“ The Photoshop Mentor Series is fantastic!  It made a very intimidating program seem easy!  The lessons are simple and straightforward. I am now much more comfortable navigating Photoshop, and I am, finally, getting the results I want!"  

Summer Ennis
Fairhope, Alabama”

FROM: Gene Rodman
Dear Fellow Photography Enthusiast,

Did you know that using Photoshop correctly is one of the best skills to have to create beautiful images like the ones you see in magazines and calendars? Did you also know that in order to create magazine worthy images you not only need to know how to use the tools and techniques in Photoshop but also the correct sequence to use them?

If you are like me you've spent a lot of time researching and comparing your camera equipment and all it's accessories trying to get the best quality and value for your buck. You've also probably spent a small fortune obtaining all that equipment with the thinking that NOW you're going to be able to get those great photographs.

Do you know that most people believe it's a professional photographer's camera equipment that is responsible for creating their stunning photographs?

Well let me tell you now....

That Is Totally Wrong !!!

Yep, I said it. It's the truth and any good photographer knows that it is the truth. It's not something the camera companies want you to know though!

The truth is a good photographer can create wonderful images with an average camera.

The Secret To Truly Stunning Images Is To Take A Good Image And Process It Correctly In Photoshop.

It doesn't matter if it's taken in film or digitally, it still can be made better in Photoshop.

And I'm not talking about doing a lot of weird and crazy things to it here.

I'm talking about taking your photograph and enhancing it just right until it looks exactly like you envisioned it should.

(My philosophy is that I like to enhance a photograph to bring out its best qualities but I personally don't like to totally change the photograph to where you can't recognize it)

It's All In The Details

So, here's another little secret I'll let you in on.....

Photoshop is very complicated!!!

OK, so if you have ever tried to use Photoshop you know that that's no secret.

Just Google Photoshop and you'll see tons of articles, videos and tutorials on the subject. Anything and everything you'd ever want to know is right there for you to learn and a lot of it is for FREE!

So Why On Earth Would You Want To Learn From Me And Pay Me For Something You Could Learn For Free?

Well, first let me tell you about my journey of learning Photoshop and you'll see very clearly why you should learn from me and not make the same mistakes I did.

I visited Yosemite when I was a teenager and took along my little 110mm camera (you'd have to be at least 40 to know what one of those are). I really wanted to take photographs of Yosemite like the ones I had seen on postcards.

I took lots of pictures and was so excited I couldn't wait to see my masterpieces. But...when I had my film developed I was extremely disappointed by what I saw.

My pictures weren't masterpieces, they were all washed out, dull, drab, and not very sharp! I really wanted to be able to capture the most beautiful place I'd ever been and share my experience with everyone through my photography. I was so frustrated.

So began my 20 year journey through college (yes you read that right) of learning how to become a better photographer. I'd still be going if I hadn't moved to Montana. One photography class led to another, then another. I was even helping the teachers teach I'd been there so long.

It wasn't until my guidance counselor suggested I get a degree in photography that I even realized I had completed all my courses.

That was in the early 90s when film was still King and developing in the dark room was our best option.

After moving to Montana, I remarried and found myself helping my wife raise two children after having raised two of my own. My stepson, Nick, was graduating from high school and we wanted to take a really nice senior portrait of him.

I had just bought my first digital camera, a Fuji, and took him down to our studio and photographed him. I opened his images up in Photoshop 6, which is what we had at the time, and realized I had a lot of work to do to retouch it. He had a lot of blemishes and the colors were all wrong. His skin was really red and the black background definitely wasn't black.

It Just Looked Horrible!

So I sat there and stared at the screen for awhile wondering how I was going to fix everything. I didn't even know where to start!

Well, I decided to try to fix the colors first since they were so bad. So how do I do that? I didn't have a clue.

I had dial-up internet at the time so even if I found tutorials I wouldn't have been able to watch them since it would've taken so long to download them. Honestly I don't even know if the thought entered my mind.

You had to pay for everything in those days, and I was determined to learn on my own.

I had a photography degree, I should be able to figure it out.

I checked out the help section but that didn't enlighten me. I just didn't know enough to know what to ask.

So I decided to just randomly click on buttons to try and figure out what to do. Aha, I found a color balance thingy - that should work. I tried moving the sliders to fix the colors, but everytime I got close to fixing the background, Nick's face would turn brighter red, or worse green!. I got so frustrated I did what I normally do.

