photoshop. Be careful: it is highly addictive once you get the hang of it, and you might end up sitting late at night until your eyes are as square as your screen. Make sure you do not let the joys of Photoshopping distract you from focusing on school and on "real life" ;-D
About programs:
-
Adobe Photoshop CS is the leading and most popular image editing program out there. You can get a student version of this package - the "normal" non-student version is horribly expensive.
-
Adobe Photoshop Elements (which I use) is the watered-down version of Photoshop CS. It does not, for example, have the highly cherished Pen/Bezier Tool. I use it in combination with:
-
GIMP. GIMP is said to be almost as powerful as Photoshop CS and is a cross-platform program. And: it is free of charge :-D
GIMP - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The most recent version is 2.6.11; when you open/use it for the very first time, you will have to get used to the user interface, which consists of three separate windows. A single-window-interface is foreseen in version 2.8, but it is unclear when this version will be released (end of this year or beginning of 2012). Once you get used to GIMP, you will be very happy with it. I love it
)
-
CorelDraw Graphics Suite X5. Corel is one of Adobe's main competitors; I do not like it that much, to be honest; I find the UI a bit complicated; but other GFXers like Archie or Nick have perfect mastery over both CorelDraw and Adobe Photoshop, so they'll be able to tell you more.
-
Paint.NET. A free and popular program (especially for beginners) for Windows users only. You need to have Microsoft NET Framework installed (hence the name). I do not have any experience with it, but I have often seen it recommended over here.
Uhm...That's all I can think of for now
My co-GFXers will definitely give you some more valuable input.
