Adobe Photoshop 6.0 Web Design by Michael Baumgardt Search Amazon for other books by or about Michael Baumgardt. Rating: Reviewed by: Douglas Malcolm

Adobe Photoshop 6.0 Web Design is put out by the good folks over at Peachpit Press. This is the same firm that produces the well-received Visual Quickstart Guides, so I was mildly excited at the chance to see what they would do with a Photoshop book. Alas, no book can be everything to everybody, and this one is a case of a book being particularly ill-suited for me personally. That's not to say that it's useless to everyone - not at all. It's just that you have to fit into a very specific demographic to maximize your use of this volume, that demographic being "Macintosh users who formerly used Photoshop for print media but would like to use it to move into web design". If you fit into that category, you would be hard-pressed to find a better book on the topic.

Adobe Photoshop 6.0 Web Design stands out as a very well designed book, and by that I mean the production value is outstanding. The binding and paper are clearly of the highest quality, and the page layout and design are top notch. The use of bright colors and visually hard-hitting graphics throughout the book make it a real pleasure to peruse.

Mr. Baumgardt starts out with a section titled "Basics of Web Design". This fills in the background on general web technology, and is reasonably well done. Sadly, it has nothing to do with Photoshop, but instead seems intended as a quick introduction to what's going on behind your web browser. This supports my theory that this book is aimed at print designers looking to make a lateral move into web work; the other possible target demographic, those familiar with web development but unfamiliar with design using Photoshop, would have no use for such a chapter.

The next major section, titled "Design Concepts", is the part of the book that I disagree with most strongly. Baumgardt goes on and on in an admiring manner about some of the great web designers of our time, and where they see web design heading in the next few years. He even interviews many of them.

I have some experience in the field, and unfortunately I disagree completely in the direction these folks are heading. I'm talking about sites with no clear or labeled navigational scheme. Large iconic buttons with no associated text to clue in the end user just looking for information. That's called "Mystery Meat Navigation" where I come from, and it is to be shunned in all it's forms. I believe in clear and functional sites, even at the expense of eye candy. Anyway, it is apparent that Baumgardt and I are polar opposites when it comes to taste in design.

Once you get past that part, the book picks up considerably. Baumgardt covers everything you'll need to know to take a shot at web design, including (quoting section titles here);

• Optimizing Photoshop
• Working with web-safe colors
• Photoshop Techniques
• Designing web elements
• Working with ImageReady
• GIF animation
• GIF,JPG,PNG (3 separate sections)
• GoLive basics
• Video and audio

One last thing to note about this book; Baumgardt is obviously a Macintosh user, and his step-by-step tutorials are based upon the Macintosh version of Photoshop 6. This shouldn't present a problem for Windows users, but mystifyingly, it does. While attempting to follow along with my own copy of Photoshop for Windows, I was stunned to discover that the menus between the two versions are not compatible. When Baumgardt says, "Click this, then that, then that", you'll find that it just doesn't work in Windows... the menu items are in a different location. Some items I was able to find with some difficulty, and some not at all. This isn't the author's fault by any means (blame Adobe - I mean, what is that?), but it certainly bears mentioning.

So. To sum it all up, if you are a Macintosh-using print media designer and want to try your hand at web design, this is your book. Grab it, learn from it, and go forth. If however, you are already a web person, and just wanted to learn Photoshop on Windows, you'll might do better to look elsewhere.