I’m a big fan of Photoshop (PS). I’ve been using it for a number of years, mostly doing basic photo retouching with earlier versions of the software. Lately, though, I’ve been learning much more about PS through enrolling in the various digital art courses I’ve been taking under the umbrella of Photoshop Artistry. Our founder and digital art mentor, Sebastian Michaels, states that you don’t need to learn all the intricacies of PS to create digital art, that the basics will do, but it is fun learning PS in depth and learning the awesome techniques that other artists use. I also enjoy using Lightroom, another Adobe product I’ve had for quite a while. It’s great for post-processing photos and for storing and cataloging those photos; I’ve got around 20,000 of them.
So, I don’t mind paying, along with many others, the $10 monthly subscription fee for being able to use the two products (that’s $10 for both, not each). Some folks, though, have always been and still are up in arms about the subscription model that Adobe has adopted. You can read two points of view, one from a photographer who doesn’t mind the fee and one who does.
Photoshop Artistry is the basic course that got me started doing photo art in PS. If you want to learn more about it straight from Sebastian, he was interviewed recently on PS Guru Dave Cross’s weekly podcast (Episode 41). Give it a listen.
If you’d like to get into PS in more depth, you don’t have to pay to enroll in a course, as there are a large number of websites where you can learn more about the software. I recommend Colin Smith’s Photoshop Cafe or Adobe’s Daily Creative Challenge (scroll down the page for past challenges). And, of course, there are plenty of Youtube tutorials. I do, however, highly recommend Photoshop Artistry.