Review on “Paint Shop Pro 7 Solutions” Book

The world of graphic design continues to penetrate the information, communication and entertainment media. More and more people are getting hooked in this profession because it’s truly interesting and enjoyable. In addition, your artworks will be made available to everyone any time you want it to be – through the Internet, of course.

With the continuous demand for the use of different digital images, Lori J. Davis has published the book, “Paint Shop Pro (PSP) 7 Solutions” which is fitted for novice PSP users. The book allows users to create dramatic graphics using the latest version of this image editing software package. It has concrete examples where users learn how to create, edit, draw, paint or animate images. Its topics include painting tools, working with layers, and vector, web, print and photo editing solutions. Also, installation and configuration basics and selection solutions are being discussed. It also teaches users on how to optimize web images and describes the advantages and requirement for publishing images online. Special focus is given to teaching image editors practical ways to use hardware and software by introducing specific projects users can accomplish themselves.

Personally speaking, however, this book is not as effective as I’ve expected. Based on the descriptions in the publisher's website, it appeared that the book’s author would not spend time doing its precious pages on bad remarks and instead, focused on using PSP to do real world applications. There are also precious few photo solutions in it with much of the book devoted to drawing vector objects or revising basic material but all these things were already well covered in the user's manual. I was wrong and was totally disappointed. However, if you want to learn how to draw shapes and such using the vector tools, then this book just might be the perfect fit for you.

I did not learn anything from this book. The book covers almost everything, but it is too brief and shallow. I feel like I wasted my money buying this book. If you’re looking for a book that describes each and every tool and panel in great detail, don’t think twice to buy this book. But, if you’re looking for 'how to' do things – forget about it!