Martin Evening has updated his comprehensive introduction to Adobe Photoshop for the latest version of Creative Suite, CS4. Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers is a massive book. 704 pages, it weighs over 4 American pounds. You can exercise your biceps hauling the book around while you exercise your mind with Photoshop chops.

If the content in this book is the ultimate in topics for a workshop for digital photographers, it makes me glad I've never spent several hundred dollars for a workshop with the likes of Jeff Schewe or Martin Evening.

I strongly recommend Martin Evening's book on Photoshop CS4 for professional digital photographers. It's an excellent book. Well written, if a bit stodgy. Comprehensive. Much of the content of this new book with Jeff Schewe is available in Martin Evening's "Adobe Photoshop CS4 for Photographers" and with more detail.

I own more than one shelf of books related to digital photography. Advanced Digital Black & White Photography by John Beardsworth is oneof the few books that I am confident will improve the digital B&W photography of anyone who reads it, whether complete novice or seasoned photo retoucher.

Alien Skin Bokeh is a Photoshop CS3/CS4 plug-in filter for quickly adding selective focus (bokeh) and vignette effects to photographs. Digital photographers can add simulated bokeh effects for well-known lens. You can use the full range of Photoshop selection tools or the Radial and Planar tools in Bokeh to control just where its effects are applied.

Alien Skin Bokeh is also compatible with recent versions of Photoshop Elements and with Corel Paint Shop Pro X2.

Amazon has released Kindle 2, and you might wonder why I would write a brief review of it for a digital photography site.

Believe it or not, there are already more than four dozen popular books on Photoshop available in Kindle versions. For example, some of Scott Kelby's books are ready for download.

I was an early adopter of the Pocket PC, largely for the ability to download and read eBooks with Microsoft Reader. The Kindle experience is completely different from any eBook reader I've ever used.

Disclaimer: I have written guest articles previously for Michael Reichmann's site, The Luminous Landscape.

Guide to Camera Raw: New in CS4 is the latest instructional video by Michael Reichmann and Jeff Schewe.

I purchased three books last week on HDR photography. I reviewed Mastering HDR Photography by Michael Freeman earlier this week.

I strongly recommend High Dynamic Range Digital Photography by Ferrell McCollough. One strong feature is the HDR examples. Candidly, some are over the top in terms of saturation. But you will also find inspiring examples for a large number of contributing photographers.

Michael Freeman is an author I respect both for the quality of his technical writing and for his skill as a photographer. He is a well-known and popular author on digital photography, writing about digital B&W, HDR, photographic composition, night photography, etc.

There are some excellent choices for books on converting color photos into B&W fine art images. John Beardsworth's Advanced Digital B&W Photography and Michael Freeman's Mastering Black and White Digital Photography are favorites of mine for B&W conversion tips and techniques.

Mastering HDR Photography was the first book I purchased for my bookshelf on the topic of High Dynamic Range (HDR) photography. It was one of the first titles on the topic, and I have a lot of respect for Michael freeman's technical writing on digital photography.

I have mixed feelings about this book. The technical content of the book is good. It covers the important topics on HDR photography. It covers three major tools: Photomatix, FDRTools, and PFSTools. It also discusses the Photoshop CS3 tools for HDR.