Do you know if this books are any good?

Real World Camera Raw with Adobe Photoshop CS (Real World)
or
The Photoshop CS Book for Digital Photographers (Voices That Matter)

or can you recommend some?

Carlos.

The second book by Scott Kelby is outstanding! They also make a CS2 and Elements 4 book by the same name.

Matter of fact, every book I own by Voices That Matter is excellent!

I got the photoshop CS2 for Digital Photographers. I think it is good for learning the workflow. Easy to read and apply. The other one I got is Adobe Photoshop CS2 for Photographers by Martin Evening. I found this one to provide much for technical information. It is well rounded. Great reference !
Good Luck !

Thank you guys, I appreciate you input.

I will order it right now.

Carlos.

RW Camera Raw is essential for anyone that wants to try raw format.

The camera RAW book is good.
To summarize it in one quick post, set shadows to 0 and work from top to bottom (changing shadows last)...

• Select a pre-set white balance or manually change the Temperature and Tint so that the colour looks correct. This is why it's still handy to set custom white balance when shooting RAW. It should show up "as shot"
  
• Adjust the exposure bar. As you do this, you should see the histogram lean to the left and right... it's not shifting... but more like leaning to one side or the other.
  Try to balance the histogram so it's weighted nicely in the middle.
  
• Adjust the brightness bar paying attention to highlights and shadows.
  
• Adjust contrast so that the histogram fits nicely without escaping the dynamic range of the histogram.
  If you increase contrast, the histogram will spread from the center. Sometimes you'll want to reduce the contrast to avoid blowouts.
  
• Adjust the saturation if needed
  
• Go back and adjust the shadows. Increasing this setting will add some nice contrast in the low end.

Rich, you must have skipped the last 100 pages . In my opinion, the real strength of the book isn't how to use ACR - I think most can figure that out by themseves - it's how to integrate raw format into a streamlined workflow. There is a ton of info on how to automate many processes. Some of the information on creating and editing xmp templates is very useful.

I guess it all comes down to what kind of learner each of us is. I personally don't have a preference over learning by doing, reading, lecture, video, trial and error, etc., but I do enjoy reading books. What can I say, I'm nerdy. It's good advice to look to videos - there are good ones out there - if reading textbooks sounds as much fun as eating your veggies (I like those, too).

You're right... I skipped through that part because I edit each of my pics individually.
I don't shoot weddings or anything so I like to take the time with each image. I don't like automating things if I don't have to.

As I said, get the book for more information.. it's a good one.