Deke McClelland is quite possibly the most accessible and humorous Photoshop guru around, rivaled only by Scott Kelby and Russell Brown. In the introduction to this book, he asserts that he was born in Verona in 1511, and later, with diabolical intent, developed a pathogen code named the "Pernicious Instrument of eXtreme Evil" (you guessed it, "pixel" for short). Then, in the words of the introduction, "When his invention turned out to help rather than hurt photography, he went quite mad. He now inflicts his revenge by writing educational books and hosting training videos."

Although written with his characteristic wit, McClelland always returns to the point, very carefully and thoroughly explaining the precise steps needed to achieve various results in Photoshop, so that even a beginner will be able to follow along easily. Having said that, this book is true to its "Professional Edition" designation – it covers very advanced techniques. For example, one very interesting bit of information I picked up is that Layer Styles (automated effects provided in the Layer Styles palette) can be "deconstructed" – that is, by choosing Layer > Layer Style > Create Layers, you can take over and edit each layer of the effect to your satisfaction.

Attention to detail is one of the hallmarks of this book – in the chapter called "Painting and Brushes," McClelland even covers the hardware a Photoshop artist would probably use (the Wacom tablet), and elaborates on the techniques it can facilitate.

Well written and designed, and with color photos and screenshots throughout, this is a tome (649 pages!) that should serve as a useful reference for years to come. Although this is written to cover Photoshop CS, nearly all of the techniques covered would apply to Photoshop CS2 as well. Supplemental information can be found at dekemc.com.