I told my wife she had to figure it out because there was no way I could take it anymore.

She worked at it a few hours and came to the same conclusion. It was just too complicated.

We took the best digital image we could create, blemishes and all, and figured it had to look better after it was printed at Walmart. It didn't.

(Taking your masterpieces to a place like Walmart or someplace similar is definitely on the do not do list, unless they are snapshots. You'll learn why and what better options there are for you in your lessons.)

They looked so bad we couldn't send them out to our friends and relatives. There was no way we wanted people to see them. We redid his portraits outside so we wouldn't have to worry about the black background and we did them far enough away so his skin wouldn't be as noticeable.

After That, We Decided We Needed To Know What We Were Doing.

We were professionals and people were going to depend on us to give them great photographs.

We went to the bookstore and bought some books on how to work in Photoshop. We each tackled a different book taping little pieces of paper to the outside of chapters we knew we would have to find easily.

We would open a book and go through it page by page following along with their lessons. When ever we discovered how to do something and it CLICKED, we would get so excited and teach each other how to do it.

But...a week or so later we would forget how to do that step and we would have to start learning it all over again.

We Quickly Realized 2 Things About Photoshop.

1. Photoshop can be AMAZING!!! I could do things in Photoshop so quickly where it would have taken me hours in the darkroom. And it gave me so many creative options, plus it let me change my mind constantly so I could go back and forth between options. I thought I was in heaven every time I learned something new.

2. Photshop can be HELL. If we didn't do things EXACTLY the way Photoshop wanted us to do them, we would get stuck for hours or days trying to figure out what it wanted.

We would try to follow the lessons step by step, eventually we would find that one teeny, tiny little step or piece of information would not be in the lesson and we would come to a screeching halt. We would become so frustrated because we wouldn't know what to do and something that should be so easy and quick to do would turn into frustratingly long wasted hours.

What we found out about learning from books is that we wouldn't know exactly where the lesson was taking us until we got to the end.

And a lot of times it's not where WE wanted to go so we were wasting a lot of time learning how the author wanted us to learn. But still not knowing how it applied to OUR situation.

We also went to seminars every chance we got and learned different ways to do things from different photographers. But being from a small town we didn't have a lot of opportunities to learn from other photographs.

We Loved When We Discovered How To Do Something More Efficiently And Effectively.

Saving time was really important to us because we didn't have a lot of it. Going to seminars and SEEING how something was done was very refreshing to us also. We tend to learn better when we can see it being done and we do it ourselves also.

Our brains were happier.

We have found out which techniques worked best for our situations.

Slowly and steadily we learned through more and more books, magazine articles, web sites, tutorials, and seminars. It all started coming together and now that we have opened our own photography gallery and studio we are learning how to apply everything we have learned to our business.

Just randomly click on a button to see if you can magically figure it out.
Click on the HELP button to see if the Photoshop Fairies will magically help you on your specific problem. Especially when you don't know what the problem is.
Go to a bookstore or online and hope you pick a good book out of the hundreds available that can teach you on your level and that you can understand easily.
Open up your book and start to read contents. Realize you don't know where to start so just start at the beginning. Get to the 27th step on how to do something when you realize you don't have the same options as what the book says you should. Start back at the first step to see where you've gone wrong until you have the same problem where you proceed to step number 1 again. Repeat over and over til you just can't take it anymore and you want to smash you computer to smithereens. Please don't do that. It's not yours or your computers fault. You just weren't told what problems you might encounter along the way and how to fix them if you do. It's usually something really stupid that will take you hours to figure out only to have the same problem happen the following week where you'll have some faint recollection of having been through this before and how it all seems so familiar but for the life of you you can't remember how you fixed it. Repeat.
Paste lots of little stickly notes on your computer and walls and desk so you'll remember how to do everything. Just make sure you don't lose any or do them in the wrong order.
Surf the web for tutorials on how to do 1 thing in Photoshop. Go through millions of pages to find what you want without being distracted. Open, wait for it to download, watch and listen to how you can change a color photograph to black and white in only 120 steps! Get frustrated half way through, find another tutorial and repeat. Get distracted and forget what you were looking for in the first place.
Give up and just let Photshop sit idly on your computer untouched for eternity vowing you will someday learn it.
Ask 5 friends how they do something and get 5 different answers each one telling you the way they do it is the best and only way.

