Getting Started
Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 10 delivers image-editing tools that balance power and versatility with ease of use. Whether you’re a home user or hobbyist, a professional photographer or a business user, Photoshop Elements 10 makes it easy to produce good-looking pictures, share your stories in sophisticated creations for both print and web, and manage and safeguard your precious photos.
If you’ve used an earlier version of Photoshop Elements, you’ll find that this Classroom in a Book® will teach you advanced skills and provide an introduction to the many new and improved features in this version. If you’re new to Adobe Photoshop Elements, you’ll learn the fundamental concepts and techniques that will help you master the application.
About Classroom in a Book
Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Classroom in a Book is part of the official training series for Adobe graphics and publishing software developed with the support of Adobe product experts. Each lesson in this book is made up of a series of self-paced projects that will give you hands-on experience using Photoshop Elements 10.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Classroom in a Book includes a CD attached to the inside back cover. On the CD you’ll find all the image files used for the lessons in this book, together with additional learning resources.
Prerequisites
Before you begin the lessons in this book, make sure that you and your computer are ready by following the tips and instructions on the next few pages.
Requirements on your computer
You’ll need about 800 MB of free space on your hard disk—around 250 MB for the lesson files and up to 550 MB for the work files that you’ll create as you work through the exercises.
Required skills
The lessons in this book assume that you have a working knowledge of your computer and its operating system. Make sure that you know how to use the mouse and the standard menus and commands, and also how to open, save, and close files. Can you scroll (vertically and horizontally) within a window to see content that may not be visible in the displayed area? Do you know how to use context menus, which open when you right-click (Windows) / Control-click (Mac OS) items? If you need to review these basic and generic computer skills, see the documentation included with your Microsoft® Windows® or Apple® Mac® OS X software.
In this book, the forward slash character ( / ) is used to separate equivalent terms and commands for Windows / Mac OS, in the order shown here.
Installing Adobe Photoshop Elements 10
You must purchase the Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 software separately and install it on a computer running Windows Vista®, Windows® XP, Windows® 7, or Mac® OS X. For system requirements and complete instructions on installing the software, see the Photoshop Elements 10 Read Me file on the application disc and the accompanying documentation.
Trouble-shooting installation problems
Should you have problems installing Photoshop Elements 10, point your browser to www.adobe.com/support and choose Photoshop Elements from the list of product help and support centers. On the Adobe Photoshop Elements Help And Support page, click Downloading, Installing And Setting Up, under Getting Started & Help.
Copying the Classroom in a Book files
The CD attached to the inside back cover of this book includes a Lessons folder containing all the digital files you’ll need for the lessons. Keep the lesson files on your computer until you have completed all the exercises.
The files on the CD are practice files, provided for your personal use in these lessons. You are not authorized to use these files commercially, or to publish or distribute them in any form without written permission from Adobe Systems, Inc. and the individual photographers who took the pictures, or other copyright holders.
Copying the Lessons files from the CD
1. Create a new folder named PSE10CIB inside the username/My Documents (Windows) or username/Documents (Mac OS) folder on your computer.
2. Insert the Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Classroom in a Book CD into your CD-ROM drive. For Windows users: if a message appears asking what you want Windows to do, choose Open Folder To View Files Using Windows Explorer, and then click OK. If no message appears, open My Computer and double-click the CD icon to open it.
3. Locate the Lessons folder on the CD and copy it to the PSE10CIB folder you’ve just created on your computer.
4. When your computer has finished copying the Lessons folder, remove the CD from your CD-ROM drive and put it away.
In this book, the forward arrow character (>) is used to denote submenus and commands found in the menu bar at the top of the workspace or in context and options menus; for example, Menu > Submenu > Command. The forward slash character ( / ) is used to separate equivalent keyboard shortcuts and commands for Windows / Mac OS, in the order shown here.
Creating a work folder
Now you need to create a folder for the work files that you’ll produce as you work through the lessons in this book.
1. In Windows Explorer (Windows) / the Finder (Mac OS) open the Lessons folder that you copied to your new PSE10CIB folder on your hard disk.
2. Choose File > New > Folder (Windows) / File > New Folder (Mac OS). A new folder is created inside the Lessons folder. Type My CIB Work as the name for the new folder.
