Getting started --- best approach?

I have recently purchased Adobe Master Collection CS5 and after looking at several Adobe video tutorials on Photoshop I am overwhelmed. I am running it on both Windows 7 (64-bit) and Windows Vista (32-bit) platforms. I have used Corel Draw previously and it my first impression of Photoshop is that it has much more capability than Corel Draw. However, Photoshop has so many features that it very hard for me fully appreciated this features when examined individually.
I would appreciate greatly some guidance on how to attack Photoshop to get the most out of it and be able to use it in a near optimal way. For instance, I am interested to painting images that I have taken with a digital camera. Are there any good (complete) examples that show all the details of how to accomplish this with Photoshop? Are then any recent books on how to do this --- books that actually give the details?
Of course, I hope to expand my knowledge of CS5 and use some of the other software packages (e.g. In Design); but, I thought that it would be good to start with Photoshop. However, I am open to any suggestions (e.g. books, tutorial material, web links, etc.) as to how to procede on learning how to use this powerful collection of software.

Hi,
To get at the full depth of painting improvements in Ps CS5 you'll want to get a tablet and the 6D Art pen. You might also try going to Window> Workspace> Painting to set up your panels. Russell Brown recently did a tutorial on painting you can find here: http://av.adobe.com/russellbrown/ClonePaint_SM.mov
He also metions checking out these sights for digital painting.
John Derry:
http://expressivepixels.com/artists_brushes.html
Tim Shelbourne
http://www.timshelbourne.net/?p=274
Russell also has lots of tips here that are great for learning Ps.
http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html
regards,
steve

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