After Eight Years Of Research And Learning - These Are Some Of The Benefits We Found Of Using Photoshop To Enhance Your Photographs

Since a lot of my images were on slides and negatives I first scanned them to make them digital images. Then after processing them in Photoshop and printing them on my own printer I compared them to the color and black and white prints I had created in college. I thought my original prints were very good back in my college days, but after comparing them, the digital prints were much better.

These Are Just Some Of The Benefits I Saw To Using Photoshop On My Landscape Images:

• They were sharper when I wanted them to be or softer when I wanted them to be. It didn't matter if I had used a filter or not. Some parts of the image, like the edge of a flower petal could be sharpened while leaving everything else out of focus.
• They had more contrast when I wanted them to or less when I wanted them to.
• The colors were more saturated or I could make them less saturated and give them a more old fashioned feel.
• Each image could be adjusted precisely in certain areas to bring out it's best qualities.
• The exposures could be precisely adjusted to make my whites more white and my blacks actually look black with a whole range of tones in between.
• I could adjust all the colors or just a few select ones to make them more true to life.
• I was in total control and could change my mind any time I wanted. I loved that!
• My black and whites could now look more sepia (brown toned) or more blue, whatever I felt like doing at the moment.
• I could print one image at a time and if I ever want to change anything about it I could.

I Have Never Been Happier :-)

I specialize in maternity and baby portraits at our studio so being able to consistently create beautful, emotional portraits is very important.

The Benefits I Saw To My Portraits Were Equally Amazing!

• The babies skin looks soft and pink
• Their eyes have such a dimension to them. They are sharp and clear and sparkle, you just can't help but be drawn into them.
• I can retouch skin without it looking plastic or fake. Everyone can look healthy and relaxed but still look like themselves.
• I can make their teeth a little whiter without overdoing it.
• I can create soft, romantic images of mothers cuddling with their babies or make them sharp and colorful and full of energy.
• I can now create beautiful senior portraits that look like they belong on a magazine cover! And I'm so proud to show off!!!

BUT....

The biggest benefit I found was that I could save the image while I was working on it and come back to it another time to finish it. I didn't have to spend my whole day in the darkroom having to finish a print so the chemicals wouldn't go bad.

And that's just the benefits of film.

Digital images captured on a digital camera are equally impressive.

By the way, in case you were wondering, here's some things you might not know...

Your camera CAN NOT create the same quality images you want that Photoshop can.

Your camera CAN NOT create black and white images as good as Photoshop can.

Your camera CAN NOT sharpen an image as good as Photoshop can.

Why not get the full benefits of your camera equipment that you've spent hundreds or thousands of dollars on? Having a good quality camera is just the beginning. ..using Photoshop to enhance your photographs is what you need to actually see results.

So this leads me to some simple questions for you:

There Is An Easier Way
For You To Learn Photoshop

But, like I said before, if you prefer to learn on your own like I did, there is plenty of information out there for you (and it's for FREE). If you don't mind sifting through it all to find what you want and if you already know which steps to do and in what order.

***Warning***

Also be very careful you don't damage your image if you are working on JPEG images! As you will learn in my Mentor Series if you do not know how to use Photoshop (or any digital imaging software out there) correctly you can damage your image beyond repair. Please, if you are learning on your own make sure that is the first lesson you learn.

However....

If you prefer to have someone (who's been where you are now) mentor you step-by step, without leaving anything out, from the beginning to the end in easy-to-understand lessons, where you will :

• thoroughly learn each lesson before moving on to the next,
• easily know where to find information if you forget how to do something,
• watch the videos to see me do the lessons on my screen, while you're working on your own image on your screen so there will never be any miscommunication,
• know that if you do all the lessons from start to finish that you'll end up with a photograph that you'll be proud of.
• Plus I'll send you weekly assignments for 12 weeks to help you step-by-step increase your confidence and improve your photography. At the end of the 12 week session you'll be able to enhance your photographs so well you'll be anxious to print them to show them off to everyone.

Then This Series Of Lessons Is For You

OK, so now that you have convinced yourself that learning Photoshop is the best way for you to create the photographs you want here's how we'll do it.....

