Adobe Illustrator Cs6 Classroom in a Book

As I approach the Creative Suite software one-by-one, I have bought different versions of instructional books to see which suits me best. This was my first “Classroom in a book” and I have just completed the lesson plan (the others I am looking at are the “Missing Manual” version for Photoshop and the “Visual Quickstarter Guide” for Dreamweaver). All in all I have to judge it as a positive experience: I knew nothing about Illustrator before and now I feel confident enough to start my own projects – Illustrator is a fantastic software for a variety of things. The time-plan given at the beginning of each lesson is more or less correct and you can comfortably fit in the whole book in a week, with two lessons per day. The analytical index at the end of the book will make it easy to jump to each specific topic as I need it and I have a very good overview of the scope of the software.
It took me a while, however, to warm up to the book. The “lessons” are basically sequences of instructions on pre-constructed and largely pre-digested images, where you have a “start” file containing more or less all material you will need and an “end” result to aim for. No explanation is offered as to why you are doing a certain operation, what is the larger purpose of it or which alternatives are possible (like all Adobe products, Illustrator is largely redundant). This goes on until about lesson 8, after which apparently the reader is deemed knowledgeable enough to manage a couple of explanations. At times, I felt like a robot currying out instructions without having any idea of why or because. This changes radically around lesson 9 (with some minor exceptions in the previous chapters), after which I not only started to appreciate some explanations around the various functions but also managed to move much faster through the lessons, also trying some alternative paths to the same result – and enjoying myself much more.
Overall, I can recommend the book for people who have no knowledge of the software, but only if you can manage to learn in a somewhat mechanical fashion for some time. For people who have already some previous knowledge it is probably not the best option.

Arrivato in ottime condizioni, sia il libro, sia il CD compreso nell’edizione.
La guida si compone di 15 lezioni di apprendimento da fare sul proprio PC grazie all’uso del CD-Rom (bisogna avere già installato, non solo Illustrator CS6, ma anche una versione di Photoshop per poter aprire alcuni file).
Dopo 3 capitoli introduttivi sul programma, si parte con le 15 esercitazioni che illustrano passo dopo passo, in modo chiaro e sintetico, i vari step per raggiungere l’obiettivo di ogni lezione, soffermandosi anche con alcuni chiarimenti riguardo l’uso dei vari comandi.
Il libro è in lingua inglese, ma non vi preoccupate, è comprensibilissimo anche da chi non è propriamente madrelingua! (Vi basta una conoscenza base della lingua, sullo stile “the cat is on the table” 😉 ).
Vi farà scoprire tutte le potenzialità di Illustrator –> CONSIGLIATISSIMO!!!
Buon lavoro a tutti! 😉

Una guida fondamentale per la comprensione del programma. Passo a passo ti porta a comprendere le potenzialità di illustrator grazie a spiegazioni semplici e immediate. Tutto a colori, cosa che non guasta affatto quando si parla di un programma di grafica. consigliatissimo!

The required textbook for my graphic design class is Against the Clock Professional Portfolio series, but that book is really geared for more advanced users. I am seriously considering dropping that course because the book is incomprehensible. However, in efforts to learn the program on my own, I purchased this. I can truly say that I am learning so much more using Classroom in a Book than the required text. It’s very step-by-step and hands on, which is great. However, I wish there were instruction explaining the “why” behind things; at times it feels a bit robotic. I also wish there were videos that supplement the lessons, but it is a goldmine compared Against the Clock. I do, however, like the fact that it is very step by step, with lots of illustrations, so I know exactly what to do and how to do it. The book is geared for the absolute newbie, which is great for me. When I finish working through all the projects in the book, I expect that I’ll have a good working knowledge about Illustrator, but to become more of an expert I’d need a second book. I love how chapter one allows you to experience various tools at a very basic level, and then later chapters would go more in depth.

I am convinced that if I tried to learn AI-CS6 without this book, I would still be struggling with the basics. I don’t know how the Adobe Creative Team does it differently from others, but I learned the features and techniques of AI-CS6 with a whole new level of comprehension.

Notes and Tips:
– Take your time. I completed lessons in 2-3 times the suggested durations. Sure, I could have raced through each lesson, but that isn’t the point. My objective was to learn AI-CS6 by taking the time to explore each lesson and experiment with the features. The lessons and examples are rich in content.
– Read the instructions carefully. Many of the instructions are specific where every word is important. Skimming the text doesn’t work.
– Each lesson has an initialization step to set AI-CS6 with a known default configuration (resets the essentials). This is nice because it allows the user to experience any lesson in any order or to refer back to any lesson.
– Many of the techniques (e.g., setting the fill color, re-sizing, managing layers) are shown using multiple methods.
– The examples are well-designed. It became obvious as I progressed through the lessons. The examples are so crucial to the book and learning AI-CS6.
– I bought the Kindle version of the book. As other reviewers have indicated, the link to download the files is located on the last few pages. I had no problems finding the fifteen zip files but the ‘Download All’ button didn’t work for me. Even with clicking the download button for each of the fifteen files, I had the files in a minute.
– The first example is titled ‘A Quick Tour of Adobe Illustrator CS6’ and introduces several of the tools and features using a sign post example. I had two reactions to this first example: 1) AI is an amazing software app for illustrations. 2) If the rest of the book is like this first tour of AI-CS6, then I am in way over my head. Fortunately, the fifteen actual lessons are very well-designed and instructive.

Great job creating an indispensable guide to learning AI-CS6!