Amazon.com (ISBN 020165895X, Paperback)

Adobe Photoshop 5.5 Classroom in a Book, Special Web Edition, like others in the fine Classroom in a Book series, is somewhere between a manual and a tutorial; the lessons can be read straight through or referenced on a need-to-know basis.

Photoshop 5.5, a significant upgrade to the top image manipulation software, now comes packaged with ImageReady 2.0, Adobe's Web graphics application. Combined they comprise an extremely powerful and very user-friendly set of tools for creating well-executed and optimized JPEGs, GIFs, GIF animations, sliced GIFs, rollovers, and many other complex images.

Each lesson in the book begins with an overview and ends with review questions, making it easy for experienced users to skip around to new material. Files for the lessons are on the accompanying CD-ROM, but there is plenty of room to experiment with your own images within each lesson.

The first two chapters in Adobe Photoshop 5.5 CIB are Quick Tours adapted from the CD-ROM that comes with Photoshop 5.5, each tour covering the key features of the two applications, respectively. The remaining lessons go into greater depth on these features.

And there's an amazing amount of information here: Lessons that cover layers, masks, channels, filters, and actions, not to mention the newest tools in 5.5, the Magic eraser and the Background eraser, both of which make silhouetting an image a breeze. Readers learn the new and easy ways to use compression previews in both applications. Slicing images and applying different compressions to each slice is also made simple.

The writing is thorough and concise, and each step is well-illustrated. A full-color section demonstrates selected tutorial steps, finished projects, and toolbox overviews. Similarly effective are the pages with thumbnails of different mode selections (multiply, dissolve, soft light, and so on). And throughout the book, sidebars address special Web issues and tips.

Like Photoshop 5.5, Adobe Photoshop 5.5 CIB, Special Web Edition is specifically aimed at the Web designer, however print designers benefit as well from the book's extensive instruction on new tools and color management. For those who plan to upgrade, Adobe Photoshop 5.5 CIB will get them up and running within a just a few hours. --Angelynn Grant

Topics covered: using Adobe Photoshop 5.5, including ImageReady 2.0, with emphasis on new features and creating for the Web; lessons on optimizing image compression, slicing and animating GIFs, working with tools, layers, gradients, channels, and masks; retouching images, basic pen tools, advanced layer techniques, special effects and filters, combining Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop images, working with spot colors, color management techniques, and preparing CMYK art for the press; CD-ROM contains files for all lessons as well as preview tours of other Adobe products.