Customer Reviews
Digital Collage and Painting, Susan R. Bloom 
2008-09-23
The book is fantastic and is the missing link to get started when you want to blend several items into one. The chapters really encourage you to try a collage. And, the images in the book are very clear as Susan walks you through each step.
What type of book is this? 
2008-02-25
I feel that the author was torn between writing a step by step, "follow these directions to recreate this image" project book for beginners, and a book filled with art to inspire and spark the creativity of those a bit more advanced. For me, it does neither well.
There are about 600 pages in this book. The first 500 show you other artists finished work then give you detailed, step by step directions, complete with screen shots and settings, on how to recreate what the artist did. This makes it seem to me like a step by step project book. Problem is, you aren't supplied with the images so you can't duplicate the image (and why would I want to anyway?). I would guess that each piece of finished work you're shown gets at least 10 pages of directions on how it was done. If I was a beginner and wanted a step by step project to follow, it would have been great, but only if they supplied the images, which they don't, so it's not. As I'm not a beginner looking to replicate someone else's work, all those pages and screen shots were a complete waste of book space and my time, reading page after page after page of settings and screen shots bored me silly.
Sometimes, you get page after page of screen shots on how the artist fixed a bad photograph before he used it in his collage. Huh? So now this a basic "How To Use Photoshop" book? This is why I say the author wasn't clear on what type of book she was writing.
I feel the book misses the mark as one to inspire and spark my creativity simply because 500 of the 600 pages are filled with screen shots of how to replicate someone else's work. If I could have gotten 600 pages of art with a small blurb with the gist of how it was done I would have loved it.
The best part about this book for me was the quotes. There is a quote about art on almost every single page. The reason I didn't flip past section after section of screen shots was that I didn't want to miss the quotes.
So, unfortunately, this book will go on my shelf and probably never see the light of day again. If it supplied images to go with the steps, I'd pass it along to a beginner to use, but it doesn't so I won't. And all those pages of screen shots doesn't really spur my creativity, so I'll probably never open it again.
Most chapters are good... 
2006-12-27
Most chapters are very good. My interest is painting--I found that several chapters were just excellent instruction and tips-others were OK. Worth the purchase price to me...
Digital Collage and Painting: Using Photoshop and Painter to Create Fine Art 2006-11-24
This book was like reading a great novel, I couldn't put it down! The inspiration was excellent. The incorrect assumption of some that "digital" means "computer generated" is debunked in this excellent work which has lots of beautiful examples of many kinds of digital art (not just collage). There are lots of step by step tutorials that are helpful and tips for using the tools of PS and Painter to their best advantage.
It is not a beginners book however as Bloom assumes that the reader is familiar with PS and Painter. Still this might be the work that makes one REALLY want to do the work needed to become proficient in these programs.
Loved it more than any other work on this subject and I already have a shelf full!!!
Suni R
Buyer Beware 
2006-11-10
Ok, firstly if you want a hands-on plenty of action book stay away from this one. Sure you get to see how other artist have created their work but if you read carefully there are gaps between getting from one stage to the next in some cases. Also a MAJOR dissapointment is you get no images to play with so you can attempt to emulate what the artist is doing as you read. Using the same techniques on different images can obviously give you totally different results.
There is a small hands-on section (26 pages) at the back where you have to download the images to work with. Come on guys how about a CD..? You also have to download a total of 49 files off the web if you want all of them AND they are all largish TIFFS instead of jpgs so be prepared for a long download session.
Basically if you want to be a digital vouyer and have a perve at how others do it without having fun yourself buy this book. If you want to get down and dirty and have heaps of fun then look elswhere. I have read many good PS and Painter books but for me this is not one of them. I might add I am a very experienced PS user and more than a fair Painter user and while the author certainly knows her stuff the book for me is a major letdown and certainly not for a new user looking for a good start to take them to an intermediate level.
Bridging the Digital Disciplines 2006-10-07
Digital Collage and Painting proudly showcases the work of twenty-one talented digital artists. Each artist walks you through the creation of a piece of their art and lets you in on their secrets about equipment, software, favorite papers, and how their creative process begins. The artists included are:
Audrey Bernstein
Paul Biddle
Leslye Bloom
Stephen Burns
Luzette Donohue
Katrin Eismann
Paul Elson
Steven Friedman
Ileana Frómeta Grillo
Bill Hall
Julieanne Kost
Rick Lieder
Bobbi Doyle-Maher
Ciro Marchetti
Lou Oates
Cher Threinen-Pendarvis
James G. Respess
Fay Sirkis
Jeremy Sutton
Maggie Taylor
Pep Ventosa
* Discover how the computer can be used to paint on photographs, incorporating other visual materials into images
*Learn from step-by-step examples for painting, collage, and panoramics
* The associated website contains the art samples used in the book so that you can practice the different techiques
A great book for learning new techniques and skills 2006-08-26
This is a great book for the curious and creative artist who wants to use Photoshop and Painter as their tools for expression. The author provides plenty of information, step-by-step instructions and illustrations to help the reader go through the process and create his/her images. The book is not an introduction to basic Photoshop or Painter. The book is for the artist who wants to improve his techniques and learn new skills using these programs. You can practice, and apply the new skills and I'm sure that you will notice immediately the improvement on your technical skills.