1. You'll receive an e-mail from me each week with your written lesson and videos showing you how to do it and a photography assignment.
2. You will read through the lesson if that's how you prefer to learn while you are working on Photoshop, and/or watch the video of me doing the lesson on my computer. You will be able to make the video small enough to view so that you can work on your project at the same time.
3. I'll explain everything thoroughly so you will understand what you are going to be working on and why it's important. Also I will alert you to any problems you might encounter along the way and how to fix them.
4. Each lesson I'll explain the lesson and show you how to do them correctly. Then at the conclusion of each lesson I will give you your weekly photography assignment so you'll have a good photograph to work on the following week.
5. Each lesson I will be talking to you about the BIG PICTURE. Photoshop can get so detailed you might forget what you're trying to accomplish. I will be reminding you what your goals should be for each lesson to keep you from getting distracted.
6. I will also have you keep a copy of your original image before it was processed so you will have a reminder of how far you've come in such a short period of time. I will show you some examples of my "before" photographs, what mine look like after a particular lesson, and how it will look at the conclusion of the 12 weeks of lessons so you can see where you're headed.

(Every lesson you receive will teach you techniques to make your images the best they can be.)

It's That Simple!

Plus It's A Lot Of Fun Seeing Your Photographs Transformed Right Before Your Eyes

You'll just be amazed at how good your photographs will look.

(Give your images more drama. Let them tell a story. Find out how in Lessons # 4 and # 11.)

Here's Some Benefits Of Joining My
Photoshop CS4 Mentor Series:

• You'll learn not only how to do things, you'll learn in what order you should do them.
• You'll get to learn at your own pace-Even though lessons are sent once a week you can take as long or go as fast as you want. You won't feel frustrated or overwhelmed with too much information at once.
• You will learn all the steps to enhance a photograph whether it's a landscape, portrait, architectural, or anything else. All my lessons will work on all your photographs.
• You won't feel guilty for spending so much money on your camera equipment and not have anything to show for it.
• You will gain confidence as a photographer because you'll be taught by a professional who makes money selling his photographs and portraits.

{Now you must realize there are a lot of ways to do the same thing in Photoshop. I'll show you my way that I process my own photographs to sell in my gallery. Some techniques will give you great results where others will actually damage your photographs. I will let you know what not to do so you don't accidentally damage your images.}

I developed the Photoshop CS4 Mentor Series to teach you Photoshop the easiest way possible.

Every week for 12 weeks you'll receive an e-mail with a special download link for that week's step-by-step lesson. Included in the lesson is an assignment for you to complete so you'll make progress every single week.

Over the 12 weeks we'll cover everything you need to know to enhance your photographs from their original state to being print ready.

Some of what you'll learn is:

1. What settings you should set your camera to so there's less work to do in Photoshop
2. Will Photoshop be able to SAVE some of your problem photographs and if so which ones?
3. What computer equipment and accessories would help you improve your photography?
4. How to make the colors "POP" in your photographs.
5. How to get rid of distractions in your photographs.
6. What you have to do to your photographs before you can send them to a professional lab to be printed.
7. How to convert your color photographs into black and white or sepia (brown toned). No you do not just click the greyscale button.
8. How to retouch skin in portraits but still have them look natural.

And so much more....

Instead of simply publishing this information in a book like everyone else does, I'm making it available to you week after week in action-sized portions so you'll actually SEE results.

You won't be overwhelmed by too much information at once that'll clutter up your brain. What you need is a weekly "here's how you do it next" action step to complete. What you need is for someone to show you how to quickly get started and then keep teaching you week after week so you don't get stalled along the way.

(Adjusting the exposure, fixing the colors, dodging and burning, and cropping are just a few techniques you'll learn that will help your images be transformed from boring to exceptional.)

And that's exactly what I'm going to do
when you join my

Photoshop CS4 Mentor Series Program

(Just Think! In Just 12 Short Weeks You'll Have Photographs You Actually Will Be Proud To Display On Your Walls!)

As a member you'll receive~

One weekly lesson for 12 weeks in downloadable .PDF format and videos. (If you don't know what .PDF is I'll help you to set up the free software on your computer below).

You'll learn how to do one or two particular things in Photoshop that'll make a huge difference in your photographs each and every week.

Each lesson is strategically created in such a way that you'll see continual progress in your photography.

Each lesson is based on how I actually do my own work that I sell to the public in my gallery so you know these techniques are used in real life and gallery worthy (not just theory).