Adobe Photoshop CC – Essentials Training Course vs Adobe Illustrator CC – Advanced Training

Covers the full beginner Photoshop surface — layers, selections and masking, retouching, blend modes, type, filters, smart objects and export across roughly 10-12 hours and ~88-93 lessons. Reviewers consistently describe it as well-structured from easy to hard with no padding. Capped because the recordings predate several current Photoshop AI features (Generative Fill, newer Select Subject) and some panels have moved.

Daniel Walter Scott is an Adobe Certified Instructor and Adobe Certified Expert, an Adobe Max speaker with 15+ years teaching. He is the single most-cited reason to take the course — students repeatedly call him clear, funny, patient and genuinely passionate. Learnopoly names him "one of the best Photoshop tutors out there." The clearest strength of the course.

Effective Udemy sale price of roughly $15-19 (full list ~$100+ is rarely paid) for 10+ hours, 20-ish guided projects, lifetime access, downloadable exercise files and free updates. For a beginner Photoshop foundation this is among the strongest value-per-hour on any platform. The same content also lives on Skillshare and CreativeLive at different price models.

Project- and assignment-driven throughout rather than feature demos — reviewers single out the "fun practical tasks" and note the assignments gave them a start on a portfolio. Outputs are competent beginner pieces (composites, retouches, simple graphics) rather than finished client-grade deliverables, which is appropriate for an essentials course.

Teaches the everyday Photoshop workflow a junior designer or photo editor actually uses — non-destructive masking, layer discipline, retouching, export for web and print. Skills transfer directly to entry-level work. Ceiling is scope: this is foundations, not advanced compositing, colour grading or production-pipeline depth, and some newer AI tooling is absent.

Covers the full advanced Illustrator toolset — pen tool mastery, complex paths, advanced typography, colour theory, logo design, packaging, pattern design, and complex illustration workflows. The curriculum is dense without being padded; reviewers describe it as genuinely comprehensive for the intermediate-to-advanced level. The main gap is limited coverage of screen-first digital workflows (UI, web) relative to the depth given to print and vector.

Daniel Walter Scott is an Adobe Certified Instructor and Adobe Certified Expert with over 16 years of design experience. His teaching is praised across thousands of reviews as crystal clear, professionally paced, and attentive to the edge cases where learners get stuck. The Adobe certification is not cosmetic — it translates into accurate, current, and authoritative instruction on the tool.

Priced at $19.99 on frequent Udemy sale (the effective purchase price for nearly all students) for a comprehensive advanced course with real-world projects and lifetime access. At sale price this is the strongest value-per-hour advanced design course available on any major platform. Full list price ($100+) is never what anyone pays, which matters for how you should think about the Udemy pricing model.

Multiple real-world projects throughout — logo design, packaging mock-ups, pattern systems, complex vector illustration — rather than isolated exercises. Reviewers describe finishing the course with a small body of work they can use in a portfolio. Some exercises feel more like skill-drills than finished pieces, but the balance across the curriculum is strong.

The skills covered — pen tool precision, colour systems, typography workflows, file structure for print — are what working graphic designers and illustrators use daily. Reviewers in professional design roles describe the course as directly applicable to client work. The print and vector orientation limits applicability for UI/UX designers whose primary output is screen-first.