The chapters on Collage are excellent and the author provides a step-by-step guide in the creative process of a diversity of images. She inspires you to use the newly learned techniques to create stunning collages. The chapter devoted to creating panoramic images is superb. You will enjoy this chapter because you can use any digital camera to create great panoramas and you don't need to invest in expensive equipment.
You will love the chapter on filters; you can practice and create new versions of some of your favorite old images. The chapter on Essential Photoshop and Painter techniques is a must for everyone who wants to be proficient with the tools of both programs. This chapter has a step-by-step approach to the method and you'll have plenty of illustrations and instructions to learn how to master the tools. The book provides five projects for you to practice some of your newly acquired skills. I'm sure that this book will help you find inspiration and will motivate you to go out and create great images with this wonderful programs. This book is a must in the library of every photographer and artists who uses digital technology.
A rich palette to dip into! 2006-08-11
Susan Bloom has utilized her talents as a gifted teacher, photographer and artist to produce a book that should be kept within easy reach of those aspiring to take their photography to the fine arts level. The book presents a rich palette of ideas to enhance images and to develop the digital artist. Through clear instruction and illustration she shows the extensive range of possibilities available for digital art production. The artist case studies and "instructional" sections provide inspiration, clarify procedures and highlight software capabilities.
Your assumed basic knowledge of Photoshop and Painter is extended and enhanced in the practical sections with interesting and challenging projects involving the gamut of software tools, options and materials. For those needing a revision of basic procedures - there is a section for you.
This book will have you thinking differently about the photographs you take and their final form as you set out to create panoramas, collages or simply to give a photograph an artistic interpretation using Painter. The book is a triumph!
excellent, but in some areas only 2006-08-02
Enthusiastically written and covering a comprehensive range of topics, ideas and projects, this is an engaging book. I found the structure to be interesting, with a lot of material intended to inspire the reader at the front (including twenty-one individual "chapterettes", each involving a single artwork project, from invited contributors). The only purely instructional chapter comes right at the end, offering more detailed insight into some of the key steps and procedures used throughout the balance of the tome. And, in total, a bulky tome this is - 583 pages and 3 pounds plus a little (to be almost exact). A lot of the material presented is very inventive; for example, I do not recall seeing any of the techniques used as the basis of the worked (and finely artistic) examples within the `Painting in Photoshop ...' chapter included within any other of the now growing number of contemporary photo-art texts. Collage is taken to include the building of panoramic photographs and a whole chapter is devoted to these. However, arguably the best software for actually doing such constructions - NHIS' PTgui - isn't included (presumably because it doesn't fall directly into the Photoshop or Painter bucket). It's a shame, I think, that the urge to put the names of the two super-heavyweight software packages on the cover of the book lead to exclusions like this .... Fo2PiX' ArtMasterPro application would have been very worthy of some coverage in this case also. There are a couple of other omissions which are really too obvious to go unremarked. First, there's almost no material in the book on portraiture - for example, just two of those "chapterettes" involve using and developing full-facial images, while a large proportion of the author's own fine art work involves just landscape and still life subject matter. Secondly, there are some clear encouragements given at the outset (that is; within Chapter 1, titled `Concept') on pre- and post-visualization of the fine art. Post-visualization almost always needs to include some planning on a target size for the output/finished printed work. Again, a few of the "chapterettes" include some details on this, but it is a topic which remains pretty much absent from the remainder of the text. Overall, the careful reader will undoubtedly find a whole slew of new ideas from within this worthy book; but, may have to work independently - and/or pioneeringly - to execute some of them in detail.
Digital Collage and Painting:Reveiw 2006-07-23
This book on Digital Collage and Painting is abundant in creative and technical know-how. Susan is both generous and thorough and because of that she will inspire you to see potential in each new process. This is the only book you will ever need on digital art. Each step is detailed, photographed and beautifully illustrated. Each chapter will reveal a trick or tip necessary to making your image your own. The techniques you hoped to learn from previous books on digital art only to find that they fell short will not be the case with this great new book! This artist and author shares her own work along with other digital gurus, 21 to be exact. Other tutorials detailed in this book include how to make your own ink jet papers, creating panoramic images, the effects of combining drawing and photography and much, much more. Kudos to Susan Ruddick Bloom!