About catalog files
Photoshop Elements stores information about your images in a library catalog file, which enables you to conveniently manage the photos on your computer. The catalog file is a central concept in understanding how Photoshop Elements works. Photoshop Elements doesn’t actually “import” your images at all; for each image you import Photoshop Elements simply creates a new entry in the catalog that is linked to the source file, wherever it is stored. Whenever you assign a tag or a rating to a photo, or group images as an album, the catalog file is updated. All the work you put into organizing your growing photo library is recorded in the catalog.
As well as digital photographs, a catalog can include video and audio files, scans, PDF documents, and any presentations and layouts you might create in Photoshop Elements, such as slide shows, photo collages, and CD jacket designs.
The first time you launch Photoshop Elements it automatically creates a default catalog file (named My Catalog) on your hard disk. Although a single catalog can efficiently handle thousands of files, you can also establish separate catalogs for different purposes if that’s the way you prefer to work.
In the first lesson in this book you’ll create and load a new, dedicated catalog into which you’ll import the lesson sample images. In this way, it will be easy to keep your own photo library separate from your lesson files.
In the first three lessons, you’ll learn a number of different ways to add files to your catalog, together with a variety of techniques for tagging, marking, and organizing your images, and for sorting and searching your catalog. You’ll be able to practice these new skills when you import lesson files to your Classroom in a Book catalog at the beginning of each chapter.
Additional resources
Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Classroom in a Book is not meant to replace the documentation that comes with the program, nor to be a comprehensive reference for every feature; only the commands and options used in the lessons are explained in this book. For comprehensive information and tutorials about program features, please refer to these resources:
Adobe Community Help Community Help brings together active Adobe product users, Adobe product team members, authors, and experts to give you the most useful, relevant, and up-to-date information about Adobe products. Whether you’re looking for a code sample or an answer to a problem, have a question about the software, or want to share a useful tip or recipe, you’ll benefit from Community Help. Search results will show you not only content from Adobe, but also from the community. With Adobe Community Help you can:
• Access up-to-date definitive reference content online and offline
• Find the most relevant content contributed by experts from the Adobe community, on and off Adobe.com
• Comment on, rate, and contribute to content in the Adobe community
• Download Help content directly to your desktop for offline use
• Find related content with dynamic search and navigation tools
To access Community Help The Community Help application downloads when you first install Photoshop Elements 10. To invoke Help, press F1 or choose Help > Elements Organizer Help in the Organizer, or Help > Photoshop Elements Help in the Editor. This companion application lets you search and browse Adobe and community content, and to comment on and rate any article just as you would in the browser.
You can also download Adobe Help and language reference content for use offline, and subscribe to new content updates (which can be downloaded automatically) so that you’ll always have the most up-to-date content for your Adobe product. You can download the application from www.adobe.com/support/chc/index.html
Adobe content is updated based on community feedback and contributions. You can contribute in several ways: you can add comments to both content and forums—including links to web content, or publish your own content using Community Publishing. You’ll find more information about how to contribute at www.adobe.com/community/publishing/download.html
See http://community.adobe.com/help/profile/faq.html for answers to frequently asked questions about Community Help.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Help and Support Point your browser to www.adobe.com/support/photoshopelements/ where you can find and browse Help and Support content on adobe.com.
Adobe TV http://tv.adobe.com is an online video resource for expert instruction and inspiration about Adobe products, including a How To channel to get you started with your product.
Resources for educators www.adobe.com/education includes three free curriculums that use an integrated approach to teaching Adobe software and can be used to prepare for the Adobe Certified Associate exams.
Also check out these useful links:
Adobe Forums http://forums.adobe.com lets you tap into peer-to-peer discussions, and questions and answers on Adobe products.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 product home page
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopel/
Adobe Labs http://labs.adobe.com gives you access to early builds of cutting-edge technology, as well as forums where you can interact with both the Adobe development teams building that technology and other like-minded members of the community.
Free trial versions of Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 and Adobe Premiere Elements 10 The trial version of the software is fully functional and offers every feature of the product for you to test-drive (does not include Plus membership). To download your free trial version: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=photoshop_elements&loc=en_us