
Ask HN: Whats the best way to learn Adobe Photoshop? - amerf1
If one was to use it to create prototypes of product designs in 2D
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sujon
Follow the guide along with infographics in your solution. including some
various paths, you may consider. [https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-best-way-
to-learn-Adobe-Ph...](https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-best-way-to-learn-
Adobe-Photoshop/answer/Md-Bakhtiar-Uddin-1)

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musgrove
If you're going to be creating prototypes, that's above intermediate, so
you're looking at a significant investment of time in any case. But Lynda.com
videos are helpful, but also look at Jesus Ramierez's videos, Phlearn, or the
videos available in Creative Cloud for PS. Photoshop is very powerful and can
be used for all sorts of things including video editing. There are so many
features that it's easy to get confused if you're trying to just do photo
editing, or just do product designs, for example. But I'd recommend diving in
and figuring out how to do what your goal is really well and not worrying
about the other capabilities until needed or time allows. Of course what it
will eventually boil down to is just spending time working in the program.
Lots of time.

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open-source-ux
There are lots of beginner tutorials on Photoshop on YouTube. You'll also find
many courses on subscription sites like lynda.com or skillshare.com.

However, if you are planning to use Photoshop for user interface design, I
recommend using a vector tool like Sketch (Mac only) or Affinity Designer (Mac
and Windows). Laying out interface elements is much easier in these apps than
in Photoshop. Both Sketch and Affinity Designer have features that target UI
design.

Although Photoshop has some vector tools, it's strength is in photo editing
and digital painting, plus it has a sprawling, clunky interface that is harder
to learn than the aforementioned vector tools.

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seanmcdirmid
Adobe has its own Vector tool in Illustrator.

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open-source-ux
The reason I didn't recommend Illustrator is that, like Phostoshop, it is
powerful and rich in features but also has a clunky and clumsy interface. It
is not as optimised or streamlined for UI design as newer apps such as Sketch
or Affinity Designer (IMO).

Illustrator is subscription-based too, unlike Sketch and Affinity Designer.
For example, purchasing Sketch gets you one year of updates, but if you don't
upgrade or renew after a year you can keep using the version of the app you
downloaded. This is different from Adobe's subscription model where the moment
you stop paying your monthly or yearly subscription fee, the app stops
working.

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seanmcdirmid
If your job is a professional visual designer, then Sketch and Affinity aren’t
going to cut it, which are more suited to wire frames than production vector
assets (and vice versa, illustrator sucks at wire framing). If you are just a
pure interaction designer, then you might be able to get by without an Adobe
CS subscription at all.

If you are wire framing, then being vector really has nothing especially to do
with it, it’s just that this is the default for block and drop style apps. In
that way, PowerPoint is vector also, but no one talks about refining Bézier
curves with it.

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open-source-ux
I disagree. For wireframing, vector tools are essential because of the ease
with which you can move and scale elements.

Sketch and Affinity Designer are perfectly capable of exporting production
vector assets - Sketch can even export CSS attributes. Sketch in particular
has a thriving eco-system of plugins.

An online search quickly reveals a plethora of Sketch templates with pre-made
UI elements for all operating systems and platforms: not wireframes, but high
fidelity mock-up designs.

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seanmcdirmid
Sketch is not a serious vector production tool, at least not in the same
league as Illustrator. It is proficient at wire framing, hence the name
“sketch.” There isn’t much difference from a wire frame and a mock up in that
context.

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tomduncalf
My partner learned Photoshop (and AutoCAD and SketchUp) using Lynda video
courses and was very impressed. I’m not a huge fan of learning by video
personally but on that sort of situation I think it makes sense!

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amerf1
Thanks a lot guys, I will get started with Lynda seems like a good place to
start

