A big part of good photography is good craftmanship. But judging from the entries to our competitions and from the photos uploaded to our photo reviews, many of our members could devote a lot more time getting better at the craft of photo editing.
A good number of our members have become proficient at using Adobe Lightroom and Lightroom Classic for their photo editing but have been reluctant to add Photoshop to their "toolbox"--even though it comes with the Lightroom subscription. And this reluctance results in not having the powerful tools at your disposal that only Photoshop can provide. These tools certainly aren't necessary to your success as a photographer, and you certainly won't need them for most of your photo editing. But when you DO need them, you'll praise the photo gods for having motivated you to learn them.
Too many photographers are reluctant to take on Photoshop because they think it would be too difficult or time comsuming. But only a small part of this huge program is designed for photographers, so all you really need is someone to show you what you need to learn and what you don't. And I think there's no one better for that than Matt Kloskowski. Matt offers an excellent, inexpensive course in learning only the tools within Photoshop that are essential to photographers, and I highly recommend it to you.
For a short video from Matt about the importance of learning the basics of Photoshop, go to https://mattk.com/photoshopsystem/. And to sign up for his course, go to https://mattk.com/photoshop-how-to.
And remember: The more advanced members of CCC will be happy to answer any questions you may have and coach you along as you learn and begin to use this amazing program.
Gerry
To add onto what Gerry has said, there is a 5 day virtual summit coming up (Feb 23-27) that is dedicated to Photoshop Fundamentals. You can watch the material from each class segment for free for 48 hrs. Matt Kloskowski that Gerry mentions is one of the instructors, but there are other really good instructors as well. Of course, the organizers want you to pay for a permanent pass, but I have found that I can usually glean what I need from the 48 hrs they give me to watch each class. If you have been reluctant to jump into Photoshop this might serve as an entry point. I would also guess that there will be refresher material in this summit that can benefit every skill level. Here is the link to signup for the Photoshop Virtual Summit: Foundations. https://davecross.krtra.com/c/ZTMWPN8DQO9c/w9VG
In addition to the "sign up" button, you can look through the agenda and abstracts of what will be covered in each class to help you decide which classes to watch.
Thanks for this addition, Mike. And yes, there should be a lot of great tips presented here. The only caution I'd add is that getting lots of different tips from lots of different people, within a short period, can become overwhelming. So if you're new to Photoshop, it would be much better to purchase a single course, like the one I recommended from Matt K, and take all the time you need to learn one aspect of the program at a time, at your own pace, with sample photos provided by the teacher.