Martin Freeman / Scott Kelby

Please let me know. Will be a week or two before I even think about finding time to press the buy button. I think I need to know layers and so if he makes it easy then it's the one for me

I don't have the Scott Kelby book you mention but I do have his new 'Channels' book and quite liked the way he lays things out.
The humour was tolerable up to a point but if you are at a reasonable level already and want to move up a gear I can personally recommend Martin Evenings' book.

It gets straight to the point without the corny jokes and having read it cover to cover I now use it as a reference book.

I will be buying Scott Kelbys' book though to see if I can pick up any straggling bits of information and maybe re-enforce the content of the Martin Evening book.

Here is a link to the Martin Evening book.

I suppose to a degree it depends which side of the pond you live too.
Martins English style is a little dryer whereas Scott is a little 'louder' and more motivating.

In my opinion, apart from his questionable sense of humour, Kelby's book is a bit slow. It seems at times that pages have to be filled with more steps than really needed. I guess that is good for people w/o any previous knowledge of PS.

On the other hand, I did enjoy Fraser & Blatner's "Real World Adobe Photoshop CS2". However, it does get confusing sometimes.

Also, for photogs, Chris Orwig/Lynda.com's "Enhancing Digital Photography with PS CS2" is also great.

I think I would prefer a more 'dry' style, it would suit me more! As you said Steve- you use it as a reference- once I have learnt it all that is exactly what I would want this book for.

Don't worry dave I will tell you once I get it! My birthday money is also helping me get a lowepro bag, polariser (sp?), tripod, grip, and possibly one of those split screen focusing screens for my zeiss!