Photoshop beginners

This is a course to introduce Adobe Photoshop to beginners. The course gives you the know-how and confidence to re-touch, manipulate and edit your own photographic and digital images.  Achieve this through expert tuition, hands-on practice, reinforced with step-by-step resources and digital tutorial files specially designed for your use. The course will build from basic techniques on a sessional basis from week one, to the final weeks whereby you should then have the know-how to work with Photoshop layers.

Learner & Entry Requirements: 

You should have basic computer literacy and be able to find your way around a PC. It is not necessary to have any previous knowledge of Adobe Photoshop.

General & First Session: 

You would benefit by having Photoshop or Photoshop Elements at home.  If you already have a Memory Stick (USB Flash Drive to copy and take digital files home) please bring it, but do not purchase one specifically for the course until after the first session.  KAE is unable to offer refunds for any materials, equipment or books if the course is subsequently closed.

Course Aim & Objectives:  

To introduce beginners to Adobe Photoshop, the World Standard digital image editing software and Photo design tool and give them the confidence to work on their own photographs.

SMART OBJECTIVES: By the end of the Course students will be able to:

• Manipulate, re-touch, cut out, crop, clone, paste detail, and edit photographs and digital images.
• Work with layers to build a composite photograph.
• Cut out detail, scale, rotate and manipulate it for use in other images and photographs.
• Downsample High resolution images to Low Resolution for use on websites or as attachments to emails.
• Repair damaged Family photographs and produce a number of edited versions for their own purposes.
• Lighten and Darken selected areas of a photograph using Levels and Curves plus a variety of filters to sharpen up images.

By the end of the course you should have enough knowledge, confidence and ability to transfer what you have learned to edit and manipulate your own photographs and also to repair any damaged family photographs in your collection.

Assessment: 

View the results of your re-touching on a 'before and after' basis, by looking at the colour laser print-outs of the images you have edited, and comparing the results with the original files.  Group discussion, question and answer, observation, peer- and self-assessment are key factors.  Different levels of ability and proficiency with the software are noted during an initial open forum and induction.  Self-demonstration by learners.  Assessment is formative and summative when exercises are completed and printed out.

Progression: 

On completion of this course you should be able to continue on to Intermediate level and progress further with building photo-montages and working with multiple layers.  To enrol on the Photoshop Intermediate course, please ask at the centre office for details.

Course Syllabus: 

Primarily introducing image-editing software (Adobe Photoshop CS) in order to edit your photographs and produce finished results to save in digital form and also print out colour laser copies.

A tour of the tool palette and its uses.  Methods of selecting images in order to edit them.  Cutting, pasting and duplicating images, methods of re-touching and cloning detail.  Extending the canvas size or picture area to fit the printer, using type with images. Retouching a Family Archive photograph. Designing for print.  Lightening and darkening areas of photographs, using various filters and methoids of selection.  An introduction to building and composing a Photomonage or simple composite picture. Saving files in jpeg and other formats, either for printing the results or changing file sizes for web use, or to attach to an E-Mail.

Individual projects are encouraged according to abilities attained, and end products printed.